by Olivia Dade
But the man was a terrible liar. Just awful. There was absolutely no way in hell he’d ever intended to staff the dunk tank until he’d seen her plunge into the icy water. He’d come to the booth with no towel. No bathing trunks or wetsuit. No extra changes of clothing. No excuses to offer when Keisha found him in the tank and loudly wondered what in the world he was doing.
No, he’d clearly intended to watch the festivities and consume mango salsa-topped latkes—very tasty—and go home just as bone-dry as when he’d arrived.
One look at her goosebumps, and he’d taken off his shoes and prepared for submersion.
And the way he’d dabbed at her face with that towel, his brow furrowed in concentration, his touch as light and soft and warm as a cashmere throw…
No. She wouldn’t think it again. Wouldn’t feel it again.
He didn’t make her feel safe.
Not in the slightest.
But she supposed maybe they could be friends. Of a sort. With strict boundaries to protect her from any undesired emotional consequences.
And friends had coffee together, right? No big deal. No panic necessary.
“Black, huh?”
She blinked, abruptly aware that she’d been so busy thinking about Martin Krause that she’d paid no attention to the actual, physical man two feet away. “Uh, what?”
His fingertip nudged her mug. “You take your coffee black. I should have known.”
“Black and bitter.” She couldn’t resist adding, “Like my heart.”
He raised a skeptical brow. “Right. Because people with black and bitter hearts often staff dunk tanks to fundraise for their schools and provide vendetta-based amusement for students.”
“All part of one of my evil schemes.” She battled to keep her face solemn. “A complicated one involving mermaid tails and goth softball teams.”
With a tip of his mug, he saluted her. “That does sound complicated. Good luck.”
“I don’t need luck. Merely guile and misanthropy.”
Cologne Ad Man reappeared with a grin. “No wonder you wear all black. You’re clearly the villain in this particular melodrama.”
“The cliché is correct: Villains get all the best lines. Besides, they drive the plot.” The long night had definitely caught up with her. She had few filters remaining between her brain and mouth. “And women often get cast as villains for trying to be the heroes of their own stories, so better to embrace the role from the start. Make it your own.”
He bowed his head to blow on his coffee once more, shielding his expression. “That’s the reason for all the black clothing?”
“Well, I’m not on the girls’ softball team, so it’s not that.” A long sip of her coffee bought her a moment to think. “The best black clothing doesn’t ask to be liked. It’s uncompromising.” She exhaled in a long sigh. “There’s a lot of black clothing for women my size, but most of it was created to facilitate the disappearance of the woman wearing it. To erase her from sight in apology for her existence as a fat woman. That’s not the kind of black clothing I wear. Mine has metallic accents. Bold lines. Quality fabrics. Good tailoring. All unmistakable markers that I’m not apologizing or looking to disappear.”
“Those heels don’t hurt the cause either.”
She extended one silver-veined stiletto under the café lights. “No, they don’t.”
His brow furrowed. “Or maybe they do hurt. They don’t look particularly comfortable.”
“I don’t intend to present a more comfortable version of myself for anyone. Even me.”
Yes, sometimes her feet ached, and she longed to relax into flip-flops or Crocs or Uggs or whatever comfortable, hideous shoes were currently popular. But discomfort was a small price to pay for the safety of an inviolate, immaculate shell.
He spoke slowly. “Yet here you are. In sweats.”
For him.
Her breath hitched, and her hand jerked in the direction of her purse.
Shit. Shit, this was a mistake.
“I’m worried about Sam,” he abruptly announced. “I was hoping to talk to you about them.”
She’d had a few concerns herself, simply because of the student’s situation, so she settled back into the pleather-tufted chair. “Go on.”
“I haven’t seen any bruises. But we both know kids like them can have a rough time at home, depending on the parents. They have a single dad, and he hasn’t returned my messages for months.” He grimaced. “I’ve talked to Sherry in guidance, but she hasn’t had any more luck than me. As long as Sam keeps coming to school on time and getting decent grades, there’s not much more I can do.”
Another sip of her coffee helped corral her thoughts. “Have you spotted any signs of abuse?”
“I don’t know.” His mouth twisted. “They’re guarded. All I can say is that when they arrive in the morning, they look unhappy. And they stay late after school. For yearbook a couple days a week, but sometimes for no particular reason I can figure out.”
“Any idea whether they’re being bullied in school?”
“I’ve asked. Sam says no, and they seem sincere.” He slumped backward in his chair. “There could be nothing wrong. Sam could just be a teenager going through a rough patch for all the typical teenage reasons, compounded by the emotional upheaval of transitioning. But if there’s a problem, I think it’s at home.”
His leg was bouncing. He was agitated, clearly concerned for his student.
But she couldn’t help but wonder whether there was more going on than that.
“Did Sam’s father come to a parent-teacher meeting?”
Bounce, bounce, bounce. “Once. Right after school began.”
“How did he seem?”
“Fine. Friendly enough. But parents can fake it for quick meetings.” His jaw turned stony. “I know that from personal experience.”
She shouldn’t ask. Not if she intended to keep a certain distance.
Which she did. Definitely. But they were friends now, right? And a friend could ask certain questions.
Especially when those coals in her chest were aflame, and rage had darkened her vision. The thought of a parent—or anyone—abusing the man seated across from her…
If they ever showed up at Marysburg High, she’d eviscerate them. And laugh.
She imagined black could hide a lot of bloodstains.
Despite her anger, she kept her voice calm. Low. Steady. “If you’re willing to talk about it, I’d like to hear more about that personal experience.”
His gaze focused on a point in the distance. She swiveled to see what had drawn his attention, but there was nothing there.
She turned back and waited, unsure which answer she really wanted from him.
After a long moment, he met her eyes again. “Sure. I’ll tell you.”
Men don’t whimper about their fucking feelings, pansy boy.
But Martin’s father had been wrong about that, as he was about so much else.
Swallow enough hurt in silence, and the pain either chokes you or curdles into gut-deep rage.
His dad’s version of manhood would destroy you one way or the other. Which Martin, after so many years of mute suffering, had eventually realized. In the end, he’d drawn out most of the poison through talk therapy. Through acknowledgment of his emotions. Through vulnerability, rather than a pretense of strength.
His father’s voice became his college counselor’s. Vulnerability is strength, Martin.
He believed it. He could only hope Rose did too. At least when it came to others.
Her eyes were sharp on him, but not cold. Not judgmental.
So he pulled in a breath and told her…not everything. But enough for now. “My father had very specific ideas about how boys should act and think and be. About how his sons in particular should act and think and be.”
She’d laced her fingers together on the table in front of her, but not in a relaxed way. As if she were holding them back from doing something infinitely more destruct
ive.
But her voice was soft and sweet as whipped cream. “Such as?”
“They should be good at sports. They should shout over other people. Make a mess. They should have lots of equally loud and messy friends. They should get laid early and often. Tell bitches to shut up and fuck off if they got too bossy or clingy.” He sighed. “His words. Not mine.”
“I know.” Her fingers had turned bone-white in her own grip. “Go on.”
“Boys shouldn’t care much about school or grades, or anyone else’s feelings. Shouldn’t like keeping their mom company as she cooked. Shouldn’t join Model UN. Shouldn’t cry if they got hurt or try to disappear during an argument.” He tried on a smile. It didn’t quite fit. “Basically, they shouldn’t be me.”
“That sounds…” Something popped in the vicinity of her jaw. “That sounds really painful.”
“My older brother took after our father. Things could get”—he chose and discarded various adjectives—“interesting.”
She enunciated the quiet words one by one, each seemingly an effort. “By interesting, do you mean violent?”
“Sometimes.”
But his father and Kurt hadn’t required spatulas or fists to inflict pain. Their scorn for him, for everything he said and did and was, hurt worse than a few bruises.
Her nostrils had flared wide open, but the warmth in her gaze could have dissolved sugar into syrup. “Where was your mother in all this?”
At the stove, carefully not watching what happened around her. Retreating to her bedroom immediately after she’d cleaned up the remnants of their dinner, while the men watched sports and got mean. “Doing her best to stay out of the way. The same as me.”
“The difference is—” She cleared her throat, the noise harsh. “The difference is that she was an adult, while you were a child. Her child.”
“She did her best to protect my younger sister, Mila.”
As far as he knew, no one in the family had heard from Mila for over a decade. Not even his mother. Last he’d heard, his sister was somewhere on the west coast, working in finance.
When Rose set down her mug, it clattered against the marble table. “But you didn’t need your mother’s protection. Because you were a boy.”
Enough. This recitation of his past didn’t hurt him, not anymore. But he was pretty certain she was about to grind a molar to dust.
She might bat him away, but…
He reached across the table and covered those twisting fingers with his palm. “Rose. It’s okay.”
Her gaze whipped to his, so full of anguish and rage his stomach twisted. “It’s not. It’s not okay. Not even a little bit.”
“It wasn’t.” One by one, he disentangled her fingers before she broke something. “But it is now. I haven’t seen my father or brother in over twenty years. I have an amazing daughter. I have a job I love. And if I need her again, I have a great therapist on call. Everything is fine.”
Rose made an odd sort of grunting sound, clearly unappeased, and he fought the sudden urge to laugh.
All that passion and compassion, all for him. Or at least, for the boy he’d once been.
And she was the villain in this story? Like hell. Black or no black, she was no evil queen. Much as she might like to pretend otherwise.
Muscle by muscle, her hands relaxed under his. “How long have you been divorced?”
“A couple of years.” He’d filed the papers after finding Sabrina’s damning texts, but the process took a while. “She got engaged a few months ago and moved to Marysburg. I didn’t want Bea to have to choose between us for her senior year, so I followed.”
Her mouth opened, then closed. Then opened again.
He could have sworn she was about to ask for more details, and he would have shared some. Although, in all honesty, that particular wound was much rawer than his childhood terrors, not to mention much more relevant to his brief but fraught history with Rose.
If his quest to breach her walls progressed much further, she’d need to know. But he didn’t think they’d reached that waypoint yet.
To his relief, she unzipped her purse instead of inquiring further.
“Need to leave a tip,” she muttered. “There’s a five somewhere in here.”
He reached into the sweatpants pocket for his wallet. “I’ve got it.”
She pinned him with a gimlet stare. “I thought you weren’t beholden to traditional rituals of manhood.”
“Apparently, therapy didn’t fix everything.” He adopted a helpless expression. “Blame our nation’s mental health infrastructure.”
Her snort drew the amused gaze of the barista. “Smartass.”
“I’m hurt you would say that.” He plucked out a few bills. “Very hurt.”
Her squinty-eyed scrutiny narrowed even further. “If I put my own money on this table, are you going to find some way to slip it into my purse later?”
His mouth dropped open in genuine astonishment. How had she known?
“That’s what I thought.” She rezipped her purse. “Fine. I’ll let you provide for the little lady tonight. Next time is mine.”
Next time? She wanted a next time?
Why hadn’t he risked hypothermia in an overly-chlorinated tank before now?
They walked to the parking lot in a comfortable silence.
When they reached her driver’s side door, she turned to face him. “For now, I’d just keep an eye on Sam and tell them you’re always available if they want to talk. Next time I see them, I’ll try to chat and form some sort of connection too.” Her lips curved in a wry smile. “I don’t think being a grumpy teenager who stays late at school merits much more intervention at this point, although I understand why you’re worried.”
He nodded. “I agree.”
But he’d be watching closely, and he knew Rose would too.
After he opened her car door, Rose eased inside and tossed her purse onto the passenger’s seat. Buckling her seatbelt, she spoke without looking at him. “You know you’re just as much a man as your father and brother, right?” The buckle clicked into place. “And more importantly, you’re a better human.”
The last bit was kind of mumbled, but he caught it.
An outright compliment. God bless winter-festival dunk tanks.
“Being a man doesn’t even require a Y chromosome or a penis.” Martin grinned. “So yeah, I know I’m a man despite my master’s degree and shameful lack of dunking skills.”
She didn’t try to tug the door from his hands. Instead, she glanced up at him as the winter wind blew a strand of her hair across her cheek. “See you Monday?”
When he carefully tucked the strand back behind her ear, he could have sworn she nuzzled into his touch for a millisecond. “See you Monday.”
That dunk tank manufacturer was totally getting a thank-you note in the morning.
Nine
Halfway through seventh period, the fire alarm blared to life.
No surprise there. The school ran a drill monthly, and they’d reached the final day of January and the final period of the school day. Rose imagined someone in the front office had seen a calendar somewhere, checked for previous drills that month, muttered a silent oh, shit, and heaved a sigh while pulling the red handle.
In theory, she should depart the copy room and join the teachers and students streaming toward the exits. Their voices, raised in both laughter and complaint—because it was freaking cold outside—echoed in the hall just outside the closed door of her little sanctuary.
In reality, a staff meeting was starting ten minutes after the final bell. The copy room would be mobbed both before and after the meeting, so if she ceded her territory now, she’d be lucky to get her packets done before sunset. Besides, this was her damn planning period. She wasn’t giving up fifteen minutes of it to tromp around school grounds.
It was cold out there. A bit slippery too. And her heels didn’t have much traction.
Small though it was, the copy room contained
a threadbare but overstuffed chair she could occupy during the less labor-intensive parts of packet creation. The heat from the machines kept the space toasty, and fresh stacks of copies warmed her hands better than gloves.
Nope. No way in hell she was leaving that room.
She added more paper to the appropriate tray, forced the machine to accept her top-loaded packet—damn copier should have been replaced before the turn of the century—and fiddled with the settings. Collation, definitely. Staples. One step darker than default, as per usual. Two-sided copies required another battle, but she prevailed.
All the pages appeared to load correctly. Hallelujah.
Then she was lounging in the chair, warm and peaceful, as the machine chugged next to her. And if she tweaked the blinds just a tiny bit…
There. In full view of her window, Martin had guided his students from her classroom out to the frozen tundra. As she watched, he urged them to don their jackets and circulated among the different factions that naturally formed as soon as the kids stopped walking.
Such a good teacher. Such a good man.
She had no idea why his ex-wife had let him go, but there was no way—no fucking way—that woman’s new fiancé could outshine Martin in intelligence, wry humor, or sheer human decency.
He bent over to study something on the ground, and Rose almost bit her tongue in two.
Not to mention that round, taut ass. Jesus.
She’d almost asked him about his marriage so many times over the past month or so, but always stopped herself before the words could emerge.
That night in the coffee shop last month, he’d exposed himself to her judgment, to her potential ridicule or incomprehension, as he told the story of his childhood. He’d trusted her to listen and understand, and she hoped to God she’d done a decent job of both, despite her raging hatred of almost his entire fucking family.
She understood the weight and gift of that trust. The strength required to make such a valuable, fragile offering.
But for all the friendly, private conversations and coffeehouse visits they’d had since then, she hadn’t offered her own trust, her own history, in return. So she didn’t have the right to ask for more intimate revelations about his marriage, his relationship with his ex-wife, or anything else.