Perfection (Neighbor from Hell 2)

"After you," he said, gesturing once again towards the shower.

With a small sigh she pulled her shirt and panties off and tossed them on the hamper and stepped into the shower. "We're just talking, Trevor. Nothing more and I'm only going along with this because I need a shower and I don't want to wait an hour for the water to heat up again."

"Whatever you say," he murmured in agreement as he stepped in behind her.

She stepped beneath the shower spray, already cringing at the prospect of her stitches stinging. When they didn't, sting that is, she felt herself relax and enjoy the hot water. She felt the tension leave her body and almost sagged with relief. The only thing better would be a bath, but she wanted to get clean more than she wanted to relax.

"Step back," Trevor murmured as he gently gripped her shoulders and pulled her back until she was leaning against his chest and halfway out of the water. "Close your eyes."

She was about to argue, but decided to save her energy. They had a lot to discuss and probably argue and she wasn't about to start over something so petty. Besides, the man had some very talented fingers and she'd always loved the way he took care of her.

When he started massaging shampoo into her hair she'd barely been able to bite back a moan of pleasure, but she hadn't been able to stop herself from sagging back against him. Without a word he put his arm around her to support her while he continued to massage shampoo into her hair. When she felt the hand on her stomach gently caress where their babies were she nearly cried at the sweet gesture.

Five minutes later she felt refreshed and more than ready to face what needed to be done. She just wished she knew where to start.

"We probably should talk," she said, hoping he'd start them off so that she had some idea of what he was thinking. Other than apparently being happy about the baby, well, he didn't know they were having twins and she should probably tell him at some point, but for right now she needed to have some idea of where he stood.

"Okay," he said, reaching past her to shut the quickly cooling water off. "What do you want to talk about?"

She should have known it wasn't going to be easy, she thought as she stepped out of the tub and wrapped a large fluffy towel around herself. As much as she would love to put this off and go drown her sorrows in a pint of ice cream, and yeah she could do that and not feel guilty about it now, she needed to get things settled between them so that there were no misunderstandings. She also wanted to be able to say that they were friends since the thought of not being able to tolerate each other wasn't exactly helping her stomach.

"Okay," she said, deciding that this conversation was probably best held in the bedroom where she could get space. She walked into his room and did her best to stay away from the bed while she wrapped her arms tightly around her body for comfort, "This is probably where I should tell you that I'll be moving out."

"What else?" he asked, barely looking at her as he dried off and pulled on a pair of boxers and jeans.

"The arrangement is over," she said, a little hurt that he hadn't at least argued about her leaving. Not that it would have made a difference, but it would have been nice to know that he at least liked having her around.

"I know. I came to the same conclusion the other day," he said with an indifferent shrug.

"Oh," she said, feeling like an idiot. Of course it was no big deal for him. This had never been more than an arrangement for him and now it was over and true to his word he was walking away without a care. Granted neither one of them had predicted that they'd be ending this with a pregnancy, but it was over nonetheless.

It was fine. More than fine. She'd known coming into this thing that there wouldn't be a future. She could handle that. It was more than fine with her, she thought as she contemplated storming over to him and kicking him in the shin for breaking her heart.

"Then I guess there's not much else to discuss right now," she said, deciding she'd tell him about the twins later. Right now she wanted to go feel sorry for herself in the privacy of her own home.

"I'll just be going then," she said, gesturing towards the door.

"Okay."

"Well, thanks," she said lamely, "for taking care of me and everything."

"Not a problem," he said, giving her his back as he pulled a shirt on.

"Okay then, bye," she mumbled, heading for the door and wondering just how long it would take for her broken heart to heal and surprising herself by not regretting a single moment with him.

Of course the little bonfire she had planned for his Yankees shirt would probably make her feel marginally better.

Chapter 29

"You son of bitch!" Zoe yelled.

"That didn't take her long," Trevor noted, heading downstairs at a snail's pace as he did his best to bite back a huge shit eating grin.

"What the hell is this?" Zoe demanded as she stormed back into his apartment, waving a piece of white paper in the air.

"Your eviction notice, what else?" he asked in a bored tone as he headed for the kitchen.

"You can't evict me!"

"Looks like I just did," he said, gesturing to the paper.

"There are procedures you have to go through first. You cannot just post an eviction notice to my door and change the locks!" she snapped, slapping the notice on the kitchen island.

"True, but going through the courts to get you evicted would take too much time and money. I figured it would just be easier to leave a notice and change the locks," he said, before adding with a one shoulder shrug, "and cheaper."

Her eyes narrowed on him dangerously as her face took on an interesting shade of crimson. She noticeably took a deep breath to calm down and it probably didn't help when he grinned. She was just so damn cute when she looked ready to kill him.

She stuck her hand out towards him in silent demand. "There's no need to evict me since I already told you that I'm moving out so give me a copy of the key," she said evenly and he could tell by the way her eyes kept darting down his leg that she was thinking about kicking him.

"I'm sorry, Zoe. I just can't do that. I'm already using it for storage," he said, wondering how much longer it would be until she gave into the need to attack him.

"You're using it for storage? How the hell can you do that with all my stuff in there?" she demanded, her voice rising as her little hands curled into fists by her side.

"I needed the space," he said with a shrug.

"For what?" Did her eyes just dart to the butcher block?