Stronger

by Blue Ashcroft

  When someone else is the scared or suffering one, I can jump into nurturing mode. But when it’s me, I just want to freeze up and hide it till it’s over.

  “Knight, what makes you think he’d do more?”

  Knight sighs and sits back, dragging a hand through his hair. “He’s a psychopath Amy. Geoff thinks so, and I know so.”

  “Yeah well, I’ve been handling it for a year, I can handle it on my own some more.”

  “Amy, he’s dangerous.”

  “Why do either of you care? I’m not your problem. I’m your employee, and what happens outside of work shouldn’t matter to either of you.”

  Knight’s eyes cloud as he looks out at the deck to where Geoff is standing. He looks sad. “I guess, Geoff and I are a little overprotective of the women in our lives. For good reason.”

  “What reason?”

  “Well, I guess because we failed someone important to us, and have never gotten over it.”

  I bite the inside of my cheek as pain washes through me because I remember that his girlfriend Camille killed herself. I barely knew her, but she was still in my year. I knew her face. And I…it still feels like failure, even on my end. So how must it feel for Knight?

  But what does it have to do with Geoff? I look where Knight is looking. Geoff is looking uncharacteristically serious as he stands by the lap pool.

  “Knight, it wasn’t your fault.”

  “You can’t say that. I guess we’ll never know. But it made me who I am. And who I am is someone who is worried that there’s a rapist tailing one of my friends, and one of my best employees.”

  I raise an eyebrow.

  “You can’t not think we’re friends Amy. Not after the years we’ve worked together.”

  I guess normally I’d call him a friend, but I don’t want to if it means letting him interfere in my life.

  Sometimes I wish I could have a dad I could talk to. Not that I would ever give up my moms, but at least if I had a dad, it’d be a man that had a right to meddle in my life, not Knight and Geoff.

  “Why would Geoff tell you that? Why would he care?” I ask.

  Knight blinks. “What do you mean? He’s your friend.”

  I shake my head and exhale. “Yeah, but telling my boss my business goes a bit further than that.” I frown. “Last time I invite him to a party.”

  “Don’t be too hard on him. He’s a good guy. He’s been through a lot.”

  “Oh yeah? You’ve been through a lot, too. What does he have that’s so bad? What justifies him violating my privacy and telling you about my life without my permission?”

  “I don’t know that he’s justified, but in some ways, he’s been through more than me.”

  “How?” What’s worse than losing your girlfriend to suicide? I wonder if I’m really asking because I’m angry at him, or because my brain can’t make sense of the intense look of pain on Geoff’s face last night when he said he couldn’t stand it.

  “Well, Camille was his sister. That’s pretty rough.”

  I try not to show the shock washing over me, but I must be failing, because Knight’s mouth falls open.

  “You didn’t know?”

  “No.”

  “Damnit, that wasn’t mine to tell.” He rubs his chin with his hand. “Don’t tell Geoff I told you.”

  I turn and watch Geoff, still frozen with shock. That Geoff? That Geoff is Camille’s brother? Happy Geoff? High-fiving Geoff? Eat a whole burger in one bite and brag about it Geoff?

  My mind can’t make sense of it. If I were in his position, I could never be so normal, or so happy.

  “But yeah, he blames himself, like I blame myself, and I guess, yeah. It makes us overprotective. Especially if we see something like what happened to Camille potentially about to happen.” He runs a hand through his hair again, harder this time. “Makes us crazy.”

  “Yeah it does,” I say, remembering last night. “I just. Wait, what do you mean, what happened to Camille?”

  “Damn,” Knight says, dragging a hand down his face and staring at me with pained eyes. “You didn’t know that either? I thought Rain would have told you.”

  “Well, I know she…um…killed herself.”

  “She was raped,” he says.

  “Oh. And she killed herself?” I don’t get the connection.

  Knight’s eyes grow hard. “Yes. She couldn’t stand it. Thinking about it. Remembering it. We tried to get her help, but it wasn’t enough. We would have done anything for her. Anything.”

  He leans forward, staring out the front window but seeing something much further away than the pool deck. “I guess in a way, Geoff and I think that if we can prevent that from happening to others around us, maybe someday we’ll be able to make up for failing her.”

  I swallow. This is all heavy, considering I thought I was going to get in trouble for something minor. I don’t want them in my business, but at least I now see why they want to be there.

  “What do you want me to do about Mike? If I confront him, it’ll only get worse. At least now he just shows up once in a while. Has something creepy or off-putting to say. I can live with that. If it doesn’t get worse.”

  “That’s the whole point, Amy. It could.”

  “So what do you suggest?”

  “I have a couple ideas I brainstormed with Geoff. If you’re all right with hearing them.”

  “I guess I don’t have a choice, the alpha males have decided.” I guess I should be pleased that two friends are taking an interest, but it just feels weird. I’ve never had anyone to worry like that, in that male, unreasonably overprotective way.

  Sure, my parents would want to kill Mike if they knew, but then I’d have to tell them what he almost did, and how I had been behaving prior to that. I can’t do that right now. I can’t see the disappointed look on their faces.

  “I want you on the lap pool rotation, all this week.”

  “Why?” That rotation is boring. I groan inwardly.

  “It’s closest to the office. We can keep an eye on you.”

  “You think he’d come here?” The thought sends a chill down my back.

  “I don’t know. Just in case. If you’re right that confrontation makes things worse, then Geoff throwing him out should have done that. Maybe things will escalate, maybe they won’t.”

  “See? I told you we shouldn’t…”

  “But if they have to get worse to get better, so be it,” Knight continues. “I really don’t think, Amy, that you can negotiate with Evil. Placate it, and hope it goes away. I don’t think that’s how it works. You’d have to ask Geoff though. He’s seen more of it than me.”

  “What?”

  “You’d have to ask him about it,” Knight says, standing and opening the door, holding his hand out for me to leave first.

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll also have someone walk you out to your car after shift. It’s dark out there.”

  “Thanks, Dad.”

  Knight stops, taken aback for a moment, and then his eyes twinkle. “You’re welcome.”

  Rolling my eyes, I huff and head out to the lap pool to move the rotation. When Geoff’s eyes meet mine, I look away, flustered and unsure how to react.

  Geoff

  Camille is on my mind today. That’s just how grief is. Sometimes you can go without thinking about it for a while, and then it just hits. The waves are less intense when they come, but I still feel bowled over.

  I miss her.

  When I held Amy last night, it was hard not to remember. When I woke up with her sleeping beside me, it was hard to remember that it was wrong, that she wasn’t my sister, who always used to sleep on my shoulder, and that I should go home and leave her alone.

  Sun shines in through the windows all over the facility, heightening my pain and the intensity I’m feeling. But I’ve pushed this feeling away and I’ll do it again. Pace up the pool to a count of twenty. Pace the other way. If I go home, if I stop working, I’ll have nothing to think of but t
his.

  Her.

  Amy walks out of Knight’s office, looking pissed. They were in there a good while together. I bet she’s angry I got up in her business.

  I was just planning to be a friend, get to know her, and then find out what I need to from her. But I can’t ignore the Mike thing, or the fact that she’s in danger.

  Her scowl at me as she looks away makes me smile, makes it easier to pull my facade back around me like a comfortable coat.

  I’m a badass. With a motorcycle and a crew. Not someone sensitive. Not someone who is lost without his sister.

  “Hey,” I say, with a wave.

  She narrows her eyes at me, and then blinks a couple times, as if thinking something different about me to what she usually thinks. She seems confused, not her usual self towards me. It’s uncomfortable, and makes me feel like my ship is sinking in stormy waters.

  “Hey,” she says, taking the hot tub spot from Steven. He comes over to rotate me, and I wave him ahead. He just shrugs and moves on. It just means an earlier break for him, so guards never do that. But I want to be on rotation next to Amy.

  I look over to see her glaring at me again. Great. Back to normal, the way I like it.

  On a sunny day like this, her hair is such a nice nutmeg brown. I want to put my hands in it, bring it to my face, smell it. Smell it as I pull her against me and kiss her neck…

  I need to focus on the pool, not how much I’d like to pull her close.

  I look at the clock. Seven more hours.

  I can do that.

  Seven hours and three rescues later, I’ve done it. I’m glad three people decided to drown on my watch. I needed the distraction. Nothing like life guarding for the kind of adrenaline that can wipe grief away. Nothing like needing to save someone’s life to keep you from thinking about that one time you didn’t.

  I can’t save Camille anymore. Most days I’ve accepted that.

  But some days. When I looked in that asshole’s eyes, saw the way he was pressuring Amy, I just felt so inexplicably angry. So damned furious. I could have killed him, I really could have.

  Asshole.

  I realize I’m putting my issues with Camille on the shoulders of a guy who’s probably a harmless creep, too wussy to even do more than show up at a party and look creepy. I’m probably projecting my problems on him, as my fancy psychologist would say.

  After Camille died, and my parent’s split cause they couldn’t take it, my mom married a rich dude. They could afford all kinds of therapy. Which was weird because before that we couldn’t even afford school lunch. Suddenly I could afford private school, which was good, because at my old school, everyone knew my sister killed herself.

  Maybe they would blame me.

  Like I do, sometimes.

  Now I have a trust fund. One I’ll never touch, because I don’t want money that came from Camille dying. I don’t want a better life because she doesn’t have hers anymore.

  And a fancy education, with a vocabulary that only comes out on days like this, when I’m too tired to tuck it away behind the facade that keeps things running.

  I’ll live hand to mouth, like I always do, because then there’s no evidence that things changed, that she’s gone. I can survive most days, if I just don’t think about it. If nothing makes me.

  And I have a mission. One I’ve been neglecting.

  I’m glad I rotated off right before Amy, because I’m in the perfect position to walk her out when she gets off in five minutes. She’ll be the last off, because she started on break. I grab a towel out of my locker and towel off my hair, still dripping from my recent save. I grab a tee shirt and swap it out for my tank. Amy isn’t here to yell at me about indecency.

  If you ask me, she just likes my muscles a little too much and doesn’t like that she likes it.

  Back to the asshole. I’m comfortable as the asshole. I put him on with my shirt and hop in the restroom to get into jeans.

  I like my jeans loose, with rips and tears, and a big belt buckle. I like my shirts tight on the chest, loose through the waist. I like logos.

  I finger comb my hair to the side. It always looks cool. I wink at myself in the mirror and sit at one of the break tables to wait. I put my head on my arms for a quick nap.

  I’m sure I’ll hear her and wake up when she comes in. I’m not a sound sleeper.

  Not anymore.

  Amy

  I can’t believe he’s asleep.

  He’s just passed out on his hands at the guard table, looking awesome in a tight tee shirt and jeans. I open the door, trying to be quiet, but his head snaps up and for a second, before he gets his bearings, he looks at me with wild, steely eyes.

  Eyes that pierce through me. A Geoff I don’t really know. Darker. Harder.

  Maybe that’s the Geoff that lost Camille.

  But then his face bursts into a grin, wiping everything else away. “Hey, Dollface.”

  I grimace at the name and go to my locker. “Hey.”

  “Doing anything after work?”

  I shrug, but don’t look over at him. Not with him I’m not. No lack of plans could make me hang out with that Neanderthal…but midway through my usual thoughts about Geoff, my mind starts to change, because of the new information I have.

  And because he saved me the other night. I grip the locker and let my head fall forward for a moment.

  The other guards are out talking in front of Knight’s office. I don’t know why Geoff is still here when he must have been rotated off twenty minutes ago.

  My last rotation was mostly making sure all the patrons got out without anyone falling into the pool or hot tub in my area. You’d be surprised how often that happens.

  “I said, any plans after work?” he asks again.

  “None of your business,” I say.

  “What if I want to make it my business?”

  “Apparently, you want to make everything about me your business,” I grumble, searching for my jacket. I take a quick glance over my shoulder to see him stretch and yawn, seemingly relaxed.

  I find the rest of my clothes and turn to close the locker, but he’s there, hand above me on the lockers, smirk on his handsome, square face. Pecs right in line of sight.

  “Maybe I do.”

  “Do what?” I say, blinking stupidly up into his changing gray eyes. Sometimes they’re steel, sometimes they’re more like the fur on a Persian cat.

  “Make everything about you my business.” He scans me, from head to toe, and my face erupts in a blush. Embarrassed, I move to push him away, but fail to do anything more than brush his chest. I don’t know how to push this Geoff away.

  This Geoff who chased Mike out of my life, at least for a night, this Geoff who represents everything I thought I hated about men, and yet draws me in. This Geoff who wakes up alarmed, with pain and coldness in his eyes.

  Maybe I’m just imagining it. Romanticizing it, because I don’t want to think I could actually be falling for a Neanderthal. If I was falling for him, I mean. Which I’m not.

  Yet.

  But I am attracted. I look up into his face, and he meets my eyes with his own, which are sparkly and amused. He tilts his head down towards me. I tilt further up towards him.

  I guess I do want to kiss him. Just to see what it feels like.

  A slight smile quirks one side of his lips as his eyes catch me watching his mouth.

  My heart is pounding, and I want to move, break the spell, but I can’t. He doesn’t do anything either. For all his bluster, I was expecting him to just go in for it, but instead he’s just waiting there, and it’s driving me crazy.

  He brushes a piece of my hair back into my ponytail.

  “You have so much hair,” he says, smiling.

  “Thanks,” I grumble, because I’m sensitive about it.

  “I meant it as a compliment. It’s pretty. So feminine.”

  I let him touch it because it feels kind of good, kind of lights me up when he brushes my ear with the tip of his f
inger. I bite my lip and stare up at him.

  Who is this man?

  He stares down at my mouth, runs his tongue lightly over his full bottom lip. He’s going to kiss me. I’m going to let him. He leans in close and stops a breath away from my lips. If he spoke right now, his lips would graze mine.

  My knees are already giving way and he hasn’t even kissed me. His finger draws soft lines over my neck and shoulders. Feels so good.

  I breathe against his mouth, unsure which of us will make the first move to close the distance. It’s almost like he’s kissing me already, though our lips aren’t touching.

  I have to say something, or we’re going to go for it. I open my mouth to say something, and my lips meet his. He comes forward with a groan, taking my mouth with his, his hand firmly holding my head while the other goes to my waist. He’s an amazing kisser, and his tongue goes into my open mouth, stroking, searching, heating. Making me unable to think about anything but his hands and mouth and anywhere he’s touching me.

  His hand goes down a little lower than my waist. I’m not ready for this, not in the guard room. I have to say something, anything. To stop this madness between us.

  I pull away slightly. “Why didn’t you tell me about Camille?”

  His hand freezes and he bites down on his lower lip. “Mood killer.” He takes a deep breath and pushes away from the lockers, and me, and the spell is broken. I can breath again. Properly.

  I put a hand up to my chest, where I can feel my heart beating hard and rapidly. It’s got to be just because I worked a full shift after not getting a lot of sleep last night. Not because he kissed me.

  I shut the locker and go to change, but he grabs my wrist gently. “I’ll meet you outside.”

  “Why? I didn’t say I’d go with you.”

  “I know.” He lets me go. “But I promised Knight I’d walk you out.”

  “Oh,” I say. “I should have known it’d be you. I’ll be out in a minute.” I change robotically, not thinking about how I’m doing it, but thinking instead about what it felt like to have Geoff so close, so serious, so…dependable? No, that’s ridiculous. But there is something reassuring about the way he cares. I come out to find him leaning against the door frame, holding the door open with his foot.