Just Good Friends: Cheap Thrills, #5

By Mary B. Moore

After twenty-nine years working as a police officer in NY, my dad attended a call that shocked the country when the details were aired on the news. He'd done everything he could, but he'd been too late to save the daughter of a powerful businessman. 

After a lengthy trial and investigation, and with her killer in prison, her father had turned his focus onto the people he felt failed him and her—my dad and his partner included, and their families. After a close call, we decided it would be safer and Dad could focus on stopping Cevdet Gjorka if I wasn't there, so I started over somewhere far away from my family as Zuri Hadid. 

I've kept my head down and work at a hospital in Texas now, not saying more than I have to. Well, until the topic of jelly fish came up and I remembered a meme I'd seen online. Who can resist spouting facts that probably aren't true? Not me!

It was only meant to be temporary, but I love living in Piersville… and then there's Garrett Evans. He makes me want to get out and live again, instead of hiding all the time. Sometimes bad things bring new joy and light into our lives, right? 

That is until trouble found me.
∞∞∞∞
Leaving the military should have been a scary experience, but I couldn't say I felt that way.
Yeah, I've had some nightmares and I definitely have scars, but I'd come out of the Air Force with plans for my new civilian life, and it'd turned out better than I thought it would. 

Some of my scars weren't from the military, though, and if I'd known a jellyfish sting years ago would bring Zuri into my life, I'd have thanked it instead of calling it every name under the sun. But then, for some ungodly reason, I'd immediately friend zoned myself with her.

Fortunately, I prefer to think of zones as suggestions, not limits, and suggestions can be changed with a bit of persuasion and work, so that's what I set about doing. Well, after we'd both been stitched up in hospital after an unfortunate accident involving me and a door, with Zuri standing on a chair on the other side of it. It didn't break the ice per se, but it definitely broke the glass.

I never imagined that the kinds of monsters I'd fought against would follow me from my old life into the new one. These ones weren't terrorists from overseas, they were living on home soil with the power of money behind them who wanted revenge, and for people to feel the pain they were feeling. 

One thing is clear, though—when you get good in your life, you fight to keep it. Who knew a meme could have such an impact.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mary B. Moore
• Release date: Aug 5, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201434427

Book preview

PROLOGUE

ZURI

Ihated celery, but the diet I’d been following for three days extolled the virtues of the disgusting stuff, so I was doing my best not to be sick every time I bit into it.

Why did it have those string things in it?

Were they even digestible?

Did I really want a smaller ass that badly?

Even thinking about it had my stomach twisting, and the gag I only just held back was so violent, I knew I couldn’t do it.

I couldn’t eat anymore.

Deciding that throwing the stuff in the garbage was the kindest thing I could do to my body when it came to this diet—which wasn’t kind at all—I braced to get up when the door to the staff room slammed open, and a man dragged a pretty dark-haired woman in with him.

It might have been self-preservation given the circumstances behind my move here, or it might have been the fact I’d always been an awkward person, but I slammed my ass back down in my chair and tried to disappear into the wall behind me, doing my best to act like I was normal instead of like the anxious hooker I was inside.

This left me with just my phone and the green piece of Satan to focus on, though. Shit!

She’s worse than bad, the guy hissed. She’s like an octopus.

I didn’t want to do it, I truly didn’t. I wanted to remain invisible, but of course, that fucking meme I’d seen on Facebook when I’d first came in here on my break resurfaced in my brain, and out it came.

Did you know that the box jellyfish has sixty anuses? So if you get stung by one, you’ll end up with a scar with them on it for the rest of your life.

Shoot. Me. Now!

Way to go, you dork.

The man’s back and shoulders stiffened, then he slowly turned around to look at me, not looking at all surprised that I was in the room as I accidentally took another bite of the god awful vegetable. Maybe he had eyes in the back of his head—his gorgeous, silky looking, dark head.

Are you for real?

Tearing off another mouthful of celery with my teeth and unable to stop the grimace that followed it, I did my best not to look like I was close to shitting my pants as he skimmed me with his eyes.

Eh, I saw it on a meme, so I’m not sure if it’s true or not.

I was stung by a box jellyfish four years ago when I was on vacation in Indonesia, he replied, leaning down to pull up the leg of his jeans. It burns and goes red when I eat shellfish and seafood.

Leaning around the chairs, I looked at the scar as best I could, still chewing away and shuddering at how the strings in it kept pulling on my tongue.

It was when I swallowed it and felt them tug on the way down my throat, that I gave up. No celery ever again, and if the diet insisted on it, I’d substitute it with cucumber.

Throwing what was left of it on the table, I slid out of my chair and squatted down next to him, examining it more closely.

Huh, and I thought people who got butt holes tattooed on them were weird. Again, I told myself not to, but my finger was a traitorous bitch and had its own mind. It wanted to feel the scar on his leg, so it did. Do you think that’s an ass there? It looks different from the other ones.

Do y’all want me to leave you alone, or…? the woman who’d come in here with him asked, sounding like she was choking back a laugh.

This was error number two of the day: I’d not only failed at keeping quiet and going unnoticed, but I’d forgotten to be vigilant of my surroundings, too.

Almost as if he’d forgotten she existed, the man stood up straight, looking over his shoulder at her. You don’t leave my sight, hear me?

Saluting him, she smiled at me as I straightened up to my full height. Hey, I’m Rose Beauregard. I don’t think I know you?

Grinning widely, she held her hand out to me. Digging the last name. I’m Zuri Hadid, and I just started yesterday.

She shook and then released my hand with a friendly smile and gave the guy a nudge forward. This is Garrett Evans. Garrett, say hello to the lovely Zuri.

Hello, shooting her a glare, he mumbled. Thanks for pointing out the ass holes on my leg.

Bursting out laughing, I moved stiffly back to the celery and threw it in the trash. I love random facts, so if you ever want to win a quiz, shout me.

Little did I know, but the meme was going to create a friendship that I wasn’t ready for but that I wouldn’t have wanted to miss out on if I’d known before how amazing it was going to be.

He was hot. He was complicated. But Garrett Evans brought something into my fucked up life that made it tolerable again, almost like the last one and a half years had been a bad dream.

CHAPTER ONE

ZURI

Eight months later…

Throwing my arm out in the direction of where the alarm on my phone was screeching at me, I slammed my palm down, praying that the screen acknowledged I was aiming for the snooze button on it.

It didn’t.

Instead, the sound of something moving across wood, followed by a crash as it fell off the bedside table and hit the floor, sounded with the irritating noise still coming from it. There was also that telltale crack every person prayed didn’t mean a shattered screen when they had a phoney go dropsy moment.

I knew it meant at least one crack because apparently, I was a dick who needed to invest in an alarm instead of just replacing phone screens. It was a problem!

With a groan, I went to turn over to pick it up and silence it, but a sharp pain in my ear and heaviness attached to it stopped my head from moving.

The panic hit instantly. I worked at Piersville Hospital, and I wasn’t a doctor or specialist, but I knew that things happened all the time medically that we didn’t know about before… And a heavy weight and pain in my head—was it a stroke?

I’d never had a stroke before. What if this was what some people felt when they had one?

People could have a-typical symptoms with things, too, and that shit ended up in medical journals and papers that were released to hospitals. Those things always got discussed at length in the doctors' break room, who all claimed it had to be bullshit or a freak occurrence.

Oh my God, was I a freak of medical science?

I had the shittest luck in the world, always had, hence why I was now going by a name that wasn’t mine and couldn’t relax. Well, that wasn’t my fault, but it totally fit with my luck. So this being a stroke and me ending up the topic of a medical journal that doctors laughed at? Totally my luck.

More than likely, none of this irrational panicking would have lasted more than a minute if I hadn’t just have woken up from a deep sleep, by the way. But seeing as how I had, it stuck with me that bit longer.

Seeing as how my brain hadn’t woken up properly, though, I decided I needed to call for help, so I focused hard on turning over, wincing when the pain started again, and then stopped when it got too much.

This time when I moved, I got my elbows under me, bracing them on the mattress so that I could try and lift myself up—relieved when I realized I could move said arms—and pushed up with ease. The pain was still there, as was the heaviness on that side, but at least I was moving.

Being able to do that was good, right?

Sitting up fully, something hit my back, and other sensations kicked in, along with my common sense starting to come back online. And what was registering at that moment was something I’d never felt before in my life, almost like I had a gentle chimpanzee laying on my back.

Reaching around, I tugged on whatever was there and squealed when it pulled on my ear, because something was wrapped around the flower-shaped stud through the piercing in the cartilage at the top of my ear.

And, suddenly, it all made sense.

My new pillowcases had a top layer of pink fabric with cute shapes cut out of it, showing off a white layer underneath. They came with a matching duvet, and I thought they’d look cute in my bedroom. Apparently they weren’t copacetic with my piercing, though.

After some wiggling and squeals when I tugged too hard, I finally freed my ear from the stitching and flopped back onto the mattress, rubbing my face and breathing a sigh of relief that no one had witnessed it.

Even though it hadn’t taken long to sort out, I was exhausted again. Since I’d moved here, I was a slow to sleep—slow to wake up girl, so I usually only got four hours sleep a night because it took me all day to wake up. How weird was that? I was exhausted all day long, then as soon as bedtime came and I got comfortable, I was wide awake.

And that’s absolutely what I was blaming for this morning’s reaction.

I also blamed it for yesterday morning, when I’d shuffled through to the kitchen to make some coffee, with my eyes still mostly shut, and something had dripped onto my neck. Most people would probably have looked up, but because I’d only achieved just over an hour of sleep, I automatically pictured something out of Alien spitting at my back and had turned around to look for it.

Never, ever would I do that if one was near me, by the way, but for some reason it was pertinent to do it then.

I want to say I looked up after that, but I’d be lying. Badly. Try ten freaking minutes of doing it.

Finally, after a drop of water had landed on the top of my head, my brain decided to kick in, and I’d looked up, getting rewarded with a drip right in the eye from the massive orange and brown stain on my ceiling.

My initial thought had been, Jesus Christ, please don’t let that be from old man Albert’s toilet, but then common sense had hit, and I’d called the landlord to report a burst pipe.

Fortunately, it’d been a pipe attached to his cistern that was busted, not a sewage pipe, but I was now having to wait two weeks for my ceiling to dry out so it could be resealed and painted, leaving me with a Donnie Darko shaped stain above me when I went into the kitchen.

Now that shit woke you up when you saw it in the faint light as the sun rose. I swear to the gods of Hollywood, I thought I needed an exorcism in the apartment when I saw it the next morning, forgetting there’d been a leak.

From my landlords lack of fucks when I reported it, I was also fairly certain it wasn’t going to get fixed anytime soon. Two weeks he’d said, but I reckoned it was going to be at least two months.

So me thinking I’d had a stroke wasn’t exactly a rare occurrence. It also sadly wouldn’t be the last time I thought dumb shit like that, either.

My brain was like an old car, it took time to warm up so that it could run without scaring the shit out of the driver.

Picking up my phone, I looked at the screen and saw there was only saw a small crack on the corner of it. I could totally live with that.

Shoving it into the waistband of my shorts, I got up and shuffled through to the kitchen and started the coffee brewing while I considered what I could do about my piercing.

While I waited for the pot to fill, I unlocked my phone and started going through new labrets for it. I loved the daisy, but I loved the duvet and pillowcases more, so it’d have to go.

Through non-caffeinated eyes, I saw a cute little silver squiggle and ordered it, smiling when it confirmed it would be delivered tomorrow. I could hack one night where I was more careful about how I moved my head.

Well, if I was honest, I could hack a morning where I had to think wisely and remember that it wasn’t a stroke, just my ear attached to my pillow.

Two days later…

Is that a sperm in your ear? a deep voice asked beside me, making me grind my teeth.

It wasn’t the owner of the voice making me do it—lies, it actually kind of was, but just not as bad as I was doing it at that moment—but the fact that I’d been asked the same damn question repeatedly today.

Hell, my first patient had been the one to start it with, Girl, why’d you got cum on your ear? and then it’d just snowballed.

Granted, it’d taken me a moment to realize he meant one singular sperm and not a big wad of it—who’s to say what intoxicated patients get up to before you take their blood? It wouldn’t be the worst thing I’ve ever walked in on—and that it was my new earring, which looked like a swimming semen tadpole.

Pretty much everyone was pointing it out now.

Throwing a wrapper in the trash as I walked around Garrett, I mumbled, It’s a snake.

The title on the listing had clearly said that was what it was. Snake they said—cum said the rest of the world.

And it was c-u-m because people who didn’t want to ask the question crudely today had decided that spelling it out was more polite.

I’m not entirely certain a snake looks like that, jewelry or not. Did you check the description? Garrett asked, leaning around me to get a closer look at my ear.

Sighing, I pulled my phone out of my pocket, navigating to where my orders were and hitting on the spe… snake purchase.

Sterling silver, snake labret earring for cartilage piercings, I read, sounding as bored as I could.

Rolling his eyes, he gestured at my phone impatiently. Flick down to the actual description.

Yada, yada, yada, I mumbled, skimming over how excellent the quality of silver was, how cute the little serpent was, the fact it was hypoallergenic and whatever other shit they—

Oh, those lying, dirty little bastards.

Seeing I’d hit on what he’d expected, Garrett rocked back on his heels with a grin on his face. Well?

This little sperm will happily grace the ear of any wearer, regardless of their gender—

Awesome, a unisex cum tadpole, he snickered, holding his hands up when I glared at him. Please, continue.

The quality and amount of silver make it a hard-wearing—

Garrett snorting as he looked down at his feet, shoulders shaking, interrupted me.

—piece of jewelry. The flat back of the earring helps wearers with their comfort levels, as well as making sure it doesn’t get caught in hair or garments.

A breathless wheeze sounded this time, and I growled at how the description sounded.

This happy sperm will be the topic of conversation as he swims up the wearer’s ear, looking for a new hole to— I lowered my phone, hitting the power button without finishing. Know what, this is dumb. Okay, so I have a sperm swimming up my ear—

Technically, you have a hypoallergenic sperm in a hole in your ear, he pointed out, his eyes shining as he held back his laughter.

Ignoring him, I finished, But it could be worse, it could be… I broke off, totally lost on an example of how much worse it could be.

A vagina? A deep male voice offered from inside the room we were standing outside of, making both of us turn to look inside.

There, handcuffed to a bed with a bandage covering one side of his face, was the biggest guy I’d ever seen—in every way possible. Literally, and by that, I mean that he was butt necked, barrel-chested, and had considerable girth all over. He was also covered in filth and grime and had a beard that hit halfway down his stomach with leaves tangled in it.

Or a cock ‘n balls, he added, the one eye visible looking to the side of the room. Then again, you could put the cock first, in the next hole have the swimming cum, then have the vagina in the last hole. How many holes you got?

Uhh… not sure what he meant by that, I took a step back and to the side, trying to hide behind Garrett. Only minutes ago, he’d been a pain in my ass, and now he was my human shield.

Reading my confusion correctly and ignoring my obvious discomfort, he clarified, In your ear, girl.

My hand raised without volition to the body part in question, and my finger went inside my ear, like that answered the question.

Rolling his eyes, big neanderthal man growled, Piercings.

Now that made more sense.

Leaning around Garrett, who was standing with his arms crossed in front of me, his muscles rigid as I leaned on him, I held up two fingers, and then for good measure, said the number out loud. Two in each.

In my defense, I wasn’t sure if he could see the fingers. Maybe he was short-sighted?

Hmm, maybe just the sperm and vagina then, he suggested.

Sighing, Garrett reached and put his arm around my back and pulled me into him, still facing the man. As great as that suggestion is, maybe you shouldn’t make any more of them. Zuri’s here to take your blood for the doctor, not to discuss her piercings.

You were the one talking ‘bout how she had cum on her ear. I was just trying to find the silver lining, he pointed out.

Leaving them to argue, I left to get the request from the doctor and then grabbed what I’d need to draw his blood.

As I got closer to the door, I heard Garrett talking to the man and almost dropped what I had in my hands.

If you hadn’t driven your car into the woods and tried to drive through the trees, we wouldn’t be here, Garrett sighed, making my lips twitch at how normal he sounded talking about someone doing something that crazy.

Well, if you hadn’t been driving after me at such a high speed, I wouldn’t have tried to hide in the woods. Would I?

Ralph, your description matched one of a man who’d just run out of the store with a cart filled with condoms, lube, and tampons. That’s why I was trying to get you to pull over. Since we’ve been in here, we’ve been given close-ups from the security cameras of your face, and we’ve got footage showing you sweeping full shelves of all three items into the cart, running out the door, and a clear photo of your plates as it drove out of the parking lot.

Can’t help it if my woman gets horny on her period, and I don’t wanna knock her up. Anyway, if you look carefully, you’ll see I left a twenty on one of the shelves to cover it.

"I’ll repeat—full shelves. Whole shelves," Garrett argued, totally missing the two parts for the reason of the crime that struck me as a woman.

Firstly, period were nasty things, and a majority of women suffered when they had theirs. So, for a woman to feel horny and have sex during hers… I wasn’t sure if I admired her or wanted to shudder. The thought of anything going up my cooter while I was on mine really didn’t do anything for me apart from want to reach for some holy water.

Secondly, a woman couldn’t get pregnant during her period. The whole point of the period was to dispel the lining of the womb and unused egg from her body. I’m sure someone out there would argue about that, but so far, I hadn’t seen any evidence that impregnating someone on their period and having a baby was possible. Not that I’d looked for it, but now that I had it on my mind, I was going to have to look it up when I got home.

Cringing, I walked into the room, doing my best to look like I hadn’t been eavesdropping.

"Okay, I’m here to take some blood for the doctor who saw you.