by Christa Wick
"Oh..." I folded back just enough of the paper that I could add another note.
Newbies always fill oxygen tanks.
"Baby girl," he laughed. "I think I love you."
Chapter Twenty-Three
Dare
Once Eden knew I had moved to Tucson, I began finding ways I might casually run into her rather than showing up at work or her apartment and making her feel completely boxed in. I bought my groceries at the stores closest to her home even though I was renting halfway across the city. I hit all the social venues where the other EMTs and firefighters liked to hang out. If a location looked like it had even the smallest potential, I was there. The only exception I had made was for one highly probable opportunity -- the first of Graf's fundraising events for Laurie.
It was easy to skip. I was the new guy, getting to know the area and my team. Fewer volunteers were needed. And I had sent Graf on his way out of my office with a hundred dollar check tucked into his folder.
The second fundraiser, a carnival set up on the lot of a recently closed dealership, needed too many volunteers for me to dodge it. Graf had also learned that I had turned down a basketball scholarship at a southern college. In his eyes, that made me one hell of a lure for the hoops booth where shills would try to win their honeys a stuffed animal with three successful, consecutive, throws of a small basketball at a cleverly angled hoop.
Considering that I would be in plain site and easily avoidable by Eden under circumstances that otherwise cautioned against my approaching her, I agreed. When the day came, I did my two hours barking and sinking balls to draw in the more competitive males in the crowd.
Ten minutes before my scheduled slot ended, Dave DiMarco showed up to relieve me. I worked through my remaining time, chatted with him and lingered a little longer after discovering we had some mutual interests. Feeling it was safe to ask him a question, I pointed at one of the women passing by.
I singled her out because someone had painted a skull on her face. I had seen quite a few similarly decorated faces go by as well as clowns, lions, rabbits, swirlie girlie princess masks and so on. But the skulls made me uncomfortable even if I had a tattoo of one on my back as a memorial to fallen firefighters I had known.
I mean, Laurie was a civilian who worked a touchy-feely kind of job. The hard reality of a fleshless face had nothing to do with her line of work, and I wouldn't be adding her name below Mike and Adam's.
Or anywhere else on my body, for that matter.
"It just seems odd," I explained. "I mean, the carnival is for a woman who is dead."
"Welcome to Little Mexico," DiMarco laughed. "The calavera are part of the Dia de los Muertos tradition."
I gave him a blank look. I couldn't even translate the words he had just spoken, let alone attach any cultural significance to them.
"It's basically what they call our All Souls Day -- Dia de los Muertos or Day of the Dead," he continued. "They make candy skulls, paint their faces with skulls, stuff like that to honor the dead. Half the fire department is at least a little Mexican. The rest of us are Mexican by osmosis."
He pulled out his wallet and showed me a picture of him with a beautiful Latina woman. The two of them each held a dark haired child, the kids about a year apart.
Dave's lily white ass and her lovely brown skin made me think of Felix Hernandez and how chummy Eden was with her ambulance partner. The small amount of snooping I had done indicated she wasn't dating anyone, but seeing her and Felix together, I wondered if maybe the office gossips wouldn't know if there was a work romance happening under their noses.
"And it doesn't matter if we're months away from the actual holiday in November. The designs are popular year round." Dave smacked a wad of singles in his hand from the last schmuck who had tried his luck with the hoops. "The face painting station made three times as much as any of the game booths last year. Graf is hoping he can get Abbey to come to all of the fundraisers."
"Who is that?" I asked, uncertain whether he was using a first name or a last name. Just like the military, firefighters were prone to skipping first names, even among friends. Different stations kept different schedules, but several consecutive 24-hour shifts at the station followed by several days off was standard. On any given rotation, there might be several individuals present with the same first name. Defaulting to last names avoided confusion.
So maybe he was talking about Eden or maybe he wasn't. I knew she had spent a lot of time sketching when she was a kid, but in the two weeks she had lived with me on her return, she hadn't given me any indication that she had kept the hobby up.
"The hottie EMT chick," he answered, the lovely Latina pictured in his wallet temporarily forgotten. "The one who rides with Hernandez."
He dropped his voice down low. "You know, the gay with the big mustache."
"Right." I processed the different streams of information he had just fed me. First, Eden was at the fundraiser. Second, no matter how close she and her partner were, they were not close in the way that I had feared. And, third...
Fireworks exploded in my chest as I considered the full implication of information stream number three. Eden was taking donations to paint on people. Painting on people took time. Given the incredible detail I was seeing on those people who had selected the skull faces, it probably took a lot of time. She had to remain in close proximity to the person she was painting. And she wasn't just painting faces. I had seen a few of the drawings on the hands of those shooting baskets and several guys had passed by completely shirtless with animal prints painted on their chests.
DiMarco had drifted off to check the air pressure on the balls. I caught his attention with a knock on the counter.
"You know where I can find the nearest ATM around here?"
Hands on his hips, he turned a half circle then pointed at the northeast corner of the lot. "Convenience store across the street. You'll have to exit on the east, though, because of the fences."
Grinning, I thanked him and left.
As I walked to the ATM, I scrutinized the wisdom of my plan. I had avoided the first fundraiser, a casino night for adults followed by an auction, because it was absolutely the wrong environment to run into Eden. To begin with, it had been located in a much smaller venue, offering Eden less opportunity to avoid me if my presence proved too uncomfortable for her. More importantly, the schedule Graf had distributed beforehand clearly showed that he planned another one of his speeches. He had actually described the half hour speech scheduled before the auction as "eulogy." If I had tried to connect with Eden with all those reminders in the air around us, the sun would burn out before she'd ever speak to me again.
The carnival, on the other hand, was bigger, the larger crowd offering a certain anonymity. And the only reference to Laurie was on a small sign board at the entrance.
Pulling two hundred dollars from the ATM, I went in search of Eden's booth. When I found it, she had a line of three people. She also had an assistant, her partner Felix, handling the money and passing her supplies.
I lurked a few booths away where neither of them could easily spot me. I considered the possibility that she might refuse to paint me. The chance increased if she realized I was standing in line. Even if she didn't consciously realize why, her hands might begin to cramp before my turn came around.
Waiting for the line to disappear would give me time to consider whether I was about to make yet another mistake with Eden. She hadn't responded to my texts that first night. She had made it clear she wanted nothing to do with me at the hospital a few days after I sent the texts. The few times we had encountered one another on the job, she had remained professional but aloof.
I shoved a hand into the front right pocket of my jeans. I had stuffed the twenties from the ATM inside and I smoothed a thumb along the paper as I considered my next step. One, I could go home. Two, I could get her to paint the smallest thing possible on my hand. Three, I could launch a full-scale assault and pick the most time-intensive image for her
to paint.
Going home was not an option. Every day that passed was a chance for some other guy to move on her. I could list half a dozen men in the department who were interested based on how they acted when she was around. Someone said she was taking classes at the community college. That was another group of males to worry about.
Hell, she might even decide to find a boyfriend as another layer of insulation between us.
Seeing her chair empty and no line, I pushed away from the booth and started walking toward Eden. Felix saw me first, his gaze hardening when he realized their table was my destination. When I had just a few feet to cover, he grabbed the price chart and a dry erase marker. The five dollar lion face became fifteen dollars. The twenty dollar full skull face became one hundred dollars, as did the twenty dollar chest painting. Every single option was quickly marked up three to five times its actual price.
Eden noticed what he was doing. She followed his line of sight, her face tightening when she saw me. Rolling her eyes, she turned away, ignoring me but showing no sign of being ready to put up her paints and brushes.
Determined to be unhelpful, Felix offered a passive-aggressive greeting. "Thank you for visiting our table. All funds go to the Laurie Quade memorial scholarship fund."
Offering him a chilly smile, I started counting out the twenties in my pocket in front of him, all ten of them. Then I stripped off my t-shirt and sat in the folding chair next to Eden. She placed a binder on my lap. The pages were separated by tabs for the face, hands and chest. I selected the most intricate of the sugar skulls. The feminine color scheme of my selection had Felix chuckling.
Eden remained stone-faced. I flipped to the chest. One of the options was an articulated skeleton, white ribs, collar bone and sternum on black. I pointed to it.
"Oh, chica," Felix cackled. "Why don't we give your poor hands a break for a few minutes. I can lay down the black for you."
And that was how I wound up sitting on a hard plastic chair with a gay Hispanic male making slow swipes of a makeup sponge from the bottom of my neck to an inch below my belly button. His estimate of a "few" minutes proved to be fifteen as he insisted on being very thorough.
At first, I was quietly pissed. But as Hernandez kept up a running stream of commentary that bounced between being homoerotic to sounding eerily like it had been modified from a movie like Silence of the Lambs, I noticed the faint upturn at one corner of Eden's mouth.
"He puts the paint on its nipples." Felix said, dabbing a spot he had already gone over twice. "It's pretty, pretty nipples."
The other side of Eden's mouth started to get in on the action. Her shoulders even did a little dance as she suppressed a chuckle. I didn't care that she might be laughing at my predicament. I only cared that she was laughing. That was one hell of a crack opening in what had become a very icy facade and I would try like hell to exploit it.
Felix's little plan to make me uncomfortable was backfiring on him -- big time.
"He puts the paint in the basket," he finished, handing off the tub of black to Eden.
Sliding into the seat Hernandez had just vacated, Eden ordered me to sit closer to the front edge of my chair, then tilt my torso back and rest my head on its top edge to account for our different heights. I obeyed, eager for her to begin working on me.
"Close your eyes," she ordered, her voice growing remote once more.
Again, I obeyed, even though I wanted as much eye contact as I could manage. And when she wouldn't look at me, I wanted my eyes open to read her face for signs of what was going on inside her head.
She began sponging the black paint Felix had used, this time onto my face. She covered my eyelids, my forehead, along my nose and cheekbones. When she moved to my jaw, I opened my eyes.
"Keep them shut," she barked. "I'll be skipping around with the colors. I'm not going to give you a warning each time I need to work on or around the eye socket."
"Understood," I said, my tone casual even though I wanted to call her out on being reluctant to have me watching her or to risk our gazes colliding.
My lips danced with the knowledge that I really didn't need to see her expression to get an idea of the effect produced by our being so close together, her hands actually on me, her attention necessarily focused on the features of my body. Just like that night on the pullout when she had been too terrified after the fire to sleep alone -- her breathing would betray her to the right man.
I was that man.
Relaxing beneath her touch, I listened intently for my first clue and soaked in all the other sensory details that resulted from our proximity. The faint scent of cocoa butter filled my nose.
I brushed my palms against the top of my thighs, drying them against the denim. She leaned forward, her hip brushing my palm. The contact jerked my eyelids open. Our gazes met. She growled lightly and brought her brush down so that it intersected my line of sight, the bristles close enough to my pupil that I instinctively blinked.
When I closed my eyes again, she exhaled a little more fully than before. The careful measurement of her breaths began to crumble the closer she was forced to lean in as the work progressed. Strawberry lip balm replaced the cocoa butter I could smell.
I inhaled slow and deep, my lips buzzing with the knowledge of how little space separated our mouths. My hand flexed, the flesh acutely aware that a shift in position of just a few inches and it could close around her hip.
She began working on my mouth. One hand curled around my neck, the fingers pressing lightly against my spine to guide me into the exact arch she needed. The more detailed lines and shapes required a brush instead of a sponge. The bristles caressed the sensitive skin of my lips as soft as any lover's touch.
"Stay still," she hissed as a delirious tension pushed my head and chest up.
The reluctance with which I tried to relax caused my nostrils to flare. The mix of strawberry and cocoa butter and the way the sun toasted her skin as she worked made my mouth water. My nails scratched at my palms, agitation and need ballooning inside me.
I could have been in that chair hours or mere minutes as she painted my face. I lost all track of time. Even so, when she pulled away and pronounced the skull portion finished, I grabbed the hand mirror and searched for some defect in her craftsmanship that would prolong the task.
Finding it annoyingly flawless, I grunted.
All that remained was for her to draw the bones on my chest. She motioned for me to sit upright. I had been so absorbed in sensing Eden, I had missed the fact that a small cluster had gathered near the table to watch her work. To my dismay, they were all women and Eden probably wasn't the focus of their attention.
"Seems like I'm not the only one turned on by your big chest and six-pack stomach," Hernandez joked, his voice low and his hand cupped around his mouth.
I pretended not to hear what he had said and to be equally oblivious to the women. I kept my eyes on Eden, watched her become absorbed in the process. Elation swelled when her focus strayed from the lines she was painting to the flesh she was painting on.
Her lips rolled, she swallowed, her breathing became erratic and then her hands got a little shaky. She stopped painting and looked up to find me watching her.
"I remember when you used to sketch me instead of sketch on me," I whispered. "I like this better."
The reminder and innuendo was a misstep. Tension edged her hazel gaze. She dropped her attention to the remaining lines and quickly finished the bones that remained. Shoving the mirror into my hand, she rose and walked a few feet away.
As I checked the lines, the most daring of the women approached me.
"The shading makes it look so three dimensional," she cooed then giggled. "I feel like I should touch it to make sure they aren't real bones."
Her hungry smile and raised brow revealed her real reason for wanting to run a finger along my body. I shook my head, acutely aware that Eden was watching the exchange. Her partner also seemed keenly interested in how I would respond to the
obvious come-on.
"It would be a crime to smudge the artist's masterpiece," I replied. "I'd have to find a cop to arrest you."
Undeterred, she made another, more blatant, attempt to hook me. "You mean like a threesome?"
"No, I meant you in a jail cell for assault." Shaking my head, I stood up and turned to Eden.
Her expression closed off, she flicked a hand in my direction. "Washes off with soap and water when you're ready. Shouldn't stick to your clothes or towels."
Grabbing the dry erase board, she ignored me as she wiped the surface clean. She spoke, her words seemingly directed at the air around her rather than at her partner or the next potential customer.
"Supplies are about out, time to pack up."
"Sure, chica." Felix tossed me an uncertain glance. "I was thinking the same."
Knowing I had just been dismissed, I walked away. The last thing to reach my ears before I was out of hearing distance was Felix's voice.
"I think you should listen to what he has to say."
I shoved my hands in my pockets and kept moving, certain his vote of confidence was too little, too late.
And the fault was all my own.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Eden
Felix wanted to drive me home from the carnival, but I opted for the bus so I had time alone to think. I stopped along the route and treated myself to a rare meal at a restaurant. I couldn't know for certain Dare would be at my doorstep when I made it back to my apartment. But the man had just tossed away two hundred dollars for a little time in my chair, so I was in no hurry to get home.
Reaching the bus stop in front of my apartment complex with that thought still rolling through my head, I had to laugh at my naivety. Every last penny of that money was going to the Laurie Quade Memorial Scholarship Fund. Considering he had put a shockingly large ring on her finger and promised to marry her, he had likely already donated more than that to her memory and would keep on donating to it year after year.