Good Girl : An Enemies-to-Lovers Roommate Romance (Alphahole Roommates Book 2) Read online

  Good Girl

  Alphahole roommates series

  Book 2

  A

  contemporary

  enemies-to-lovers romance

  By

  DD PRINCE

  Copyright: 2021.

  by DD Prince

  http://ddprince.com

  Cover Design: DD Prince and Haelah Rice Covers

  Cover images: Shutterstock.

  Sign up for DD Prince’s free newsletter to get notified of upcoming book releases - http://ddprince.com/newsletter-signup/

  ***

  All rights reserved. This book may not be copied, duplicated, stored on any retrieval systems, such as on a file server, posted online, or shared by file transfer without the permission of the author. Only brief quotations /excerpts can be shared for review purposes.

  Book piracy hurts authors. Please show your love for books by buying or subscribing through channels that support authors’ rights. Thank you!

  This book contains mature language and sex. It is intended for adults.

  This is a fictional story, the product of the author’s imagination.

  Good Girl

  Alphahole Roommates 2

  You met Austin Carmichael in Alphahole and he seemed like a great guy, right?

  He is. But when he gets pushed and has to deal with one thing after another, after another… apparently he can get a little testy.

  And like his brother Aiden, this means he can act like a bit of an alphahole, too.

  Austin has to spend some time in New York and finds himself with a new roommate.

  And the circumstances around their first meeting – instant hate.

  Though… with two hot, young, single people living in close proximity, things are bound to be interesting. Especially when Austin finds the stories she’s writing about him on her computer.

  He’s completely unprepared for how interesting.

  ~~~

  Jada:

  I’m a nice person. I’m a good girl, I swear. I just met Austin at the worst possible moment. My life has never sucked harder.

  He’s got the complete wrong impression about who I am and everything I stand for.

  I might be a good girl, but, I’ve found a stubborn streak. And he’s been such a jerk to me that I’m determined to rock my job and be 100% professional. If only I could stop myself from writing down my fantasies about the growling, angry, sexy grouch.

  And then one day, I come in and find Austin reading something on my laptop.

  ***

  Best experienced AFTER Alphahole.

  Dedication:

  To all the hot sauce lovers who wanted more.

  And…

  To all the readers who want to be good girls for their alpha.

  In loving memory of Koopa the Mediterranean / Greek tortoise.

  1

  Austin

  “We’re getting married on the beach at sunset,” Aiden tells me. “Carly couldn’t decide between the beach and the rainforest, so to decide, we,” he leans in closer, “made a game of it.”

  “A game of it?” I ask before cutting into the deep-fried burrito on my plate, and then it hits me – what my brother is doing.

  “Yeah,” Aiden grins and I know by his body language that I do not want to know the details of that game.

  I dredge my forkful of burrito in salsa and sour cream, avoiding the mound of guacamole the waitress neglected to make sure I didn’t get before shoving it in my mouth.

  Aid waits.

  I continue chewing, ignoring his expectant stare, the smirk. He’s patiently waiting for me to ask questions about this ‘game’. But I know better. My brother has no problem telling me all about his sex life. In detail.

  Most men I know, myself included, don’t get explicit about their sex life with their friends or brothers. Aiden does.

  And while I’m not all that forthcoming with details of my own sex life, thanks to loose lips while drunk a while back when I was wallowing over what happened with a girl, he now knows more about my recent sex life than necessary, including that I like little games with girls I’m with. I regret it, because now he uses that fact in an effort to bait me into letting him give me details about his sex life.

  Whatever games he and Carly get up to - I don’t wanna know. I even tried ratting him out to his girl at a family dinner, figuring she’d get angry about his locker room talk about her and tell him to stop.

  She got outraged for all of three seconds before he leaned over and whispered something in her ear that made her eyes go glassy as she leaned into him. Aiden brags about his creativity in getting her to forget being pissed at him.

  They haven’t been together that long and are already getting hitched. He proposed last week and are getting hitched in a couple days.

  In fact, I asked her out not long after she moved to our San Diego head office. But it became clear real quick that Aiden had his eye on her and wanted me to back off. He very nearly fucked it all up in a way that seemed beyond repair, but a few months after he fixed things, he locked that down with an engagement ring and a lightning-fast destination wedding plan.

  Too bad. She’s my type.

  But of course I backed off, because it was quickly clear they had something – even if it looked to everyone like she hated his guts.

  And good for Aid, because him getting involved with Carly Adler made a huge difference in my brother.

  I don’t believe people will change for love, but I do believe love can bring out the best in a person. Aiden is a prime example of this.

  My brother is someone I’d have had pegged as a confirmed bachelor who’d wait until he was pushing sixty to tie the knot, figuring he’d then marry a twenty-five-year-old with fake tits who could play nurse and later nurse him in his old age.

  Carly came along, completely different from the women my brother usually went for and it was the beginning of some changes. For Aiden and frankly our whole family.

  Him falling for Carly brought him back to us where he’d been doing his best to keep his distance for years.

  And it sounds cliché but it’s true. He’s still Aiden, but with Carly - he’s a slightly better Aiden.

  There’s been a lot going on with our family the last few months including some hard truths to face as well as hard changes, but also some changes for the better.

  As for me, I’m still single. I’m single and too busy to do much about it. But truthfully, I’m probably ready to settle down, too.

  The family business is growing, we’re all making money with that and our own private investments, and despite the whack of drama we’ve dealt with lately like health scares with Dad and legal drama for our mother with a DUI that went viral when she slapped the arresting officer, things are good.

  The legal drama caused a public stink, a memeable one that resulted in her being the poster rich bitch and the punchline in a lot of jokes, a rehab stint for her, her and my father splitting up, and to top it off, Dad getting treated for prostate Cancer amid all that. Him getting treatment has meant me and Aid have had to step up and take on more responsibilities.

  Dad should’ve taken a leave of absence; he hasn’t. The thing is, too, Dad had a heart attack not that long ago. He’s trying to still be Quentin Carmichael, workaholic, but he’s dropping balls all over the place, and my brother and I have been on clean-up duty.

  When I do get down time, I don’t have the patience to navigate the bullshit of dating. Because it feels like bullshit trying to figure out what’s real versus what’s under a f
ilter or flat-out lies. To say I haven’t had a great experience with the fairer sex lately is an understatement and my sister Adele tells me I’m on the verge of turning into a woman-hater. She worries about me going like Aiden used to be.

  I don’t want to hate on women, but I’m tired of the games, tired of trying to look for truth through the filters people wear these days, tired of the bullshit.

  When Aiden’s wedding is over, I’m even considering using a matchmaking service to take the legwork out of it for me. A service that at least partially vets them. That does background checks. Personality tests. Because I’m sick of hoping for something different, only to be served with more garbage.

  I’ve played the field. I’ve had fun. I’ve dealt with girls who are gold diggers. I’ve dealt with girls trying to get me jealous to make me stake my claim with them when it was a) just too soon for that and b) done in a way that let me know the girl was not worth my time.

  I’m watching my parents’ marriage fall apart for most of my life, but my sister has a solid marriage and now Aiden is getting hitched. I do not plan to be the forty or fifty-year-old guy just having kids. I hope to be a dad in the next three or four years. A dad who can coach, who’s young enough for the kids to play catch with. Not some old father who parents from his recliner. I plan to be a much more present father than my workaholic dad has been and to marry a woman much more hands-on with family than my mother was.

  The Carmichael kids might be privileged materially, but if it weren’t for having one another and being raised by an amazing nanny, we’d be entitled shitheads.

  Okay, so Aiden can be a bit of a shithead at times, but under it all he’s a good guy. His temper is on a hair trigger and he’s stubborn. The guy thought our father wasn’t our biological dad and sat on the evidence for a year being miserable instead of opening an envelope that would give him answers. Turned out he was wrong, Dad is Dad. Aiden’s heart is bigger than he’d ever admit – his fear was so big he’d rather worry and not know than have an answer he didn’t want.

  I’m the sort who wants to know. Tell me bad news as soon as possible so I can figure out how to deal with it. As a numbers guy, I want details and want them fast so I can look at the possible repercussions. And I’m cool as a cucumber most of the time. It takes a lot for me to blow my top, though when it happens, it’s a volcano.

  “You wanna know how we decided?” Aiden tries.

  “I really don’t.” I stuff more burrito in my mouth.

  “I did this thing, where…” He’s leaned in closer and I wish I had extra burritos to stuff into my ears.

  “Don’t,” I warn. “I haven’t got the stomach for it.”

  “Bro,” Aiden retorts, “You’re putting shit in your mouth right now that’ll have you sharting your pants if you don’t make it to the can fast enough. I think your stomach can handle this.”

  I swallow what’s in my mouth. “So, I don’t have the dick for it right now. I’m in a dry spell, brother.”

  He smiles. “Carly talked to that Meryl chick. She says she thinks she can make it to St. Kitts for the wedding. Carly sent her a plane ticket and booked her a hotel room at the resort. Maybe you two can hook up again.”

  I roll my eyes, hard.

  “Doubt it.”

  “Maybe that’s why she’s going to the effort. To see you again.”

  I take a sip of my Coke and shake my head. “Doubtful.”

  “What happened there?”

  I stuff more food in my mouth, so I don’t have to speak – still don’t wanna talk about it. I don’t wanna think over how me and that girl spent that night together. Don’t want to remember how it was one of those rare nights where you feel like you really connect with somebody. It was the kind of night that feeds romantic comedies. And it was just more bullshit, obviously, because she ran back to the Philippines without saying goodbye. No, saying goodbye, but doing it after she got home. Via email.

  I didn’t even read it. It said “Sorry” in the subject line and I deleted it without reading it.

  Before she left, she talked about how stuck she felt in her life and then went off and did exactly what she said she didn’t wanna do – go back to get engaged to a guy because it was expected of her.

  Things clicked with us. We played a ‘what if’ scenario out, deciding after a few drinks to pretend she had no responsibilities, no crushing need to please her family, only the need to make herself happy, and we talked all night about the things she’d do, the life she’d have if she had nothing but her own happiness to worry about.

  She was a virgin. She kept her virginity that night, but we made one another come. And the intimacy involved in that felt like a gift that she gave to me - her first orgasm. Not just with another person. Period. She was so innocent and sweet that she admitted in the dark, after I made her come with my fingers and she cried into my mouth that she’d never even made herself come. She got close once and stopped, feeling guilty about it. The way she was raised, she thought it was wrong to not save all of it for marriage.

  She clumsily jacked me off until I came on my stomach and then cried in my arms telling me how beautiful it was, how she’d never felt closer to another person.

  I was sure she’d want our thing to continue. Sure we’d figure it out somehow.

  She then dodged me and flew home, quitting her job and leaving my team in the lurch as well as quitting me.

  I was ready to fly there and confront her about being entitled to her own happiness, ready to talk to her parents about how I could not only provide for her but for them too - but I canceled my plane ticket when I got the ‘sorry’ email.

  A fucking email.

  Cowardly.

  It stung.

  It stung because it was obvious I was her walk on her version of the wild side.

  But I saw her with me. I dug the idea of a partner in life being someone who gave a shit enough to work overseas and send all her money home to her family. I wanted a girl who felt strongly enough about virtue to make it count.

  It’s not that I need to marry a virgin, it’s that I dug the potential idea of it that night with her curled up to me, being sweet and shy and trusting.

  She was smart, attractive, witty, demure, a little nerdy, and a math junkie and chess player like I am. Making her purr like a kitten for me knowing she’d done it for nobody else meant something.

  Fuck it. Her loss. I have no shortage of women that want to spend time with me, even to get serious with me. It’s just that I’m particular about who I spend my time with.

  I’ve been on a couple dates the last few months since she’s been gone, even fucked a couple women, but it was all empty to me.

  Aiden raises his hands defensively. “Fine, I won’t tell you.”

  Our father joins us, looking frazzled.

  Aiden rears back. “You pull an all-nighter?”

  Dad shakes his head. “No, why?”

  “No reason,” Aiden mutters, stuffing food into his mouth and giving me a look.

  Dad looks rough.

  “Sorry I’m late, boys.” Dad sits and beckons the waitress over with a finger crook that she’ll probably take as chauvinistic or at least elitist – and she’d be right about the second.

  My father is a good man, but he’s a workaholic who lives by the creed of time is money and he’s not exactly the sensitive type. He’s used to ushering orders and having people follow them. If he’d gotten a dollop of guacamole on his plate that he specifically asked them not to include, he’d have not only sent it back but given the server a speech that would include some adage like, “If you’re gonna be a shoemaker, be the best damn shoemaker in town.”

  She rushes over and takes his order. Then without thanking her, he immediately launches into telling us more about what he wants. That’s why we’re here. He called this lunch, but then fifteen minutes after we’re here, Aiden sends him a text to ask if he’s running late and he replies that he’s on his way.

  We don’t bother to po
int out it’s obvious Dad forgot. He didn’t tell his assistant about the lunch or she’d have made sure he came.

  His memory has been off lately. Not only has he endured a lot with fighting Cancer, but his life has also been upended since he and our mother split. He tries to hide it, is shit at it, but we don’t bother to point it out. He doesn’t need that.

  We’re trying to be there for him where work is concerned.

  As for family otherwise, Adele hosts a bi-weekly family dinner and Dad usually comes.

  “Austin,” Dad pipes up, “I need you to spend a couple months in our New York office. I want you canning Bassell as soon as we’re back from Aiden’s wedding. Guy’s a bonehead, his numbers are down, and I got a call yesterday from Blake leading me to believe Bassell’s aligning with Franklin. He’s either feeding them information for kickbacks or getting ready to jump ship. He has a non-compete clause, right Aid?”

  “Yeah; of course.” Aiden used to run that office and he hired Jim Bassell.

  My jaw drops, and then tightens. The first, not because Dad thinks Bassell is a bonehead, he is, but because he wants me in New York.

  “Need you to clean up there,” Dad continues, “He’s made a mess of things. I want you to figure out who else needs to go. My guess: three quarters of that office. We’ve had four people quit in the last three months, two of them gone to competition, one to Franklin and we’re gonna sue.”

  Aiden makes a sound of agreement.

  I blow out a long exhale.

  I don’t wanna spend months in New York. As far as I’m concerned, the big apple is rotten with a worm in the middle. That my father wants me to be the one on clean-up would normally be a surprise since it’d be a job he’d give to Aiden, but obviously he’s not going to send Aiden when the guy is about to get married because Carly would have to go too, and she has her hands full here.

  The New York office was my brother’s ‘baby’ until he moved back around half a year ago and moving here, we promoted another staff member to run it, but he left not long afterwards to start his own business and Bassell was the most senior guy left.