Year 28

by JL Mac

  Fuck. Our cover is blown, Anxiety hyperventilates.

  Now what’s the master plan, genius? Regret asks snidely.

  He’s going to keep asking what your problem is so—just—explain yourself later when you’re alone with him, Practicality reasons.

  Hell no! Regret barks. Optimism is curled up in the corner reading a book, resuming her deaf, mute act. Blind Rage is siding with Regret. Negativity, even with duct tape in place makes her opinion clear. Self-Loathing is shaking her head in disgust. The collective stance is clear, I should not be here and yet, here I am because Sylas Broussard has always been able to draw me in.

  For the next hour I listen and Gene, Dale, and Sylas discuss his non-profit’s three fishing boats and the possibility for adding another one to the fleet. At Dale’s mentioning it Sy, glances my way and mutters that he doesn’t have a name for a new boat but that he’d think about it. Gene quickly launches into the financial ramifications of adding another boat to the fleet and based on what he has said, it seems Buzzsaw Charted Fishing is not doing so well. I sincerely hope to help the charity win some high-profile donors and then, perhaps he will not only continue but also expand his charity work because it’s such an admirable, worthy venture.

  “Why not get another boat soon? Maybe expanding will garner more attention and make it clear to the public that Buzzsaw is a growing charity worth their donations.”

  “Not feasible, Miss potter,” Gene scoffs, his lip curling for just a moment and I’m reminded of the expression a person makes when someone passes gas. It’s the who farted face. Incidentally it’s also rude as hell and aesthetically displeasing. I smile and bite my tongue realizing that Gene may or may not be in the politics game—that I don’t know yet but his obvious disdain for women in business conversations is clear. I’m happy to see it, truthfully. I squash chauvinistic pigs for sport. My inner circle all perk up.

  “Well, I’d have to bring on another Captain, not to mention the initial investment, the overhead in terms of mooring and maintenance, insurance… then I’d have to have a name for her.” He ticks things off one by one. “And Year 28 just doesn’t ring true so far,” he mutters focusing his attention on wiping his hands clean with the tiny damp towelette the waitress had dropped off when she delivered our barbeque sauce-drenched food. “I’m gonna go wash my hands,” Sy announces getting to his feet and walking away.

  “You’ve got his panties twisted up, I see,” Dale laughs easily, leaning back in his seat and patting his full belly.

  “Yeah, I guess so. So Mr. Yoder, tell me, how long have you been in accounting?”

  “Please, call me Gene,” he playacts possessing genuine kindness. “I’ve been an accountant and financial advisor for nearly forty-six years. I’m retired of course, but I take on certain clients to keep me busy, involved.”

  “Of course,” I nod. “If you need any assistance with the accounting, perhaps some fresh eyes to take a look at things please let me know. I would be glad to help. At that, Gene’s jaw ticks but he cocks his head in a half nod. “Excuse me,” he says getting up and pointing himself in the direction of the bathrooms.

  “Dale, you seem to know Sylas pretty well.”

  “I spend a lot of time with him down at the marina.” He shrugs.

  “Sylas said you’ve been working for him about a year. How’d you meet?”

  “I was piss-drunk and ran him over,” Dale admits so casually that it catches me off guard and I choke on my water.

  “I’m sorry,” I frown and shake my head. “You said you—”

  “Yep. Ran him over. Got into a fist fight too.” He nods smiling a little ruefully.

  “You’ll have to elaborate,” I laugh.

  “I was neck deep in bourbon that night. Didn’t stop me from gettin’ in my truck.” He presses his lips together and his forehead wrinkles clearly in frustration with what he’d done. “I clipped his truck, technically, then tried to run. When he chased me down I swung on him,” he admits sheepishly. “I was a useless drunk not coping with some things and now I am,” he shrugs as though it’s all so simple and plain.

  “And now you and Sy are friends,” I state more than ask.

  “Yep. He gave me a job and a good reason to keep a clear head,” he says.

  “Only Sylas Broussard,” I mutter, shaking my head. “Dale, I’m glad you crashed into Sylas Broussard’s truck,” I declare with a smile and a decisive nod.

  “Me too. Every single day, me too.”

  Chapter 18

  Sylas

  16 years old…

  Since we began dating steadily, Rae and me spend just about every free moment together, reading, talking, and listening to music together. It’s basically very much like we were before we labeled ourselves boyfriend and girlfriend just without the bullshit bickering and me begging for a date. I still pester her because, well, it’s habit by now but she doesn’t mind it. Truth be told I think she’d be bored to tears if I didn’t ruffle her feathers the way I do.

  “I just don’t see how Gabriel Oak didn’t die of jealousy. I would have,” I snort and slap the book shut, tossing it to Rae whose head is resting on my stomach. I crack my knuckles then thread my fingers behind my head, soaking in the sun at the bayou with my eyes closed.

  “Oh you mean like the way I feel when Brooklyn makes eye at you,” she says, irritated.

  “Baby, I love seeing you jealous over me,” I laugh. I’m punished by Rae’s thin fingers pinching the hell out of the skin on the inside of my knee.

  “Not funny. I don’t like her. She’d steal you if she got the chance.”

  “Well she ain’t getting the chance so don’t you worry about it, huh?” I lean forward, shifting Rae as I bend down to kiss her gently, loving the taste of her vanilla lip balm.

  Rae grabs the book and flips it open to a part where Bathsheba is being a real asshole. “Why do you suppose she’s such a witch?” I ask motioning my chin toward the book in Rae’s hands.

  “Bathsheba?” she asks. I nod and Rae seems to look through the book for a moment giving it thought. “I don’t know. I think it’s a mix of stuff. I think she’s had a hard life you know? And she’s a woman doing her best in a man’s position with no respect from the people around her. She’s determined to keep up a good front. She’s tough because she thinks she has to be.” Rae shrugs.

  I have the distinct urge to grab Rae by her shoulders and shake her until she tells me what’s going on with her. After we had sex she had a full on anxiety attack. I was equally concerned as I was confused seeing her gasping to breathe, her eyes wild and frightened, her brow misted with sweat. Then during lunch with Dale and Gene, she had flipped out over me calling her darlin’. What else? That’s what I want to ask her. What else is going to upset her and most importantly why?

  I have been combing over my recollection of our past with a fine-toothed comb for clues but thus far I’ve come up empty handed. We dated, fell in love, I enlisted, she dumped me, I left for boot camp and Rae left for college. That’s what I know and nowhere in there do I know anything about a trauma that would have spawned this kind of PTSD a full decade later. That realization leads me to believe that whatever has caused Rae so much pain happened after me, maybe in college. I swear to fucking Christ I’ll dismember whoever is to blame. Since my days in the Marine Corps ended, I have stayed on a pretty even keel. I don’t get too ruffled up about just about anything but thinking on this topic confuses me and angers me. I can’t stomach the realization that Rae is fighting demons alone, demons that hurt her. You’d have to be brain dead to not see it. I’m one hundred percent certain I’m right. Maybe because I am well versed in this subject matter of surviving trauma, maybe because I’ve always been very in tune with Rae, maybe a little of both. It doesn’t exactly matter how I know something is wrong. Right now what matters most is finding out what she’s hiding and making the right moves to help her through it. I look at Rae and I see a drowning woman. I wish she’d trust me enough to throw her a
life ring. A little seed of hope burrows down and waits for the sun. If this is what’s standing between Rae and I, maybe… if she can get better, maybe she will want us back as badly as I do. At a loss for how to move forward I pick up my phone and dial momma.

  “Hey sugar,” she says into the phone.

  “Hey Momma.”

  “You still down in Cattail?”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “And how’s that going?” she asks about Rae in that way moms ask things without coming out and actually asking.

  “It’s been okay.”

  “You don’t sound very convincing, son.”

  “I know. I was wondering…”

  “Mhmm,” she hums.

  “And this is just between you and me but do you know of anything… traumatic that Rae went through?”

  “Oh you mean like her brother being killed overseas? Or abruptly ending her relationship with you? Or seein’ you the way I saw you in the hospital?”

  “You’re right. She’s been through it but I meant do you know of anything that I don’t already know about? There’s just something missing,” I speculate. Momma sighs deeply.

  “Women secrets, son. Sometimes it’s for the best and sometimes it isn’t. I will tell you this much though, if Rae has something she’s hiding, her momma doesn’t know about it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, Pam has been my very best friend for many years. I’ve seen her at her worst and same goes for me. We had lots of long talks about our kids and I can tell you that Pam has been terribly worried about Raegan since y’all broke up. She told me Rae changed around that time and she has yet to tell her momma the details. She just kind of got hard to the world and planted herself in an industry where bein’ that way is just another Monday at the office.”

  “So you think whatever changed Rae had to have taken place after me but before college?”

  “That’s Pam’s best guess,” she says in a voice softened by resignation.

  “And what are your thoughts?”

  “Well I couldn’t begin to say what got to her if anything other than what we know happened but what I do know is Rae’s not bad, son. She’s just bad at being hurt. That’s all.”

  “You’re right about that, Momma,” I nod though she can’t see me. “I better get going before my houseguest comes looking for me.”

  “Love you Sylas.”

  “Love you too, Momma.” I end the call and look up at my cabin from the front yard. The blinds and curtains are drawn and I can see Rae sitting at my kitchen table chattering away with Bethany, her assistant. My Rae is a puzzle but I’m determined to piece it all together even if she ends up hating me for it. She can’t live her life this way and my hunch tells me she doesn’t truly want to.

  Chapter 19

  Raegan

  Back at Sy’s cabin, we sit down at his dining table and I put on my work hat, which would be far easier if Sylas wasn’t silently reeling me in with his heated looks and sexual tension rolling off him in waves. It would also help if I had my workbag with me but my cellphone will have to suffice. As far as being distracted by Sylas’ allure goes? There’s no help for that.

  “First thing’s first. When and where is the event?”

  “I got the parish community center to donate use of the rec room Next Saturday.”

  “Oh boy,” I sigh. “Less than one week to dress this lady up. Okay. We can do this,” I mumble to myself, typing furiously on my cellphone. “What’s the occupancy and how many guest do you expect as of now?”

  “The occupancy cap is two-hundred fifty people, so we have shut it down at that.”

  “More people want to attend?”

  “Well, yes but I don’t have another venue.”

  “Okay. Website?”

  “Uh, yeah, Buzzsaw Chartered Fishing dot org,” Sy relays, rubbing the back of his neck with a stressed expression on his face. It’s clear this nonprofit is really important to him.

  “Why Buzzsaw?” I ask absently as I scroll through his website.

  “It was my nickname in the Marine Corps. Broussard, Buzzsaw.” I glance up at him to see him shrug.

  “Oh I just figured it’s more due to your loudmouth sounding like the actual saw versus the Cajun sir name,” I joke, hoping he will relax a little.

  “Well that too,” he smirks. It takes me less than three minutes navigating his website to see it needs a facelift.

  “Sorry but your site sucks.” He sighs and leans his head on the tabletop. Getting the ball rolling on propping up Sylas’s fundraiser banquet on such short notice requires my full attention as well as me issuing several IOUs as well as cashing in more.

  I fire off a SOS email to my web designer source and employ them to do the job of dressing up BCF’s website. Aesthetics are half the battle. I shoot Bethany an email asking her to assist me with this project remotely on her personal time, promising to make it up to her. She responds right away with, For Mr. Hot Boxer Shorts? Anything.

  Me: Thank you.

  After getting the ball rolling on vamping up Sy’s event I get to my feet and round his table. Running my hands across his shoulders he sits up, leaning back in the chair. “You look like you’re stressing out over this and you shouldn’t. It’s going to be great, I promise,” I say stepping between his spread legs. I bend at the waist to take his face in my hands, enjoying the scruff on his jaw and cheeks. I kiss him, slowly like we have all the time in the world. I break away and stare deeply into his eyes as I lower myself to my knees between his parted thighs. Sy’s eyes flare wider and he settles deeper into the chair, giving me space to do exactly what I please, and what I want right now is to taste Sylas on my tongue. I free his cock from his pants and breathe in the musky male scent of him. I wrap my hand around the base of him and look up at him. Wetting my lips, I lean forward and deposit full, wet kiss on the bulbous tip of his remarkable cock.

  If the hiss he releases is any indication, Sy is decidedly less stressed out at the moment. His hands clench on his thighs, itching to grab my face, my hair, and fuck my mouth. I reach for his hands and guide them to my face. Without hesitation he drifts his palms over my jaw, inching around to the nape of my neck where his fingers thread into my hair. Muscles in Sy’s jaw flex, his hips push forward slightly and he guides my mouth onto his cock while he presses his hips forward, meeting me half way. My lips part and the wide tip of him pushes into my mouth. I swipe my tongue over his flesh, tasting his salty essence. The look on his face is that of a hurricane in a bottle. Wild and powerful and utterly entrancing. I lick and suck and take in as much of Sy as I can. He fucks my mouth with abandon. Minutes or eternity—I’m not sure which, and I don’t care either because Sy breathes every syllable of my name like a sacred prayer as his pleasure bursts from him. I take him in, reveling at the moment, stowing mental snapshots in my mind where I can revisit them long after I have left him.

  I went down on Sylas several times when we dated in high school but it was tentative and exploratory, lacking all traces of skill I now possess. Skill that age and experience has gifted me with. It’s more than that though. Going down on him, feeling his solid flesh fill my mouth, tasting his skin, smelling the unique scent of his body, it’s the most erotic thing I can think of and I am incredibly turned on by it all. The evidence of it coats my panties. I stand between his legs, lazily stroking my fingers through his wavy deep brown hair. He tugs the hem of my shirt, encouraging me to sit and I do. I straddle his lap and hold his handsome face in my hands and kiss him deeply while subtly pressing my hips forward against him. He groans into my mouth and tightens his arms around me as he lifts me and begins maneuvering us toward his bedroom.

  Time passes in his home that is silent save for the sound of us making up for lost time, rediscovering each other and in some ways, meeting for the first time. We aren’t kids anymore. We’re fully grown adults with a decade of history to catch up on and a period of estrangement to build a bridge across. Sy makes love to me in
that way lovers do when they’re sorting out all the details about their partner, leisurely and unrushed.

  Wrapped in a towel with my hair tied up in a ponytail I step out of Sy’s bathroom to find him staring at my cellphone on his kitchen table. His attention lifts to me and he holds my phone out to me.

  “Uh, this fellow Preston must really need to get ahold of you. Been blowin’ up your phone for ten minutes straight.”

  “Oh. Thank you.” I take the phone from his hand and answer the call.

  “Preston,” I greet.

  “I got your email. Are you seriously asking for my help or is this your idea of getting my attention?”

  “I emailed you regarding this charity because it’s a good image boost and the charity could use several benefactors with deep pockets. I detailed the perks in the email I sent. Is your camp interested?”

  “I can’t stop thinking about you. Will you see me again?” He has lowered the pitch of his voice to sound seductive and I can’t help but think if he bites on the offer I sent his way, it will be conditional. He can fuck right off with that nonsense.

  “Careful now,” I warn.

  “Retract your claws, Potter. You can’t blame me for trying, can you?”