MR. RIGHT AND THE CRAZY TOMBOY

MR. RIGHT AND THE CRAZY TOMBOY --- CHAPTER ONE – COFFEE, COLLISION, AND CURSES Jayda Brooks didn’t believe in fate. Fate didn’t cover overdue hospital bills, fix secondhand sneakers with soles threatening to split, or keep a roof over a frail grandma’s head. Fate wasn’t what you waited on in a city like New York—it was what ran you over while you were busy trying to stay alive. And as she jogged down 48th Street, clutching a steaming cup of coffee and her last five dollars, fate came barreling at her in the form of a six-foot-something, thousand-dollar-suit-wearing, Bluetooth-barking businessman who slammed into her so hard, her coffee launched straight into his chest. The cup hit the blazer. The blazer soaked. The man stopped dead in his tracks, looked down slowly like he couldn’t believe what had just happened, then up at her like he’d just been stabbed. “What the hell?” he snapped, his voice dripping with polished entitlement and rage. Jayda stared at the spreading brown stain on his blazer, took in the cufflinks that probably cost more than her entire monthly rent, then met his glare without blinking. “Oh, I’m so sorry,” she said, deadpan. “I didn’t realize gravity was your enemy today.” His eyebrows lifted as the crowd on the sidewalk flowed past them, indifferent. “Are you seriously blaming me for this?” “I didn’t trip over myself,” she bit back. “You walked into me like you own the whole damn sidewalk.” He stepped forward, towering over her, eyes flint-sharp, mouth pulled into a tight line. “Do you have any idea what this suit costs?” “No, but I have a strong feeling you’ll cry about it in therapy.” That seemed to stun him for a second. Then his lip curled. “Typical. No accountability.” Jayda’s blood boiled. She had been up since 4:30 a.m., rushed from Luigi’s to the campus library to a quick run for her grandma’s meds, and now, all of a sudden, she was supposed to care about some uptight Wall Street reject and his designer wardrobe? She took a step back, tore the receipt off the cup, and slapped it against his damp blazer with a smirk. “There. You’ve been served.” Then she walked off like she hadn’t just started a war with a man who had the power to ruin lives with a phone call. He stared after her, stunned into silence, drenched in Colombian roast. Jayda didn’t look back. She couldn’t afford to. Not when rent was due in two weeks, her financial aid was dangling by a thread, and Grandma Louise needed dialysis three times a week. So she kept moving, wind pushing her hood back, the city howling like it knew her name and didn’t like it. By the time she stepped back into Luigi’s Pizza & Wings, her third job that week, her hands were shaking, not from nerves, but from exhaustion. “Yo Jay!” Mario shouted from behind the counter, tossing a receipt her way. “Penthouse delivery. Rush job. Double tip if you make it in under thirty.” She groaned. “Who even orders wings to a penthouse?” “Rich people who don’t know how to eat normal food. You want the tip or not?” She snatched the boxes and stuffed them in her thermal bag. “I’ll take the cash. Keep the attitude.” The cab ride to Midtown felt like crawling through traffic inside a sardine can. When she arrived at Knight Towers, a silver monolith that scraped the clouds and looked like it belonged to a Bond villain, the doorman gave her the kind of look that said you don’t belong here, but he pressed the penthouse button anyway. The elevator was a coffin in chrome. No music. No mirror. Just silence and numbers blinking red as she ascended fifty-one floors into a world that didn’t know struggle. She knocked once. Twice. The door opened. And there he was. Same face. Same steel-gray eyes. Same cold jawline and tighter blazer. This time, dry. For now. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he muttered. Jayda blinked. “No way. You live here?” “I built this.” “Oh, congratulations, Mr. Monopoly.” He stared at her like he was still trying to figure out if she was real or just the devil wrapped in a hoodie. “You’re the delivery girl.” “And you’re still rude.” He looked at the pizza boxes like they offended him. “You expect me to eat this?” “No. I expect you to tip me so I can go feed my grandmother who actually deserves to eat.” Something flickered in his eyes. Then he stepped aside, cold and silent. Jayda walked in like she owned the place, partly because she hated showing fear and mostly because the walls were too clean for her comfort. Sleek furniture. Glass walls overlooking a skyline that mocked her. Silence that cost millions. She handed over the boxes. He took them reluctantly, as if touching cardboard might infect his hands. “You always this mouthy?” he asked. “Only when rich men block sidewalks and forget how to say thank you.” “I’m not used to being spoken to like this.” “Then maybe you need it more.” He paused. Something in his expression changed—not softened, not exactly—but shifted. “You said your name was…?” “I didn’t,” she said, stepping back. “But it’s Jayda Brooks. Not that you’ll remember.” He smirked slightly, just slightly. “Oh, I’ll remember.” Jayda turned and walked toward the elevator without another word. And Alexander Knight, CEO of KnightTech, thirty-three-year-old billionaire, investor, widower, and legend in Manhattan’s financial world, stood there holding a box of pepperoni pizza like it had just been handed to him by an alien—and he’d liked it. She was loud. She was poor. She was rude. She was fire. He had no idea who she was. But she’d just made an impression he couldn’t forget. And that scared him more than the quarterly board meeting he had in twenty minutes. ---