“Get outta my chair. This isn’t your place. We doing all the fill today?”
“I think we have time.” Spider smiled and moved to the client chair. “The area’s not that big.”
“Let’s do the main fill, then we’ll talk about shading when that’s done. Just because it’s flowers doesn’t mean it’s not worth the time to do it right.”
“Damn straight.”
Tayla broke into their conversation. “Ginger, I’m probably going to have the occasional question while I do the books since we’re new. Is that cool, or am I going to be distracting you?”
“Nah, you’re cool.” She nodded to a blank workspace. “Just move the computer there. Cash won’t be in until after lunch today, and he actually cleaned his shit up.”
“Perfect.” She moved her stuff from the back desk to the currently empty station. There was plenty of room to spread out. “Spider, how’s Daisy?”
“She’s good. Busy. She told me your second interview in that shithole city went well.”
“Yeah, it did. Can you stop calling San Francisco a shithole?”
“I will if you agree to stay in Metlin.”
“Fine. Keep calling it a shithole. I don’t care.”
“You leaving us after all?” Ginger sat down and pulled on her gloves. “Damn, Tayla. I’m gonna have to get another bookkeeper?”
“And I’m gonna have to find somebody else for trivia night,” Spider grumbled. “Ethan doesn’t know history for shit.”
“Nothing’s for sure,” Tayla said. “Yet. They haven’t offered the job to me.”
“But they invited her to a company barbecue,” Spider said. “So they’re going to.”
Ginger pursed her lips as she filled small plastic cups with ink. “That sucks. I mean for us. I’m sure Tayla’s thrilled to get out of here.”
“I’m not thrilled,” Tayla protested. “I like Metlin. I’m not dying to leave or anything.”
In fact, more and more she had to admit that Emmie and Ox had a point. She didn’t have many friends left in San Francisco. Most of her social life had moved away. Other than Tobin, and he hadn’t even returned her text when she was in the city the week before.
Asshole.
Why was she moving away from Metlin again?
“She likes Metlin a little.” Spider spoke from the chair as Ginger cleaned his arm and inspected the outline. “She likes Jeremy a lot.”
Ginger’s needle began to buzz. “Jeremy Allen is hot as shit. I was tempted to hit that, but he’s too damn sweet. I would ruin that man.”
Tayla felt an unexpected stab of jealousy. After she left, maybe Ginger would “hit that.” The flare of anger surprised her.
“Relax.” Ginger smiled. “I don’t poach men. Especially not from people I like.”
“Especially from people who could mess your financial shit up,” Spider said. “Tayla holds the power.”
“Shut up, Spider.” She opened Ginger’s computer and started to examine the happy rows of numbers. “I would never be unprofessional with someone’s private financial information.”
Ginger cackled and put the needle to Spider’s skin.
Tayla liked numbers. They didn’t argue. There was no grey area. Numbers added up or they didn’t. Accounts were reconciled or they weren’t. Nothing was subjective.
“So if you like Jeremy so much, why are you leaving?” Ginger asked.
“This job isn’t just a job. It really is my dream job.”
“Doesn’t sound like your dream job,” Ginger muttered. “Not when you’re having to leave a place you like.”
“Good point,” Spider chimed in.
“It is my dream job,” Tayla said. “Every opportunity means sacrifice.”
Ginger snorted. “Who told you that shit?”
Her father. She’d heard it so many times she didn’t even question it. “I just mean… the world isn’t going to lay everything out on a silver platter, is it? You have to take opportunities where you can find them. There’s never going to be a truly perfect job. You have to sacrifice to get what you want.”
What had her father sacrificed?
Family. A relationship with his wife. His daughter. Did he think it was worth it in the end? He’d reached the height of success at his firm, and yet he slept alone at his club most nights with no one but a bunch of other rich assholes to keep him company.
“I don’t believe in sacrifice.” Ginger was curled over Spider’s arm. “I mean, I believe in working your ass off. That kind of sacrifice. And I believe in going after what you want. Personally, I think if the world isn’t going to give you want you want, then you make the world your bitch until it gives it up.”
“That’s poetic. Thanks, Ginger.”
“Hold up,” Spider says. “She’s got a point. I mean, how great a job is it if you have to give up living in a place you like that has a better cost of living and is where most of your friends live? Sounds like you’d be happy at work and nowhere else.”
Tayla sighed. “It’s not that I don’t like doing people’s books and being my own boss and working with Emmie sometimes and leading book club and all that stuff. But I cannot tell you how excited I am about this company. For real, it’s not just a normal job. It’s like… a mission. It’s being part of something big. Who’s to say I won’t make new friends at this job? They seem like really cool people.”
“Yeah, okay.” Ginger shrugged. “Whatever works for you. If you feel like settling, settle.”
“It’s not settling.”
Ginger lifted the needle. “Tayla, everyone in Metlin likes you. You’re practically a celebrity here. Don’t pretend you don’t like it. Your best friend is here, and she’s not leaving. And added to all that, you’re banging Jeremy Allen, who is about the sweetest damn man in this town, and he looks at you like you’re a fucking goddess.”
“You also dominate on trivia night,” Spider added. “There’s no guarantee you would in San Francisco. There’s probably more book-smart people there.”
“Thanks, Spider, that’s helpful.” Ginger shook her head. “Remind her she’s surrounded by numbnuts here.”
“I said book smart. Not real smart.”
“I like Jeremy.” Tayla felt her cheeks flush. “More than like him, maybe.” Definitely. “But Ginger, you of all people cannot be telling me I should give up an amazing job opportunity to stay in Metlin for a man.”
“I’m not saying that.” She turned the needle on again. “I’m saying I think you should get everything you want.”
“Life doesn’t work that way.”
“Says who?” She glanced up. “In a dream world, what would you want? Emmie to move back to the city? Would you want Jeremy to move up to San Francisco with you?”
The thought was tempting, but also impossible. “Neither of them can move, Ginger. And Jeremy would be miserable there. He hated living in LA.”
“I agree. So… I don’t know. Don’t settle, and figure out how to get everything you want. That’s my advice. You’re a smart girl. Work it out.”
Tayla turned back to the computer while Ginger continued filling in Spider’s tattoo.
Just figure out how to get everything you want.
Sure! Why not? I mean, why wouldn’t SOKA move their entire operation to Metlin? Give up their amazing office in the city? Move away from a large international airport and down to Bumfuck, California?
Made total sense.
Tayla almost snorted iced tea through her nose. “He did what?”
Gus smiled. “So I told his mother there’d been a little complication and we’d be late for dinner.”
“Getting stuck fifty feet up a pine tree isn’t a little complication! Did you tell her about the tree?”
“If I’d told her about the tree, she’d have tried to keep that boy in town, and he wasn’t made for town.” Gus winked. “I knew that much when he was a little bug.”
Jeremy had his hand over his face. His cheeks were dark red. “Pop, you�
��ve got to stop telling people this story.”
“We managed to get him down. I knew a forest service guy with a cherry picker.”
“How long was he up there?”
Jeremy said, “About five hours.”
“I told him if he could climb up the tree, he could climb down. I was too old to go get him. I had arthritis by then.”
“He told a five-year-old that it was up to him to find his way back down a fifty-foot-tall sugar pine,” Jeremy said. “This family has no mercy.”
“It was a damn fool thing to do, bug.”
Tayla’s eyes were the size of saucers. “How did you even get up that high?”
“I had no fear on the way up,” Jeremy said. “When I got to the top branch, I got a little freaked out.”
Gus reached for another slice of pie. “We should have known then about the mountain climbing thing.”
Tayla shook her head. “I guess so.” She held up her hand when Gus offered her another piece. She’d accepted Jeremy’s invitation for dinner, and Gus proceeded to make a delicious tri-tip dinner followed by dessert and all sorts of embarrassing stories about Jeremy. “Does it bother you?”
Gus frowned. “What?”
“The rock climbing thing?”
“I’m his old grandpa,” Gus said. “He doesn’t listen to me. Does it bother you?”
“A little.” Tayla glanced at Jeremy. “I don’t love the idea of him getting hurt.”
“That’s the truth.” Gus cleared his throat. “But you know why he does it?”
“I think so.” She stole a glance at Jeremy, who was watching her with an unreadable expression. “I know he says it centers him. The way yoga does for me.”
“I’m guessing with yoga you keep your damn butt on the ground though,” Gus said.
“Well, yeah.” She looked at Jeremy. “But I’d never ask him to stop.”
He mouthed the word thanks.
“Besides, it isn’t my place,” she said.
“Sure it is,” Gus said. “Look at him.”
“Pop, enough.” Jeremy stood and reached for the plates. “Tayla, you want anything else?”
She shook her head. “I’m good. The food was great. Thanks, both of you.”
“The pie came from Daisy’s café. Do you know it?” Gus’s eyes twinkled. “Café Maya. She makes me a fresh blueberry and sour cream every week. That was my wife’s specialty. Did Jeremy tell you that? Blueberry sour cream, and sweet potato. That was my other favorite pie. Every church picnic, she’d bring a sweet potato pie. Everyone wanted her recipes. She only gave them to Maya though. Daisy’s grandma. They were friends.”
“Wait, so Daisy’s grandma—?”
“Maya. She was friends with Louisa, my wife. When Maya and Enrique first moved here, they didn’t speak a lick of English. Enrique worked on the ranch for a while. He was a damn good worker and knew his horses, that’s for sure. We managed, even though I didn’t speak any Spanish back then.”
“Wow. What year was that?”
Jeremy said, “Probably around 1955? 1956?”
“It was 1957 when they moved to the United States. And none of the white teachers in town had classes for the Mexicans who wanted to learn English. The schools had some classes for children, but they wouldn’t take adults. Now, my Louisa’s mother was a school teacher back in Georgia and she had that teacher’s spirit. Do you know what I mean?”
“I do.”
“So she started a class after church on Sunday. And all the Mexicans who wanted to learn English would come to learn at the church. That’s how she and Maya got to be friends. They stayed friends their whole lives. It was hard on Louisa when Maya passed. She passed young.”
“So did grandma,” Jeremy said.
“Not as young as Maya,” Gus said. “Daisy’s mama had all her recipes though, so they kept up the café. And my Louisa’s pie recipes are the ones they still use, isn’t that right?”
Jeremy smiled. “Yeah, Pop. Daisy’s added a few new ones, but the older ones are all grandma’s.”
“That’s amazing.” Tayla marveled at the long ties of friendship and family. She had family history on the Reyes side, but her mother didn’t talk about it. Her grandparents had passed. She didn’t really know her aunts and uncles in Sonoma. Her father’s family back east were a video chat once a year, and no more than that. “That’s really special, Gus.”
“Special and delicious.” Gus gave a decisive nod.
“That’s our family motto,” Jeremy said, wiggling his eyebrows. “Special and delicious.”
Tayla burst into laughter.
Gus rose to his feet. “And that is my cue to leave you two young people, because I don’t want to hear anything about that business, Jeremy Allen.”
“Turn your ears off then.”
“You know I will.” Gus took his cane and paused by Tayla’s chair. “Young lady, thank you for joining these two old bachelors for dinner. There’s hope for this one, huh?”
“Good night, Gus.” Tayla kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks for the steak and the stories.”
“See?” Gus turned to Jeremy. “That is our family motto: Steak and stories.”
“Go to bed!” Jeremy kissed the top of Gus’s head. “I’ll clean the kitchen.”
“You better.”
Gus walked down the hall and into his bedroom, leaving Tayla and Jeremy alone.
“Special and delicious, huh?” Tayla raised an eyebrow.
“Give me a hand with these dishes and I’ll tell you all about it.”
Chapter Twenty
They were lying naked in bed, and Jeremy was using Tayla’s scarf to demonstrate his knot-tying skills.
“The figure eight you know…” He held her wrists together. “But do you know how to tie a figure nine loop?”
“I don’t.” She batted her eyes. “Thank you so much for teaching me.”
“You may need to practice.”
She leaned over and lightly pulled on his chest hair with her teeth. “You may need to let me go first.”
He lifted her hands over her head, making her breasts arch up to his mouth. Taking one of her nipples in his mouth, he scraped it with his teeth before he laved it with his warm tongue. “I don’t know,” he murmured against her skin. “I kind of like practicing on you.”
“I feel like, at some point, a climbing harness is going to get involved here.”
“Holy shit.” He turned his eyes upward. “Do you think I can secure a pulley to the ceiling?”
Tayla burst out laughing. “I was joking.”
“I’m not. I think.” His eyes narrowed and he turned back to her before kissing over her breasts and belly, tickling her neck with his beard, and generally making her laugh more than she ever had with a man.
Jeremy wasn’t only a great lover, he was fun. Tayla had never been able to let go like this in the bedroom. Sex was usually an intense, serious “let me show you how hot I am” display of manliness. Making love to Jeremy was easy and fun. He was confident without being cocky, though… he could be a little cocky too.
He enjoyed teasing her. He liked it when she teased him. If something awkward happened—and something awkward always happened with sex—he laughed and then proceeded to make her come, even while she was laughing. His knee slipped off the bed once, and they both went down. They tumbled onto the floor in a heap. Tayla pulled a groin muscle, but she couldn’t be mad, especially when Jeremy massaged it very thoroughly.
“For medical purposes.”
Right.
He tied another loop on the end of the scarf and hooked it over a corner post. “So, while I have you here—”
“Teaching me knots?”
“Exactly.” He kissed up her body. “I thought you could give me your opinion on an important discussion topic.”
“Really?”
“Really.” He reached under her and arched her back up, bringing her breasts back to his mouth. “I mean…” He licked between them. “There’s a lot of
discussion about positive female representation in comics these days. And because you are female—”
“I’m so glad you noticed.” Her voice was high.
“—I thought you might have an opinion.”
“Okay.” She could hardly breathe. “Um… did you have a specific concern?”
He moved down her body and got to his knees. Then he pulled one of his casual He-Man moves and flipped her onto her stomach, her hands still tethered over her head.
“Oh!”
He bent down to her ear. “You good?”
“Yeah.” He was driving her crazy, but she was happy to play along.
Jeremy smoothed a hand over the small of her back and along the curve of her bottom. “This area, for instance.”
“Yeah?”
“It provokes a lot of debate.”
“Really?” She could feel his hands along the outside of her thighs, tracing the round flesh. “Um… what do people debate?”
His hands massaged her ass, thumbs tracing the sensitive line where the curve of her bottom met the back of her thighs. “Some critics think that comic book depictions exaggerate the proportions of the female buttocks. They think artists oversexualize female characters.”
“Really? And what do you think?”
“Me?” Jeremy straddled her, his knees on either side of her thighs. He lowered himself until his chest touched her back. “I find it very difficult to complain about a generous ass on a woman, but I can’t argue that it isn’t overtly sexual in nature and therefore possibly objectification.”
Tayla was panting. “Did you know that feminist criticism of comic book culture turns me on?”
He reached down and felt between her thighs. “I had no idea.”
Fuck. She bit into his pillow. “Jeremy—”
“You still comfortable with your arms up there?” he asked again, his beard tickling her neck.
“Yes, just stop torturing me or I swear—”
He shoved her knees open, brought her hips up, and slid inside.
Fuck yes.
Tayla sighed in relief. Then she wasn’t sighing at all. She was moaning into his pillow. She was begging. She was yelling his name.
At one point she was pretty sure she blacked out.
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