Tommy’s Baby

  Then next time I saw him looking at me, I was taken by his expression. The look on his face wasn’t hurt or angry anymore. I couldn’t name what it was. It was unnerving. I wanted to know what he was thinking, what he thought of my being there, on his turf basically. Did he like having me here? Did he wish I’d go away? Well, even if he did, too bad. This job was my lifeline for the moment, and I wasn’t about to slink away for his convenience. We were both adults and, like Connor said, we could act professional. Even if I left work every night wanting Tommy’s hands on my body. Even if I saw him go into the little stockroom this morning and imagined what it would be like to follow him, to drop to my knees and unzip his jeans. To take him in my mouth after so long, how even the taste of his skin would be like hope to me. I had always loved how I could overwhelm him that way, how his hands would go to my hair and gently knead my scalp, his voice breathless and worshipful. I could shut my eyes and feel his muscled thighs under my hands, the heat of his skin, the rasp of his hair, the salty velvet of his cock surging between my lips.

  Things not to do at work: remember giving blow jobs to your boss. When he wasn’t your boss. When he was your first lover and you’d discovered everything together. I ached at the thought, at the memory of him. Of the boy I’d left, the boy I’d lost. So when he looked at me now, I didn’t know how to puzzle out his expression, but part of me was afraid he hated me. And the same part of me would give anything even now to make him stop hating me.

  On my first day off, I looked over my notebook—I didn’t use a bank, so I kept track of everything on paper. I had enough money to pay for two more weeks at the motel upfront if I wanted. And some to spare for toothpaste and socks and other essentials. I felt myself relax. I wasn’t going to be evicted or go hungry. I was fine. I decided to head out the beach. Sam had insisted I go the first day I had off, and I wanted to be able to tell her I’d been to the ocean. So I slipped on my bikini and a pair of shorts. I put on the cheap sunglasses and two-dollar flip flops I’d bought at a souvenir stand.

  I walked a long way and finally located the beach. My sense of direction on the island was getting better, but my motel wasn’t in the nicest neighborhood, not near the touristy beaches. When I stepped out onto the pale, powdery sand and took in that bright expanse of blue, the sunlight gleaming off its surface, my heart lifted. I was a city girl and had been all my life, preferring the cold Lake Michigan to the broader more temperate seas. But this was wild and open and called to me. I kicked off my flip flops and wiggled out of my shorts. There was a crowd further down the beach, and a few surfers near where I was going in. I waded in; the water slightly cooler than the scorching hot air. It felt crisp and refreshing, and I walked out deeper, feeling wet sand shift beneath my feet with the motion of the waves. I ducked my head and slicked back my hair. It felt great to my burning scalp.

  “You have sunscreen on?” a familiar voice asked. I looked over to see Brendan O’Shea on a surfboard.

  “No,” I admitted.

  “Then get out of the water right now, go over to that office, the tiki looking one over there, and get some off the counter. You will burn and peel and it will be horrible. Trust me.”

  I nodded and did as I was told. I knew he meant well, and I just hadn’t spent the twelve bucks on decent sunscreen yet. I hiked across the hot sand and slathered on some sunscreen from the pump jug on the counter at the office for the surfing business. When I went back to the water, I thanked him.

  “I appreciate it.”

  “Hey, you can’t enjoy your day off if you’re blistered and miserable. Get yourself some sunscreen as soon as you can. Or else I’ll tell Elise and she’ll force some on you. She swears by this mineral stuff for her and the baby, and she’s a fanatic about sun safety.”

  “Okay,” I said, not sure what to do with what was obviously personal information. Like Connor, Brendan, had already been off in the military when Tommy and I had been together. I didn’t know him well and he barely knew me. I just nodded to him.

  “You want a surf lesson? My last appointment finished up early.”

  “I’ve never been on a surfboard.”

  “So? You’ll love it. Consider it a perk of working at the pub. Free introductory surfing lesson. You’ve got to be initiated to the St. Martin life. There’s a reason we all retired and became beach bums.”

  “Bums? I’m pretty sure you guys are going to own the whole island soon the way it looks. You don’t seem like you sit around working on your tans,” I said.

  “Well, that’s true, but we all like the weather here and the outdoors. It’s nice to be able to do the work I love, and I’ve been able to expand, employ more instructors.”

  “Okay, show me how it’s done.”

  Brendan had me stand on the shore with the board while we practiced how to kneel and stand, how to shift my weight to my back leg and the right way to hold my arms. After what seemed like forever, we paddled out into the water. I held the edges of the board while I tried to plant my feet under me. I wobbled, lost my balance and fell in the water. The next attempt had me flipping over, board and all, and getting a nose and mouthful of burning saltwater. I came up coughing and cussing and Brendan laughed and helped me back on the board.

  After five or six more tries, I managed to stand up on the board for a few seconds before I fell off. He corrected my stance and gave me some pointers.

  “I’m a city girl,” I said. “I’m not cut out for water sports.”

  “Don’t give up. You don’t strike me as someone who gives up easily,” he said.

  “I’m usually not,” I admitted. Except for with his brother, my inner voice chided.

  “So get up there and try again. Do you think every tourist I teach to surf is a natural? No way. The only thing that separates the ones that succeed from the ones who fail is grit. You either give up or you keep going.”

  Climbing back on the board, I blocked out Brendan’s commentary on finding my balance. I’d done yoga long enough to know how to balance and steady myself. Once I tapped into that skill set, it was easier. Triumphant, I straightened up without too much of a wobble and stayed standing for a long time before I lost my balance and fell off before the wave made it ashore without me. I came up laughing. It had felt great and surprisingly like finding my still point in meditation after a good yoga session.

  I kept at it again and again, doggedly until I could find my footing every time and finally managed to ride a couple of small waves in to the shore all the way. I was thrilled with myself and had relaxed more than I had in a long time.

  “Thank you,” I said. “For the sunscreen and the lesson. That was really fun.”

  “I’m glad you liked it. How’s it going down at the pub?”

  “Good,” I said, hearing how faint my voice sounded.

  “Give my baby bro some time,” he said.

  So he knew. I shouldn’t be surprised. They were a tight-knit clan.

  “I—” I started to say before Brendan held up his hand.

  “He’ll come around,” he said. I shook my head, but he continued. “Liza, you have a terrible poker face when he’s around. It took me about thirty seconds to see everything written on your face. I bet he’ll see it too, when he’s ready to. Just hang in there.”

  I ducked my head and found my shoes, feeling hope bubble up so high in my throat. All the way back to my motel room, it was all I could think about. The fact that Tommy’s brother thought that I had a chance after all this time.

  Chapter 13

  Tommy

  The last of the lunch crowd cleared out. I updated the latest receipts on the app I used for bookkeeping on the fly. We had a more sophisticated system in place, but I used the app to track the times and days we had the biggest business and which items sold the most. It was useful at ordering time so we didn’t spend money on products that weren’t moving as fast. Connor had chafed at the idea at first, but it improved our profit margin, so he grudgingly used it himself as well.

&nbs
p; Rum was still tops, followed by Guinness, thanks to our Irish theme. A recent rush on Stella Artois made me grimace, but I took note of it. I was looking as a businessman, not a beer drinker. I finished adding my data and opened a bottle of water. Brendan came in and sat at the bar. I shouted his usual lunch order to the kitchen and waited to hear what he wanted to drink.

  “Just a pint, brother,” he said. But he was looking at me. Brendan was the serious one. He didn’t look at you, really zoom in, unless he had something to say. I looked right back at him, hoping a stare down would back him off. But no. Nothing backs off an ex-SEAL. I knew that better than most.

  “What the hell are you looking at, dude?” I asked.

  “For one thing, you’re starting to sound like Connor. Something’s got your tighty whities in a twist,” he smirked.

  “I wear boxers. And there are worse O’Sheas to take after than Connor,” I retorted.

  “I just finished teaching Liza to surf,” he said offhand.

  I felt my fists clench and my eyes narrow at him. My blood pressure kicked up a notch too.

  Brendan shook his head, a smile on his face, “Relax, bro. I’m not peeping on your girl in a bikini. I’m a happily married man.”

  “That’s bullshit. She—Liza—' I made myself say her name, “hasn’t been my girl for a long time.” I sounded bitter even to myself.

  “That’s not how it looks from where I’m sitting. It looks to me like she never stopped being your girl.”

  Something that felt like hope twisted in my gut, but I tamped it back down. I wasn’t going back down that road. The fact I still felt anything about her, hurt or anger or hope or longing—any of it, proved that I didn’t have any business being around her. I should have been over her years ago and felt nothing but a slightly bored passing interest in her when she turned up. But I was still vulnerable to her somehow. And that had to stop. So I just shook my head and busied myself with lining up glasses on a shelf.

  “You have to talk to her,” Brendan went on. “Air out whatever happened when you were young and stupid and move on.”

  He finished his beer, took his carryout order and headed out. I stared after him. There was no way I was going to have a heart-to-heart with Liza Jo Kelly about how we broke up and talk about feelings and shit. This wasn’t a teen drama. This was my real life. Maybe it was time to pick up a hot sorority girl to take my mind off old regrets. I felt myself grimace at the thought. Without even so much as looking at a cute young tourist, my stomach turned. I hadn’t had much interest in picking up women for a while now, and all at once, it seemed like I had a real aversion to the idea. Like it would be wrong. It felt wrong. It felt like cheating. Like something I couldn’t stand to even think about.

  Like taking another woman to bed—a woman who wasn’t Liza—would make me sick. I felt hot all over, then clammy. Sick to my stomach. Maybe I was getting sick or something, I reasoned. I hadn’t been with Liza in ten years. It’s not like we were anything to each other in all that time. I hadn’t been a monk, that’s for sure. But my lack of interest in dating and hooking up started over a year ago. Then she came here, and I couldn’t even flirt. It was like I’d lost my superpowers or something—the sight of her or even the knowledge that she lived on the island now was enough to dull my normal mischievous instincts.

  How was she affecting me like this? And why did my chest fill with some kind of excitement, adrenaline even, anytime she walked in the pub? Seeing her in the O’Shea’s polo shirt or the apron over her street clothes—I liked her having O’Shea written across her chest. Hell, I probably would’ve asked her to tattoo it on her skin when we were dating if we hadn’t broken up when we did.

  A shiver ran through me, sharp and strong. Just from the thought of O’Shea tattooed in dark green ink along her side, the curve where her waist dipped in, or right across her bikini line so it would show above her panties. God, I wanted her so much my mouth went dry. It was a wild, raging need that screamed within me. Something that never quit calling out for her.

  Maybe Brendan was right. Maybe the reason I felt so insane with her around was because we needed to clear the air. If we talked about it once, briefly, that might be enough to put the whole thing behind us. We could be coworkers. Maybe even old friends. I used to make her laugh all the time, and it was the best sound in the world. I’d give damn near anything to make her laugh again. Liza didn’t look like she’d been happy in a long time. Laughing wouldn’t come easy to her anymore. She seemed nervous around me, but it was more than that. More than even the dread and drama of working in close quarters with a man who wanted to marry her a long time ago. Did she remember that? That the most craven, desperate thing I ever said was to her—I’ll marry you. Please. Just say yes. I’m not leaving you behind. I’m coming back, coming home to you. Let me make you my wife, please.

  It had been the worst day, the last death throes of a relationship that I wanted to hang on to more than I wanted my pride. So I’d begged her to marry me, and she’d said no. Then she had said the worst thing, too. Liza had said if I would just stay, if I’d stay in Chicago with her, she’d have my baby. I knew damn well that wasn’t the right thing to do. We were bartering lifelong commitment and parenthood to try to control each other. We were young and so damn stupid and arrogant. She was going to be an amazing chef, a superstar. Having a baby that young would’ve changed everything for her, made that practically impossible. And I was enlisted, I couldn’t just go AWOL because my girlfriend didn’t want me to leave. We would’ve ended up hating each other if I’d stayed.

  Didn’t we hate each other anyway? I wondered. She wasn’t a superstar—she was a fry cook in a bar in the Caribbean. I wasn’t a war hero or Captain goddamn America after all. I was just a bartender slinging rum drinks and bad limericks for tourists.

  I hadn’t imagined she’d end up alone. I’d thought she’d be on the cover of every culinary magazine and have a cooking show by now. That she’d have a husband and a couple of kids. She always wanted kids. I shut my eyes, feeling the weight of it. She had wanted to have kids with me. And I’d wanted babies with her, babies with those mysterious, amber eyes of hers.

  After all this time, I remembered the exact way she fit against me, the shape and weight of her against me. Like a shadow she’d left on me. Like a fingerprint. I rubbed my chest absently.

  I was going to have to talk to her after all. As much as I hated to admit Brendan was right, he was on target this time. Because I couldn’t go on like this. I was torturing myself. If I just told her once and for all, that I was sorry it turned out badly and I hoped it all worked out for her—then that would be bullshit because if it had all worked out for her, she wouldn’t be frying mozzarella sticks in a bar thousands of miles from home. I wanted to ask what went wrong, but I didn’t have any right. Walking away from her at twenty-one had cost me any claim I had on her secrets or her failures. She would never have failed, I thought stubbornly. She was too determined, too independent. It wasn’t in her to give up. So much must have changed for her. I couldn’t help the part of me that wanted to fix it, wanted to put her back together.

  I’d never lost that instinct to protect her, that conviction that she was mine. That was the only thing I hoped Brendan was right about. If I had to choke out an apology to him and say he gave me good advice, at least I could have that—the concept that she wasn’t over me any more than I was over her.

  Chapter 14

  Liza

  We were completely covered up for most of my shift. They’d even called in extra servers to help out, and there was still a line out the door of people waiting to get in the pub. It was a little overwhelming. I kept my focus and completed every dish that was ordered as efficiently as possible. Still, they lined up on the counter waiting to be picked up.

  When I had a second to catch my breath, I grabbed a tray and loaded it with orders to serve. I hustled out of the kitchen, tray held high, and went to a long table of noisy young women. I passed out their food
swiftly. A redhead waved to me, “Hey, can you send the hot bartender back out here? I think I need me a refill!” she said in a fit of giggles. Her drink was still mostly full, and I wanted to slap her for ogling Tommy—there could be no mistaking who she was talking about. Still, I nodded and took my empty tray back to the kitchen. I told one of the workers to make some more fries if the grease was hot enough while I dished up bangers and mash and some stew. I assembled burgers and dealt out barbecued short ribs. A server ducked in to say they needed more apps for the line.

  I stopped what I was doing and assembled a tray of small bites. There were mini sliders, tiny mozzarella sticks, wings, and some potstickers I’d made earlier. I passed the tray to the server before returning to my station to start another batch of meatloaf. I had been the one to suggest a meatloaf sandwich and fries with gravy for tonight’s special, but after finishing my sixth batch of meatloaves an hour ago, I’d started to regret it. Now batches seven and eight were on deck and I put them together expertly, then slid them in the oven and set the timer. As I was scrubbing my hands, I saw Tommy enter the kitchen. He picked up an order and turned to go. My eyes were on him. I couldn’t help myself.

  He lifted those blue eyes to meet mine. I felt the impact roll through me, of being his focus for an instant.

  “We’re having a bonfire at our place tomorrow night. You should come,” he said.

  I nodded, looking around behind me, cheeks heating, worried that maybe he was talking to someone else standing near me. But everyone else in the kitchen was absorbed in their tasks and not looking at him or standing anywhere close by. He had asked me. I felt a flood of relief and joy. It wasn’t a date. I wasn’t stupid. But it was an olive branch. He had offered to be civil, maybe even to be my friend. Or at least to end the thick tension and anxiety between us. If he could act like this was normal, that I was just another new hire he was being nice to, then I could do the same.