“Oh please, I don’t need therapy about it for Christ’s sake. I wanted the house, I didn’t get it. I’m jealous and angry. Can’t a guy fucking vent?” He argued as he walked back to the truck, loaded with tools.
“Sure, you can vent all you want,” Cole told him as he hauled an air compressor to the bed of the truck. “But you don’t get to shit on Julia just because she bought the house you wanted. She’s a nice woman and she didn’t do anything to you to deserve that.”
“You kind of stared angry holes into her all morning,” Tucker pointed out.
Elliot grunted and went back into the garage with his brothers trailing behind. “You don’t think your judgment might be off because you’re both hoping to sleep with the women in that house?” he accused.
“No,” Cole said plainly. “As smoking hot as she is, Julia’s a client now. I’m not going to sleep with her. Besides, when you weren’t looking, she was undressing you with her eyes this morning.” He shrugged good-naturedly. “She didn’t look at me like that.”
“Nothing to add, since this seems to be a free for all?” Elliot invited Tucker.
“Kelsey plays for the other team.” Tucker smiled as he grabbed his last load. “And Julia’s cool, but she’s not my type.”
“All I’m saying is,” Cole interrupted. “Julia is a client now. If you’re rude, she might fire us. Then we, the business, lose not just a finished job for our portfolio, but any referrals she might give us, not to mention out reputation and, oh yeah, money. Be a nice little worker bee and just shut up and do your job.”
So, that’s just what Elliot did. For four days that week, he worked in Julia’s office and took a sick amount of pleasure in showing up early and knowing he’d woken her up. So, he’d used his framing gun when he hadn’t exactly needed to, maybe pounded a few nails a little longer than necessary.
She hadn’t said a word about it, just avoided him and pretended it didn’t happen. It wasn’t until that morning, when he’d heard a loud thump from the upstairs bedroom as he pounded on the wall, that he felt the slightest bit guilty about it.
It irked him a little that even when he showed up early, hoping to catch her unawares, that she had a knack for looking good all the time. Other than the one time she’d trudged down the stairs half-asleep, he’d never seen her anything but bright-eyed.
Well, that may have been pushing it. Julia was unlike anyone he’d ever met. She didn’t hover, like other clients. She inspected their work with a critical eye, she asked a lot of questions, but she didn’t hover. She also didn’t talk. He’d noticed that unless Tucker or Cole spoke to her, she didn’t speak to them. She wasn’t particularly friendly, which he could relate to, but she wasn’t mean either.
The more times he saw her, the more he thought he understood her desire for such a large master suite and closet. She took great care of herself. Her clothes were always impeccable, clearly designer. He was an idiot when it came to things like that and even he could see it. She just looked expensive. Her makeup was always done, hiding the young woman he’d seen that first morning at the bottom of the stairs. And her hair—she always seemed to have it in some kind of fancy style that he’d never even imagined, let alone seen before.
For some reason, he just wanted to see those curls out of control like he had the day they’d met.
Another thing he noticed, as much as it pained him to say it, because he really wanted to see her as nothing more than a spoiled, rich, pain-in-his-ass, was that she was always working. From the minute she came down in the mornings when she and Kelsey started together to when he and his brothers broke for lunch—she worked. Some days in the living room on her computer or the phone, some days at the dining room table.
Twice that week Cole had tried to get her attention, inviting her to eat lunch with them, but she hadn’t even heard him. She’d been so engrossed in whatever she was working on, that she’d been in another world. When they left at night, she was doing the same thing: making phone calls, working on the computer, riffling through papers that were strewn all over the couch and coffee table. He might have hated where she was putting it, but the woman needed her office finished. She was forever hunched over while sitting on the couch with her stuff everywhere. It looked ridiculously uncomfortable.
It made him bristle that he’d even noticed.
Cole and Tucker had gone back to the barn to pick up one of the bookcases that Tucker had made, just to make sure it fit before they took it back and finished it. Elliot was waiting for them to return on the porch later Friday afternoon when he heard the front door close behind him. When he turned, Julia was standing there, looking hesitant and holding a beer out to him.
“Cole just called. He said they’d be another few minutes and to give you a beer,” she said as she pushed the beer toward him. She had a bottle of water for herself in her other hand.
He took it from her. “Thanks.”
They stood in an awkward silence until Julia spoke. “You don’t like me.” It was a statement, not a question. Like Tucker had insinuated, he’d made his dislike for her obvious.
He turned around to face her, leaning his back against one of the columns of the porch.
“I don’t not like you,” he lied as her electric green eyes slid away from him. There was no anger there, nothing that said she was offended by his attitude. Just a strange curiosity.
“I’m not easy to like,” she explained with a careless shrug. “I always say the wrong thing.”
Again, her statement wasn’t said with any particular sadness. She didn’t seem to be digging for sympathy. He found her demeanor odd, and wasn’t quite sure what to say.
“I don’t not like you,” he told her again. “It has nothing to do with you personally.”
“It feels personal.” Julia took a sip of her water. “Why didn’t you return my calls?”
Elliot was quiet as he watched her while she looked out at the yard. She was direct without being ashamed. She had a question that she wanted answered and wasn’t afraid to ask it. She was far more direct than any other woman he’d ever met, but she lacked a certain tact. Most people would dance around the awkwardness, trying to lighten it. Julia just barreled right through it.
“I didn’t want to work on this house,” he told her honestly.
“Why not?” Her head tilted to the side as she met his gaze but struggled to hold it. Her long braid slithered down her chest, drawing his attention to her breasts.
“I tried to buy this house, but you outbid me. It was my grandmother’s. I wanted to keep it the way it was.”
Julia digested that for a moment, her fingers tapping the bottle of water. “I’m sorry.”
She didn’t sound that sorry.
Elliot shrugged, having said more than enough for his liking. “So, what is it that you’re so busy doing every day? Kelsey’s in and out of here all the time and you’re holed up on the couch in your own world.”
“Working.” She walked to the wide porch rail, sat down on it, and swung her leg over it to straddle it, facing him.
“Maybe you could be more vague,” he deadpanned.
“I could,” she said seriously, taking a sip of water. Then her eyes flipped to his. “That was sarcasm. Right?”
“Right,” he told her as he rested his shoulder on the column to face her. “What kind of work? Kelsey said something about computers and software.”
He’d also been listening, just a little, when she’d questioned Tucker about his recommendations for construction models.
“Yes,” she said, nodding.
“Are you always this chatty?”
“Talking to people isn’t my strong suit,” she answered blankly, looking somewhat aloof but annoyingly edible.
He was quiet for a few minutes before he tried again. “So, Kelsey said she was moving to Troy, too.”
“Yes.” He didn’t respond, just nodded as they surveyed the yard. “She’s looking at one on Wingate Road. A three-bedroom.”
&nb
sp; He whistled low. “Pricey. Being an assistant must pay well.”
“She’s not my assistant anymore. She’s my right hand. She does so much work that we had to hire her an assistant.”
“Your assistant has her own assistant?”
“Annie,” Julia said of the other assistant. “She’s being shifted to be the assistant to someone else in the company once my move is complete.”
“What happens to the rest of the company when you finish moving?” He was honestly curious. She was an intriguing mix of hot and cold, serious and short—two things he could completely get on board with—but also a little wide-eyed and naïve. It was an interesting contrast and, fuck him, but he kind of liked her. She had a hell of a work ethic and when she did talk to him, she was interesting. Even if he did spend half the time trying to decipher her mood. She wasn’t trying to get anyone’s attention or be the most interesting person in the room. She just was.
And whether she knew it or not, Cole was right. He’d caught her more than once sending him heated stares, filled with curiosity.
“I’m selling the company,” she interrupted his thoughts, her voice a soft monotone. “I don’t like working there anymore.”
He wondered if that was a good thing or a bad thing, her expression not conveying to him where she might stand on the subject. He was about to ask her more when his brothers pulled up. Cole honked the horn, like they hadn’t seen him park near the curb.
“He likes you,” Elliot told her gruffly, suddenly annoyed with the idea more than he’d been just a day before.
She looked at Cole walking up the walkway. “No one likes me.”
The words were so quiet, he almost didn’t hear them.
4
When Elliot showed up to work the next morning, there was a big black SUV with tinted windows running in the driveway, parked behind Kelsey’s Porsche. Apparently, being Julia’s assistant was a gig that paid well.
A big man with sunglasses, behind the wheel of the SUV, threw Elliot a jaunty wave as he parked at the curb and grabbed his tool belt from the front seat. He climbed the stairs to the porch and gave a perfunctory knock, before opening the door and coming to a short stop. Julia was standing in the living room, digging through a very large purse, her eyes flashing to his, her brows drawn down.
“What are you doing here?”
She was the most dressed up he’d ever seen her, wearing a fitted gray dress with flowers on the side and black heels. Her hair was as smooth as it probably got, all her curls looking beaten into submission in a knot at the nape of her neck.
“I was coming in to work on the office, but I can come back Monday if I’m going to be in your way,” Elliot offered even though he really didn’t feel like leaving.
“I want you to work,” she said quickly, her voice far too loud. He felt his eyes widen at her exuberance, but schooled his features. “Kelsey will be around if you need anything.”
“Kelsey has plans this morning but will be back by eleven,” the woman herself said as she walked into the living room, rolling a suitcase behind her, with a garment bag attached to it. “I’ll take these to the car for you.”
“I’ve got them,” Julia told her flatly as she wrestled the bags away from Kelsey. “Bye,” she muttered awkwardly.
He and Kelsey watched through the window as the driver got out of the car and loaded Julia’s bags. He closed the door when she slid into the backseat and drove away.
“So,” Kelsey said as she rocked back on her heels, a sly smile on her face as she shoved her hands in her pockets.
“I’ll just work on the office. I know Julia wanted it done and I didn’t have anything else to do,” he told her.
Doing carpentry and building was the best way he’d found to relieve stress. It gave him plenty of time to think without the pressure of talking to other people all the time. The idea of living in the city like Kelsey or Julia, or working in a busy office, made him itch with a feeling he wasn’t sure how to pinpoint. Anxiety? Annoyance? Could have been either or both. Hell, even trying to picture Julia working with so many people gave him pause. He had no idea what she did other than working with computers, but she’d said she was selling a company. That would imply that she was the boss in some form or another. He had a hard time picturing her in that role—the idea of her in charge of something that relied so heavily on interpersonal communication.
But what the hell did he know? Maybe she was great at it and it was him. They hadn’t exactly gotten off to a stellar start.
“I’ll be back by eleven anyway,” Kelsey told him, interrupting his annoying internal thoughts. “You can call me if you need anything or have any questions.”
“I’ll be fine. I know you’re checking out a condo this morning.”
“Well, aren’t you well-informed.” She grinned as she sat on the couch and starting carefully putting papers and files into her messenger bag.
“Wingate Road, gated community, nice place,” he said as he strapped on his tool belt. “Not your style.”
“Who told you that?”
“That it’s not your style? No one. That’s just my opinion.”
“That I’m looking on Wingate Road,” she prompted.
“Julia.”
“Julia?” Her head reared back. “And when did she tell you this?”
“We shot the shit last night.”
If anything, Kelsey looked more shocked. “You and Julia shot the shit? Julia? My Julia?”
There was a speculative gleam in her eye he wasn’t interested in exploring. Something that said she’d love to hear every tid-bit of every conversation that took place where Julia was concerned. Protective and kind of sweet, but annoying. He wasn’t interested in becoming besties with Kelsey Riggs.
“Good luck,” he offered, dismissing her with a salute as he turned on his heel and went to work. If he was efficient and worked a few extra hours, they might just finish the office part of the project early.
“You’re not even going to ask about her?” Kelsey asked, slinging her bag across her chest and following him.
“Not my style,” he responded with a shrug, ignoring her until she left.
But he’d be goddamned if it didn’t eat at him all day. He wanted to know where was she going in that car. Why did she need luggage? How long would she be gone?
His past made him feel an intrinsic interest in seeing people leave. He’d grown up mostly alone, living in an orphanage that was more socially acceptably called a boy’s home, because no one had wanted him. His own parents, pieces of shit that they’d been, had beaten the crap out of him and left him for dead, their hunt for drugs more important than their kid. They’d eventually been arrested and he’d been taken away, put in foster care.
He’d hated it there too. He’d been placed with a family that only cared about the check he brought in from the state. At ten years old, the father had snuck into the basement where he slept one night and that scumbag stood over his bed, jerking himself off. It wasn’t until he’d tried to touch him that Elliot reacted. He was a street kid—he wasn’t naïve, and he’d punched that guy in the dick so hard he’d dropped to the ground as Elliot ran.
As an adult, he was suspicious by nature, cautious with strangers, and maybe had some trust issues that he would cop to. He was thirty-eight years old and still single, and even he knew that said something about a guy. Maybe that’s why he’d loved the Williams family and Grandma Mary so much. They’d shown him what a loving family was supposed to look like without hurting each other or hurting him. When he’d been adopted at twelve years old, he’d finally learned how to be a kid.
Gram especially had taken him under her wing and had shown him things he hadn’t known he’d need to know. At twenty, she’d taught him how to cook for himself. He wasn’t gourmet or anything but she’d taken the time to teach him. He could remember the day he stood in what was now Julia’s kitchen, looking down and asking her, “Why are you teaching me this?”
He’d laughe
d because he’d burnt everything up to that point, but she’d held his hand, spatula and all, and told him. “Because, I love you, Elliot.”
Julia enjoyed her new home in Troy.
She had to work hard to identify her feelings and what they meant to her, how they twisted inside and made her feel.
Happy was a stupid word with far too many meanings for her liking. She and her therapist had drawn charts, diagrams to follow the path of feelings so she could identify where she was and how to tell what she was feeling. Happy led down different paths that meant different things like elated or fulfilled. Proud was another path that shot off of happiness, as was joy or amusement. She wasn’t at any of those places, but thought she was somewhere near content, despite the work still going on.
The ongoing construction alternately annoyed her and inspired her. She liked seeing her ideas and plans come to fruition. It gave her a sense that things would soon be exactly as she’d planned them. They also annoyed her because there were messes in her house that weren’t hers and there were people around when she didn’t want them there. Sometimes she liked them being there, something about their presence comfortable and…safe maybe. But sometimes, they talked too much, their words cutting through her every thought.
Those times she hid from them, taking refuge in her bedroom with a fan running to drown out their voices.
But her trip to the city was making her feel decidedly claustrophobic. She was tempted to leave everything at her old apartment in the city and start fresh, leaving it all behind. Of course, Kelsey had reminded her how much she loved her sectional couch, her own bed, and the artwork she’d painstakingly collected over the years. She’d deal with the city and her apartment, but only because it meant being reunited with her things.
She missed her things. They were comforting and familiar.
She also had a business to sell. Excited would be the right word to use to describe how she was feeling, as she typed out a response to yet another email from a concerned employee. She was anxious, mostly because her dislike for Jonathan Beyer ran so deep, and she was concerned that he wasn’t going to do right by the legacy she’d built. She’d tried to detail as much of that into the contract as she could, but he was a bully, always had been, and she worried he would screw it up somehow.
Elliot: The Williams Brothers Page 4