Jacked - The Complete Series Box Set (A Lumberjack Neighbor Romance)

by Claire Adams

  “Yeah,” he says. “Well, I don’t know if you’ll believe me or not, but nothing really happened.”

  “Is that a ‘nothing happened really happened’ as in stuff happened, but you didn’t go all the way, or is that a ‘nothing really happened’ as in nothing really happened?” I ask.

  “Would it bother you if something did happen between me and…your friend?” he asks.

  “Her name is Abs,” I tell him, “but you can’t call her that. Her name is Abby. So, did something happen with the two of you or not?”

  “I can’t believe it,” he says. “You, my dear, are jealous.”

  I’m laughing, but trying to cover my mouth at the same time. I can never fake laughter. My inability to smile properly on demand isn’t particularly well-developed.

  “You are,” he says. “Well, that changes things.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask. “And I am not jealous.”

  “Well, we can’t very well work together on this project if you’ve got these feelings for me. I’d be over here suggesting some brilliant idea or other and you’d be giving me the googly eyes and trying to picture me naked,” he says. “We’d never get any work done.”

  “First off, I’m not jealous,” I tell him. “Second off, I don’t have feelings for you that would affect, prevent , or even manifest in any conceivable way, as I’m not entirely sure what it is you think I feel for you.”

  “Third off?” he asks.

  I actually did have a third off, but he broke my rhythm, and the little teleprompter in my head just had a power outage.

  “I don’t even care,” I tell him. “The two of you are consenting adults and it’s none of my business what you did at that party.”

  “Can I tell you something?” he asks.

  The waiter comes over with my bruschetta and prosciutto, but he walks away before I can ask him which one is which.

  “He forgot me,” Ian says. “That dude’s not getting dick for a tip.”

  “If you’re going to talk like that, would you mind not doing it so loudly?” I ask, my face growing red as I look around the café for signs of the offended.

  “What do you mean?” he asks. “What’s the problem? I always talk like this.”

  “I get that,” I tell him in a whisper. “I’m just saying that I would appreciate it if you would curse quietly if you’ve got to curse at all. It’s embarrassing.”

  “You know, you dress kind of funny and you hang out at some pretty weird places for someone who’s so uptight about swearing,” he says. “They’re just words like any others, only someone at some point decided this term was acceptable, but that term wasn’t.”

  “Could you rephrase what you were saying to convey the same point, but use what you’d call an acceptable word instead?” I ask.

  “Listen,” he says. “I’d love to sit here and go the rounds with you again and everything. Sparring’s one of my favorite hobbies. That said, we have a lot of stuff to do and I don’t think that we’re going to get any of it done by sitting here and arguing whether or not I could have gotten away with saying the guy wasn’t going to get—”

  “Very sorry for the extra wait, sir,” the waiter says, interrupting Ian at what I can’t imagine could have been a better time. “Here’s your cheeseburger and french fries, sorry again about the wait.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Ian says calmly, and the waiter walks away.

  “You kind of switched gears there, didn’t you?” I ask.

  “Nothing happened with me and your friend,” he says. “She was kind of looking for something, but I wasn’t interested.”

  “Why not?” I ask.

  “Because I’m interested in you,” he says.

  I’d hoped for a response like that, but he’s so matter-of-fact about the whole thing that it takes a few seconds for his words to really process in my head.

  “You’re interested in me?” I ask. “You have a funny way of showing it.”

  “What do you mean?” he asks, taking a few french fries then dipping them, first in the ketchup, then in the mayo.

  “That is disgusting,” I tell him.

  “What?” he asks. “It’s called fry sauce. You just mix ketchup and mayo together. I’m telling you, it’s the best thing you’ll ever dip your fries in.”

  Ketchup is fine, but mayo on fries? Ew.

  “Listen,” he says, “we can sit here and argue over fry sauce, or we could see if we can get some work done. Where are we on everything?”

  I grab the folder sitting next to me on the seat and set it on the table. “We’ve got our topic and everything, general approach, too,” I tell him. “What we need are questions to ask people to test our theory.”

  “Which is?” he asks.

  “Oh, shut up,” I tell him. “The professor already decided on your idea, you don’t have to—”

  “I’m not rubbing it in,” he says. “To be perfectly honest, my mind’s kind of been focused on other things. I know we were going to talk to people who hold fringe or extremist viewpoints on either end of the American spectrum and see if there’s any common ground between them and everything, but what is our basic statement?” he asks.

  “You mean our hypothesis?” I ask.

  “Sure,” he says. “Whatever.”

  “Our hypothesis is that, by interviewing people with radical social and/or political beliefs, we may begin to see a pattern, even in those whose beliefs appear to be incongruent or even opposite,” I tell him. “The problem I’m seeing is that we’ve only got like a month left and if we’re going to do things your way, we’re going to need a lot of time for these interviews. I think the first thing we should do should be to write out some questions we’d like to ask and then we can worry about how to find these people.”

  “They’re not hard to find,” Ian says. “They’re usually the people with the loudest opinions and the least fundamental understanding of the world around them.”

  “So you’re saying anyone who has a firm opinion on their beliefs is ignorant?” I ask.

  “Not at all,” he says. “It’s when those beliefs have no basis in reality, and when someone questioning your beliefs becomes a cause for going off that you cross the line into freak mode.”

  “Freak mode?” I ask.

  He dips another few fries in his ketchup and mayo, lifts the top bun of his burger. and places the fries between the bun and the cheese.

  “The questions won’t be a problem,” he says, ignoring my question. He reaches down to the floor to the side of the booth and grabs his backpack.

  While he’s looking for whatever it is that he’s looking for, I’m gazing down at my plates. One looks like a dessert and one is definitely not. The one I like is the dessert, but I forgot to stop the waiter and ask which one it is when he was giving Ian his food.

  “Here,” Ian says. “I think this should help.”

  He hands me his open notebook and I start reading. They’re questions to ask interviewees.

  “When did you do this?” I ask.

  “I am a college student,” he says. “I do realize there’s going to be homework from time to time.”

  I flip the page. The back of the first page and at least the front of the next one are filled not only with linear questions, but with, “if so, go to this question,” and, “if not, go to that question.”

  “These are good,” I tell him. “I think we can use these.”

  I look up at him.

  He’s taking a bite of his burger, and I take a moment to wonder why it doesn’t bother me that he has fries dipped in ketchup and mayo on his burger, but it bothers me when he eats them without.

  “Great,” he says through a full mouth. “I’m going to need to up my practice time as the competition comes closer, but I’ll put as much time as I can into this. Despite what you may think, I’m not just some ingrate who expects other people to do my work for me.”

  I’m laughing.

  “What?” he asks, fidgeting a l
ittle in his seat.

  “I don’t know if you know this,” she says, “but I saw you biff it when you were trying to drop in at the skate park.”

  “Yeah,” he says, looking anywhere but at me. “I know you were there.”

  “What was that, anyway?” I ask, still tittering. “I’ve seen you skate before, but you looked like you didn’t know what the hell you were doing.”

  “There was some loose gravel at the bottom that I didn’t see in time to react,” he says, but I know he’s lying. Besides, I was at the park for a while, and I caught him running out or crashing every time he went down that half-halfpipe section.

  “I don’t think so,” I tell him. “If that was the case, you would have cleared it out before you tried again.”

  “I was just having an off day,” he says. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “You know,” I tease, “for someone who’s been skating as long as you have, it’s pretty hilarious to see you crash out repeatedly on something so basic.”

  “Who says it’s basic?” he asks. “If it weren’t for that vert section of the park, I wouldn’t have access to a vert ramp at all. Have you ever tried to roll in on a vert ramp? It’s harder than it looks.”

  “Oh my God,” I say, covering my mouth. “You can’t drop in.”

  “Shh!” he says, putting his finger to his lips and hunching forward like we’re talking nuclear secrets. “It’s not a big deal,” he says. “I’m working on it and I’m going to have it all down in time for the competition.”

  “You really can’t?” I ask. “I was half-joking.”

  He takes a few seconds to weigh his options.

  “Are you going to eat any of that?” he asks finally, pointing to one of my plates. “What is that, anyway?”

  I sigh.

  * * *

  “This is humiliating,” Ian says as we’re walking up to the park.

  “Well, you’re the one that brought your board,” I tell him.

  “Yeah,” he says, “I was going to come here and practice after we met up and everything. I just wasn’t expecting to have an audience when I did.”

  “There’s nobody here,” I tell him.

  It’s actually kind of strange to see the park deserted this early. The sun is setting and nobody ever bothered putting up lights around the park, but with the street lights in the distance, there’s still just enough light to see by.

  “You meant me,” I chuckle, “didn’t you?”

  “I’d rather nobody see me dropping in until I can actually learn to come out of it,” he says.

  As much fun as I’m having with Ian on this, I can’t imagine how terrified he must be to be this close, but doomed to fail. Even if he gets perfect scores in the street competition, if he can’t drop in, that’s it. Game over.

  “Why don’t you just try dropping in once and I’ll see if I can tell where the problem is,” I tell him.

  He’s looking at me like I’m telling him to kill his cat.

  “You know, just because we’ve got our questions for the interviews and everything doesn’t mean that we can just—” he starts, but I think he realizes about halfway through this is just something he needs to do. Either that, or he’s figured out that no matter what he says, I’m going to pester him until he goes through with it anyway. “All right,” he says. “I’ll do it, but I’ve had enough people laughing at me for not being able to do this, and I really don’t need any more negative reinforcement.”

  “You know, negative reinforcement isn’t actually what you think it is,” I tell him. “When you add something to a scenario, even punishment, it’s still considered positive reinforcement because you’re adding. If you take something away from a person, that’s called negative reinforcement, and it occurs to me that none of that is really that important right now.” I look up at the spot where he’s supposed to drop in, and I’m just glad I don’t have to do it.

  Still, he’s on the cusp of going pro. This is something he should really have in his toolbox if he expects to do well as a pro skater.

  “Do you want me to climb up there and observe or do it down here?” I ask.

  “It really doesn’t matter, does it?” he asks, and walks past me. For an instant, I think he’s upset with me, but as he gets to the top and looks down, it’s clear what emotion he’s feeling right now. It’s fear.

  “All right,” I tell him. “Let’s see what you’re doing and let’s see if we can’t figure out a way to do it better.”

  “Helpful,” he says. “Ready?”

  “I’m ready when you are,” I tell him.

  He takes one more look at the slope and gets his board ready, the tail on the lip, and I’m hoping that my years of watching skate competitions live and on television have prepared me to be able to dissect what he’s doing and tell him how to fix it.

  “All right,” he says, and he puts his other foot on the board.

  What happens next doesn’t really compute in my head. I see him leaning forward, I see him crouching like I’ve seen other skaters, and then, about halfway down, something I can’t even see goes wrong and he comes off his board, managing to stay on his feet and running out of it.

  His face is already red and I can feel his frustration from over here, but I honestly don’t even know what happened.

  “Any thoughts?” he asks.

  “Do it again,” I tell him. “I need to figure out what went wrong and it happened too fast the first time.”

  “What makes you think it’s going to happen slower the second time?” he asks. “Camera phone and a slow motion replay?”

  “Now I know what to look for,” I tell him. “We can start taking videos and breaking them down, but don’t you think we’d just end up spending all our time on the film and none of it on the actual work that’s going to change things? Don’t you want to get this right for the competition?”

  “Of course I do,” he says. “I was just hoping to be able to do this on my own time and without anyone to see just how bad I am at it.”

  “Give it another run,” I tell him. “I bet I’ll have a better idea after this next one.”

  He’s shaking his head, but he climbs back up to the top anyway.

  This is one of the things that really drew me to skating in the first place: the determination. I’m convinced that it’s impossible to be a successful skater without that particular personality trait.

  “Ready?” he asks.

  “Yeah,” I call back.

  I’m watching more closely this time. Whatever happened, it happened when he was about halfway down the ramp.

  His board’s in position and he’s leaning forward, only this time, he loses his nerve just as the wheels are coming down on the ramp, and he free falls the 14 or 15 feet to the ground.

  Oddly enough, his second attempt does seem to take longer than his first, but I think that’s only because he’s on his way toward a tremendously hard fall, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

  It looks like he tries to tuck and roll as he comes down on the hard ground, and he surprisingly is on his feet less than a second later, but it looks like he’s gone straight from frustrated to pissed as he tracks down his board, slams his foot on the tail, catches it, and starts stomping back toward the ramp.

  “Hold on,” I tell him.

  “What?” he asks.

  “You’re hurt,” I answer.

  He looks down. His pants are torn just above the knee, and there’s a pretty decent cut from which he’s bleeding pretty steady.

  “Fuck,” he says. “Well, that sucks.”

  “Are you all right?” I ask.

  “I’m fine,” he says. “I don’t even know what happened that time.”

  He starts walking again like he’s going to go for another run, but he’s leaving a trail of blood and I can only see the situation growing worse if we don’t take care of it.

  “No,” I tell him. “We need to get that wound cleaned up and make sure you’re not going to need stitche
s. You don’t want it to get infected, do you?”

  He groans.

  “This was such a bad idea,” he says. “I don’t know how I let you talk me into this.”

  “Hey, just be glad I’m here to talk you out of going back up there, or who knows what kind of gash you’d end up with,” I tell him.

  It takes a minute, but I finally convince him to postpone the drop-in practice or whatever we’re calling it and get where we can get a better look at the laceration. The only caveat is that he insists we go to his house, as he says it’s closer.

  We start walking, and I don’t know if the wound really isn’t hurting him or if he’s trying to put on a brave face, because he’s not limping or favoring the leg in any way, though I can see the two sections of skin puckering and parting like lips when I catch a good angle through the new tear in his pants.

  We’re walking a few blocks, and the lower-middle class surroundings start turning into upper-middle class surroundings as the houses grow larger, the cars grow nicer, and the number of people outside doing their own yardwork plummets.

  “I didn’t know you were a rich kid,” I tell him.

  “I’m not,” he says. “My dad’s a lawyer. Me, I don’t have shit for money, at least not yet.”

  We take a right and walk a little longer before we come up to what must be Ian’s house. Even for a lawyer, it looks like his dad is doing particularly well for himself.

  “Nice house,” I tell him.

  “Yeah, it’s all right,” he says. “We’re going to have to go in through the back if we don’t want to track blood over all the carpet. There’s a bathroom just off the sliding back door, and it’s all tile through there.”

  “Okay,” I answer, and follow him around the house. There are a couple of lights on, but there doesn’t seem to be any signs of noise or movement.

  We go in through the back door and I follow Ian to the bathroom he was talking about.

  “Come in,” he says, one hand on the door, the other motioning for me to enter.