Page 89 of Secret Shifters Next Door

BEAR EX NEXT DOOR

STEFF AND APRIL

My new neighbor is irresistible, but he’s already broken my heart once...

Being a fashion model had its perks until stalkers and a nasty tabloid scandal forced me to return to my hometown of Lily Valley. When I thought things couldn't get any worse, I meet my new neighbor—my old high school sweetheart.

Steff used to be my brother’s best friend before he shattered my heart into a million pieces. He’s just as stubborn and sexy as I remember. Unfortunately, he’s also responsible for my personal security while I'm living here.

With my stalkers closing in, Steff and my brothers are determined to protect me. That doesn’t mean it gives Steff the right to warn me off dating Ryland, the new guy in town.Steffsays Ryland isn’t what he seems. But I’m starting to suspect there’s another side to Steff as well, and it’s possible I never really knew him at all. I could be wrong, but I have a bad feeling that I’m cursed to lose my heart to him a second time...

PROLOGUE

APRIL

I couldn’t look away from the picture that was quickly burning itself into my mind. There I was, on the cover of the tabloid I’d bought at the corner market below my high-rise apartment. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been so pissed. Luca was such a piece of shit. How could he do this?

The cover of the tabloid showed me dancing on a table, topless. I could still remember that night. I’d been drunk as hell and out of my mind on molly. When Luca took the picture, it was supposed to be all in good fun. We’d all laughed, joking about what would happen if it ended up on the internet. Luca had laughed about it.

Then he went out and sold it.

It didn’t matter that my tits were blurred out—my face was easily visible. No way anyone wouldn’t recognize me. With fame, you had to take the good with the bad. The good? Money, travel, meeting celebrities and star athletes. The bad? Never having privacy, not being able to trust anyone, being recognized everywhere. It was a double-edged sword.

I leaned back against my leather sofa and ignored the ringing of my phone. I didn’t even have to glance at my phone to know it was my manager, Larry. He’d called me seven times already,but I needed time before I spoke to him. No doubt, he had a plan to try to spin the whole thing. I didn’t see how he could, though. Everything Luca had sold was true. How do you spin the truth?

I’d broken things off with Luca a few days ago, and it had been coming for a while. Several weeks before I broke up with him, I found out he’d been stealing from me. We were both models, but I wasmuchmore successful. It made my skin crawl to say it, but I was a household name. Luca? He was a pretty face who had been in three ads for hemorrhoid medication and one fashion show put on by one of those crazy eccentric designers. Luca had walked twice—once completely naked, then with a hat on… and nothing else. According to the designer, the clothing wasup to the imagination of the crowd. Needless to say, I was much better off financially.

Luca had forged my signature to grant him access to my bank account. By the time I realized what he’d done, over forty thousand dollars had gone missing. My accountant had figured everything out, and once I knew, I’d kicked Luca’s ass to the curb. That should have been the end of it. Instead, he pulled this shit. Two years together, and this was how he thanked me for not having his ass arrested.

The story that accompanied the pictures was just as bad. All the dirt that a famous supermodel could possibly have was in there, and everything was true. If anything really made me feel dirty, it was that. The sex, the drugs—all of it. Luca had gone full scorched earth. I was so fucking angry at him, but if I was being honest, I was angry at myself, too. Luca and I had gotten together right when I was spiraling. In my darkest time, he’d been the one to push me over the edge, filling me with drugs and negative thoughts. Larry had warned me to break up with him sooner, but I hadn’t listened.

As though he’d heard me think about him, my phone rang again. Tired of the incessant ringing, I answered the phone. “Hello, Larry.”

“This motherfucker. I swear to God I’ll have his balls hanging on my Christmas tree this year. I’ve got our lawyers working on getting the story pulled, full retraction, and we’ll sue Luca till he’s living in a fucking cardboard box down on Skid Row.” Larry’s voice was so loud it hurt my ear.

I couldn’t see suing him being very successful. You couldn’t sue someone for telling the truth. It was an invasion of privacy and shitty, but the biggest punishment he’d end up with would likely be probation or something. If that were the case, he’d laugh all the way to the bank. The tabloid had probably paid him a million-plus for the story and pictures.

Instead of arguing with Larry, I said, “Sounds great. Get his ass. Let me know how it goes.”

I ended the call and walked over to the massive window that overlooked Hollywood Hills. From this height, it was beautiful. Down there among the dirt and backstabbing? It wasn’t pretty. Los Angeles had given me a lot, and now it looked like it was going to take its pound of flesh as payment.

Over the next several days, the true fallout of the story became clear. The paparazzi had never hounded me as much as other celebrities, but now I couldn’t set foot outside of my apartment without someone snapping a picture of me. My building security had even had to tackle some photographer who’d dressed up as a maintenance guy to get a shot of me going into my penthouse. Then the gifts started coming—gifts from men all over the country, all sexual in nature.

The story Luca had sold delved deeply into my sexual tastes. S&M clubs? Check. Celebrity swinger parties? Check. Drug-fueled orgies? Check. It didn’t matter that Luca had talked me into them, I was the one who had gone along with it. It hadbeen fun at the time, and I’d liked some of because I’d gotten to explore my kinkier side, but it had been a desperate attempt to fill the hole deep inside, to pass the time and get my mind off the crippling depression that was suffocating me. So, now every guy with a dick was sending me gifts of leather harnesses, whips, and giant dildos.

I’d had to almost totally shut off my social media presence. The flood of messages was overwhelming. Everybody asked to be my Dom and spank me, or to be my sub so I could pinch their nipples with pliers or fuck them with a strap-on. There were more disturbing messages, too, which spoke about things that were, frankly, a little terrifying. It was all too much, so it was better not to go online at all.

I’d dealt with stalkers before, although I wouldn’t classify the harmless ones as stalkers. Those were the ones who were lonely and didn’t know how to talk to women, so they latched on to anideaof a woman like me. They’d send me love letters and flowers, but when I didn’t respond, they’d give up. Others were more intense, like the guy who’d actually tried to break into my house in Malibu. He’d have been successful if not for the off-duty cop out for a jog who spotted the guy climbing my fence. Then, the woman who was adamant that we were meant to be together and kept showing up at awards and fashion shows, asking me to marry her. She’d had a crazy look in her eyes, and Larry got a restraining order against her. As scary as those experiences were, some of the people trying to contact me now were terrifying. It was like once the story broke and people thought they knew what kind of woman I was, the real psychos came out of the woodwork.

It made it difficult to go out and enjoy myself. All my food was ordered in, all my shopping was done online. The thought of running into one of those people out in the street terrified me.What if they didn’t take no for an answer? What if things got out of hand? It kept me awake at night.

Larry was also driving me crazy. He was trying his best to help me, but dealing with him just added to my stress. I was completely sober, something which had been a rare occurrence in the last seven or eight years, but my mental health was actually getting worse. Without the dulling blanket of alcohol and drugs, my whole life was more painful.

I wanted to be safe. I wanted my parents, but they were in Texas. A few years ago, I’d bought them a house there, on the ocean, then moved them out there and set them up for an early retirement. They’d sent me a few texts, none of which were related to the news, but I knew they’d seen. Mom and Dad were probably subtly trying to check if I was all right without coming right out and asking.

After a couple of weeks, I finally got up the nerve to call them. As the phone rang, I wondered how they would react. Surely they’d seen the news and heard all the terrible things I’d been doing with my life. It made me so anxious that I almost hung up before they answered.

On the third ring, my mom answered, “April?”

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