His breath was soft as he said, “I’ve done some bad shit too, Luna. I’d be the last person to judge you for anything you did.”
I held my breath.
Then he added, “Tell me another time, whenever the hell you want, yeah? Put it in our… what do you call it? Box of secrets?”
I didn’t think twice about it, or the fact he was acknowledging our box of secrets. I just agreed. “Yeah, okay.”
“Where’d you go after?”
I almost sighed in relief. I could tell Rip this at least. “I had made a plan with my grandmother that she would take my sisters since we both knew their mom couldn’t and wouldn’t want or be able to take care of them.” Oh, Grandma Genie. “She gave me some money, and I had some too, and I took the bus to Houston right after I left that house. I think I told you that. I stayed in just about the shittiest hotel in Houston. It was the dirtiest, crappiest place in Houston probably, but they didn’t ask for ID or a credit card or anything. I was so scared that I had to shove the dresser in front of the door the entire time I stayed there.”
I swore my heart started beating just a little faster thinking about those days when I worried so much about getting caught and sent back to San Antonio. Of not knowing how long I could really stretch the money my grandmother had left me. “I applied at just about every job opening I could find on Craigslist. About two weeks after I got to Houston, I applied here for a job as a receptionist, actually. Mr. Cooper had decided to take the listing down the day I showed up, but he didn’t tell me until I got there.”
“He told me he changed his mind about needing a receptionist and would be better off hiring another mechanic instead. I started crying in his office, you know. He asked me if there was something he could do, and I told him I really needed to find a job and asked if he knew anyone hiring. I didn’t tell him that no one would hire me for a full-time job because I wasn’t eighteen. I hadn’t even told him I was seventeen, but I’ve always looked pretty young so….”
There was a pause and then, “He found you a job?”
Thinking back on him taking on some random person to do a job that didn’t really need doing, was a risky business decision. Mr. Cooper hadn’t needed me, but he had taken me anyway. So I nodded at my newest boss. “He warned me that I might not like a lot of the things I’d have to do around the shop, and he said he wasn’t going to treat me any differently because I was a girl, but if I was fine with that, that he’d take me on as kind of a community assistant instead of hiring a mechanic after all. But I told him that I learned fast and that I’d do just about anything he or anyone else asked, and that he wouldn’t regret it.
“I literally would have scooped up crap with my hands at that point. I didn’t care what he asked me to do as long as it didn’t involve something weird. He asked when I wanted to start, and I told him I could start right then. He found me the smallest coveralls he could find, and I started cleaning up the shop.” I scratched my upper lip remembering that day, taking in the confused looks from my new coworkers who wondered what I was doing.
“That day, at six, when everyone was going home, Mr. C told me it was a tradition for new employees to go eat at his house… He promised me he was married and that it really was for dinner and that his wife would be at the house. I’d been eating off the dollar menu and those noodles in a cup every day at that point. So I went, and Lydia fed me. They said they would give me a ride back to my hotel, and even though I told them they didn’t have to, they did anyway. They took one look at that motel and both of them went into the room with me, got my things, and told me I was going to be staying with them until I decided to move out.”
I swallowed thinking about how they had lied about the tradition for new employees to come over and eat. He had to have known I needed a meal. He had to have known something was wrong. And Mr. Cooper had stepped up to the plate. “I stayed with them for four years. I could have stayed longer, they told me, but my sisters had already been living with them for a while too by that point, and I didn’t want to take advantage… and I moved out afterward. Mr. Cooper begged me not to, but I did. We lived in a two-bedroom apartment for the next few years, and then I bought my house. And now I’m here.”
Rip’s big chest went in and out as I spoke, and stayed sucked in while he said, “I can’t see you ever taking advantage of anyone.”
I smiled at him. “That’s nice but I wouldn’t. I’ve had too many people try and take advantage of me to do that to someone else.”
Rip let out a breath so deep and slow, his chest reminded me of a balloon that had been pierced with a needle, slowly losing all of its air.
I didn’t expect the next question out of his mouth. “Why do you still work at Cooper’s? And don’t give me some bullshit answer about owing Cooper or liking your coworkers either.”
It only took me a second to think of the truth. “I like fixing things and making them look nice again.” I bit the inside of my cheek, not sure how that sounded, but at this point, I was beyond worrying what impression Rip had of me and the things that came out of my mouth. He should have been used to it by now. “Like… it’s no big deal they aren’t perfect anymore—you know, if they were in an accident—because they’re still going to run. The cars I mean. They’re going to look and run better than before and still have a long, perfectly good life ahead of them. It’s like we’re giving them a second chance.” Well, hell. “I can relate to it a lot, I guess.”
He watched me for a long, long moment.
So it surprised me when he asked slowly, “What’s up with you and wearing your fun shit everyday?”
Oh. “I read a book a long time ago about being happy.” I didn’t care how that sounded or came across. “One whole chapter was dedicated to self-care,” I explained with a little smile. “Wearing something I think is fun everyday reminds me that things are all right. That I deserve to be happy. That I get to choose how I handle things. It made sense to me. I’ll take what I can get. I’m not going to die sad and miserable if I can help it.”
Rip didn’t say a word, but he watched me so closely then I didn’t know what to say.
And in the time it took him to form his mouth into a shape that words could come out of, I had sat up. His arm burned against mine. I didn’t know if he minded me sitting beside him, practically plastered to him, but he didn’t tell me to move away either.
“I know that face. Don’t feel bad for me,” I told him, carefully.
He was looking me right in the eye as he said, “I don’t. Not even a little, baby girl.”
Well. I smiled. “Okay then. Thanks for helping me today.” Then I went for it because why not? “You know, I think you’re pretty freaking wonderful when you aren’t mad at me.”
He didn’t smile back. His voice was warm as he said, heavily, “You’re welcome. Go to sleep, Luna.”
I looked at him for a second, as he looked right back at me with that face and voice I had no clue what to do with, and I said, “Go to sleep, Ripley.”
Chapter 22
I woke up mostly because my phone’s alarm clock was wailing right by my ear, but the crick in my neck that shot through my shoulders and spine helped too.
“Oww.” Groaning as I tried to fish my hand around for my cell, I forced myself to open an eye when I didn’t immediately find it.
And it was all of a second after I’d opened an eye that I realized where I was.
On the couch. Where I’d fallen asleep the night before. Or, really, more like four hours ago.
My hand found my phone tucked under my chest, and I dragged it out, tapping my finger across the screen from muscle memory to get it to shut up, just as something moved out of my peripheral vision. Something…
They were fingers. Long, thick fingers. And there was only one person I knew who had what looked like an M and C on his ring finger and pinky finger.
Those fingers were Ripley’s.
And Rip’s fingers moved right by my face as I lay there, on the couch, on
my side.
He’d spent the night with me. Slept on the couch directly beside me. I’d barely had that thought when the pillow under my head moved.
The pillow under my head moved?
“Fuckin’ tired,” Rip’s voice—this even deeper, huskier sound than usual—said from close by as the “pillow” under me moved some more, almost like it was… stretching?
I had my head on his thigh, didn’t I?
“You all right?” that incredible voice grumbled.
I nodded, still trying to put my thoughts together. How he was there. How I had my head on his lap. Mostly how he was there.
He made this husky sound that could have been illegal. “Time is it?”
I peeked at my phone with my one open eye that was more than likely bulging now at my realization. “Six.”
The man I was using as a pillow grunted.
I moved my head to press my ear flat against the leg beneath me. I needed to get up. I needed to tell him thank you for everything he had done. And I needed to get up just because.
But I didn’t do any of those things.
What I did do was slide the tips of the fingers of my left hand under his thigh, like I was settling in to go back to sleep. Like he really was my pillow. Or like I had the right to touch him.
“I don’t wanna get up either,” Rip yawned, the fingers by my face lifting up… and landing on my shoulder, cupping it.
He didn’t say anything and neither did I. I couldn’t even hear him breathing. But I lay there, just for a minute, and thought about all the things I needed to do, starting with getting up and off him. But instead of all that, my mind said later.
The hand on my shoulder gave it a light squeeze that had my eyes going just that much wider. “Take the day off, baby girl. I gotta go into the shop for a few hours, but I’ll come back and help you after that.”
That had me opening both my eyes and staring straight at my cracked television. My beautiful, beautiful television. Okay, it was time to focus on what I needed to do. But I still didn’t immediately move. “I should get to work too. I can’t really afford right now to take a whole day off, but thank you.”
He yawned once more. “I thought you said you had homeowners’ insurance.”
“I do, but I’ve got a feeling they aren’t going to cover everything, and I don’t know how long it’ll take for them to cut me a check,” I explained. “I don’t want to end up being in debt for the next ten years buying everything on credit…” And there went the money I’d been saving for my granite countertops, I realized. Oh well, I guess. They weren’t going anywhere, and mine still did their job and would continue to.
Rip let out another yawn.
“Plus, I’m behind on what I didn’t do yesterday, and Jason never called me, so I have no idea what he did or didn’t do. I can deal with the rest of this stuff—” Never “—after work and during the weekend. I’ll make it work.”
There was silence, and the muscle under me hardened. The hand on my shoulder gave it another squeeze, just as gentle as the one before it. And Lucas Ripley moved his hand from above my arm to graze my cheek… and I held my breath as those rough fingers stayed there. “All right then, let’s go to work.”
Somehow, I managed to stir up a tired smile against his thigh—it was lovely to meet it, and unfortunately we would never meet again unless something like this happened in the future, but I hoped that wasn’t the case—and then I pushed against the cushion under me and sat up. Rip was sprawled as much as possible in a relaxed seated position on my couch, pretty much as melted into it as possible. I had gotten it because it was comfortable, not to be pretty, and with him on there… it was the best-looking couch I’d ever seen, if I said so myself.
With one arm sprawled on the armrest, his shirt was plastered completely to his entire upper body, wrinkled and rippled along his wide ribs, with stuffing from the ruined couch stuck to different places along his sides. His jeans were tight on his thighs… and opened in a V at the crotch, showing just a tiny triangle of black material underneath. That rough, handsome face had “sleepy” written all over it.
I don’t think he’d ever looked better. This sense of longing just…
Sheesh. How was he so freaking good looking all the time? I didn’t need a mirror to know I looked like hell. I’d been looking at myself in the mirror for the last twenty-six years. I knew my eyes were puffy, my face swollen, my mouth swollen. I hadn’t tucked my hair under my head before I’d fallen asleep, so it all had to be sticking out in random directions.
Oh well.
I smiled at him before slapping my hand over my mouth to yawn. “I don’t have anything your size to wear,” I told him as brightly as possible when I was done.
His blink was even lazier than before. “I got a shirt in my truck. S’all I need.”
I lifted my hands over my head to stretch and yawned out, “My shampoo isn’t too fruity, and neither is the soap, if you want to shower.”
Those teal eyes strayed down for a moment before coming back to my face, reminding me I’d slept in my clothes and hadn’t even bothered putting on pajamas.
“The bathroom is down the hall and to the right, in my room, in case you forgot. There are towels in the little closet in there,” I told him as I dropped my arms with another yawn. “I can get the shirt out of your truck if you want.”
Today was going to be rough. I needed ten more hours of sleep, easy. Maybe I could nap during my lunch break.
Rip watched me carefully for a minute before getting up to his black sock-covered feet with a nod.
“Holler if you need anything,” I said to him, still smiling, because why not? Maybe a lot of things sucked, but he was here, doing what he didn’t have to.
He hadn’t brought up the favor in a while, but I wasn’t holding my breath that he’d forgotten how he felt about it. Maybe he still thought he owed me something, but I hoped he knew he didn’t. For once, I didn’t want to remind him.
He shot me a long look, even flicking his gaze down to my socks before turning and heading in the direction of my room. Sitting there, I took a deep breath, smacked my cheeks a little with my fingers, and got up. It didn’t take long to find his keys and then do the same to the T-shirt in his backseat. Then, I followed in the same direction Rip had gone, heading toward my bedroom to pick out some clothes from the pile I’d set on the bed yesterday. We had thrown away so much stuff the night before, I honestly wasn’t sure what I had left. I hadn’t wanted to look too closely or think about it too much.
But things could always be worse.
I looked at the door connecting to my bathroom and imagined, for just one little second, the naked man on the other side. Then I sighed.
* * *
On my lunch break hours later, I headed up the stairs to the second floor of CCC to find two of the guys exiting the break room with funny expressions on their faces.
“Awkward,” the taller one of the two muttered.
“I wouldn’t go in there,” the shorter one said in a whisper.
I frowned.
“They’re fighting,” the taller one explained, still whispering.
Well, it had only been a matter of time.
The other one raised his eyebrows as they passed by me, disappearing down the stairs, as I kept going forward. I had planned on grabbing one of the frozen meals I bought and left in the freezer for emergencies since I still hadn’t gotten around to making my own lunch, and Rip hadn’t gone home, so I couldn’t expect something to magically appear.
I didn’t even need to take a step inside the break room before I heard the arguing.
“That’s fucking bullshit.”
“It really isn’t.”
“No, it really is. You had no right to make that decision without me.”
“I had every right to make that decision without you. You didn’t need to jump the gun—”
“They needed an answer and I gave them one. I tried calling you over and over again, but y
ou didn’t answer.”
“I was busy.”
There was a pause. “So I saw from you taking the day off without saying anything.”
Oh no. It was my fault?
“I get here before everyone else and stay here later than everyone else. If I need to take the day off, it shouldn’t be an issue.” There was a pause and then, “I’m not a kid and you’re not my fucking boss. You don’t get to tell me when I can take time off and when I can’t.”
Mr. Cooper didn’t reply immediately, and I stood there, right outside the break room door, listening and wondering if I should interrupt them or not. Them arguing drove me crazy. It really did.
“I’m not trying—”
“Yeah, you fucking were.”
“Cut me some slack. We’re in this together. I don’t want you getting into trouble.”
“You think I’m doing something to get into trouble?”
“I don’t know, Ripley. I don’t know! You don’t tell me anything!”
“I need to?”
“Why are you trying to—”
Okay. All right. With a sigh, I kept walking, but instead of ducking into the break room, I made it to the office door and knocked before I could stop myself. I didn’t know what the hell I was going to do exactly, but I knew I wanted them to stop and it was up to me since the rest of these chickens never did.
Sure enough, a millisecond after knocking, the voices cut out altogether.
“Mr. Cooper, it’s Luna. Have you seen Rip?” I called out, rolling my eyes at myself for being such a bad liar.
“Sure, Luna, come in,” Mr. Cooper called out after a second.
I wondered what faces they were making at each other. Or at me for being an inconvenience. But I was doing them both a favor. They just didn’t know it.
I didn’t wait for them to change their mind, I turned the knob and peeked my head inside, making sure to put a surprised expression on my face when I spotted Rip immediately. He was standing right by the door, those massive arms crossed over his chest. I gave him a smile that wasn’t totally bright—I was too tired for that—but it was good enough to pass.
Luna and the Lie Page 36