“You certainly did,” I said, my tone softening after tasting her warm lips.
She pulled back and, with a smile, said, “You should have seen the look on your face.”
My heart was still thrumming in my chest. “Stace.” I took a deep breath and let it out. “I could have run you over.”
She gave me a playful slap on the arm. “You’d never do that.” Then she tugged my shirt and pulled me toward the front door of her condo. “Come on in. Everyone’s here.”
I didn’t know who ‘everyone’ was, and despite wanting Stacy’s company, I didn’t think I was in the right frame of mind to be sociable. I stopped, and her hand fell from my shirt. She turned around, a puzzled look on her face.
“I don’t know, Stace,” I said. “It’s late. I just came from the hospital and—”
She sobered. “The hospital? Are you all right?”
“No, not me. My mother.”
“Bridget? Oh, God. Is she all right?” She came back and put her hands on my forearm, her brows knitted with concern.
I nodded. “She will be. They’re keeping her a day or two to be sure.”
Stacy looked penetratingly into my eyes. “What happened?”
I hadn’t wanted to bring up my mother’s alcoholism to Stacy, especially since our relationship was so new, but when she stayed over at my place the first time, she had quickly figured it out.
I said, “She just, I don’t know, went too far tonight.”
Stacy put her fingers over her mouth. “I’m so sorry.” Then she pulled me by the arm. “We’re going to drown standing out here in the rain. Come on in and get dry.”
I glanced through the window into the condo. There were several silhouettes of people standing, talking, and drinking. “I don’t know. I have to work early.”
“Then stay over,” she said. “It’ll save you from having to drive all the way across town in the morning. I’m sure Chuck won’t mind.”
Stacy’s house was a mile from Kingsway Airfield. I could get there in a matter of minutes tomorrow morning, rather than the better part of the hour it usually took me to get there from my place.
Once more, however, I glanced through the window. “You’ve got company.”
“Don’t worry about them. Everyone will probably be going home in a while, anyway. We’re just blowing off some steam after our shift.” She pushed herself up on her tiptoes and gave me a light kiss upon the lips. “What do you say?”
“All right,” I said after a moment, and she smiled.
I let her lead me into the house.
* * *
I knew Stacy didn’t have to go to work until later that afternoon. Six days a week, she waited tables at Hangar Hank’s Bar and Grill from four until eleven. The restaurant was a few blocks from her place and just outside Kingsway Airfield.
Sometimes it took Stacy a few hours to wind down after she got home at night, especially if she’d had a hard shift or a few particularly difficult customers.
She usually had a couple of drinks with friends—hers was the closest place to the restaurant, so the party started there. Sometimes she didn’t go to bed until after three in the morning.
When we got into her condo, I recognized two of the girls, Janet and Alice, both waitresses from the grill, and Martin, one of the bartenders.
There were four other girls there who I hadn’t met before. They stopped talking and stared at me. It was only for the briefest of moments, but I could feel their suspicion.
I was starting to get used to that look from people who found out I was an ex-convict. It’s a natural human reaction. I couldn’t blame them; after all, I was a felon, and that knowledge evoked any number of negative emotions. I got anything from mild looks of distrust to outright hostility from strangers.
“Guys, this is Rich,” Stacy said to them. “I told you about him.”
“Uh, oh, yeah,” one of the girls said, recovering from her shock. She drew her lips into a smile. “Hi.”
“That’s Lisa,” Stacy told me. She pointed to the others. “And that’s Bets, Gloria and Karen.”
“Hello,” I said to them, careful to be as polite as I could without showing any signs of self-consciousness.
I spotted Chuck near the back of the living room. He sat on the sofa, his feet up on the coffee table next to a bottle of beer. He had a game controller in his hands. He spotted me and shot me a smile, lifting his elbow to wave.
I waved back.
Stacy said, “We’re going to head upstairs. You guys are more than welcome to hang out, or crash, or whatever.”
“Actually,” Karen said, glancing at the watch on her slim wrist, “I gotta bolt. Thanks for the beer, though.” She did a little skip-step up to Stacy and gave her a hug.
Grabbing a thin jacket from a hook at the door, she slung it over her shoulders and looked back with a smile.
Stacy said, “See you tomorrow!”
The others quickly followed, and soon, only Chuck and Stacy remained.
“Lock up, would you?” Stacy called out to her brother as she grabbed me by the hand and led me upstairs.
“Yeah,” he said back without looking up from his video game.
“I didn’t mean to wreck the party,” I said, climbing the stairs behind her.
“It was getting late anyway,” Stacy said as we arrived on the second floor and went to her room.
For a girl’s room, it was stark. A queen-sized bed with a pink comforter blanket lay under a window that had a blind but no drapes. Centered on the opposite wall was a simple white dresser. A shaded lamp and a jewelry box rested on top. There weren’t any pictures or decorations on the wall.
The two of them had only moved to Seattle six months before, and Stacy had told me she hadn’t had time to settle in yet. Several packing boxes were stacked in the corner, still sealed with tape.
She pointed to my clothes. “Now, get out of those wet things.” No sooner than she said it, she pulled her shirt over her head and tossed it on the bed. She slid her skirt down her long, tanned legs. I couldn’t peel my eyes away. She had a very athletic physique—three days a week, she worked out at the gym around the corner.
In nothing but her bra and panties, Stacy reached into her closet and pulled out a light robe. She wrapped herself in it and, with her back to me, wriggled out of her undergarments.
She motioned to me with her hand again. “Hurry up, would you? I’ll throw everything in the dryer for morning.” A moment later, she gave me a half-smile and shook her head. “It’s not like I haven’t seen you naked before, you know.”
Despite feeling suddenly self-conscious, I began to peel the shirt away from my skin. It was then that I realized how chilled I was from being out in the rainy night. Gooseflesh covered my entire body.
Stacy disappeared out of the room for half a minute while I got undressed, and when she came back in, she had a thick terrycloth robe in her hand. She tossed it to me. “It’s Chuck’s,” she said. “He won’t mind.”
I was grateful for it. I pulled it tight around me and within a few moments I started to warm up. Soon after that, my teeth stopped chattering.
“Want some decaf?” Stacy asked. “Herbal tea? It’ll help you sleep.”
“No thanks.” I crooked my head to the side. “And thanks for letting me stay. I just needed some company, I guess.”
She gave me a big grin. “And you thought of me first?”
“Well, yeah. Of course.”
Throwing her arms around my neck, she planted a kiss on my lips. “You’re so sweet, it’s almost unbelievable.” Taking a step back, she said, “I’m going to go wash this makeup off. Don’t want to go to bed looking like a zombie or something.” She gave me a peck on the cheek. “Be right back.”
With light steps, she disappeared into the en suite and closed the door behind her.
The main bathroom was down the hall, and I made my way to it. After using the facilities, I turned the hot water on in the sink and waited until stea
m began to rise before washing my face and neck. I borrowed some mouthwash to swish and rinse, bemoaning the lack of a toothbrush.
Before leaving the bathroom, I looked at myself in the mirror.
My thick glasses made me look funny; I had always thought so, and had hated them from the time I started wearing them. When I was a kid, I had startling migraines whenever I went outside. An eye doctor said I had photophobia due to cataracts—uncommon for someone my age, but not unheard of. He said it was operable, but my mother couldn’t afford the procedure; her company’s health benefits didn’t cover eye care. Instead, I got glasses. As I grew older, my vision got worse, and the glasses got thicker. Whenever I went outside, I wore clip-on sunglasses; sometimes on bright days, even those didn’t help.
The eye doctor who examined me in prison said that I would probably have to do something in the next ten years or so, or else I would risk blindness.
There was a time in my life when I didn’t care about the future. But now that I was seeing Stacy…
We were still kind of a new thing, but I had started to experience an unfamiliar feeling: hope.
I combed my hair with my fingers and tried to make myself look less ragged.
When I returned to Stacy’s room, she was still in the bathroom. I slipped into the bed after hanging the robe on the top corner of the closet door.
We’d had sex before, but our intimacy was still new enough that I quite often found myself nervous and uncertain about it. I wasn’t sure if we were going to do it tonight, but I could feel myself growing aroused at the thought.
The anticipation was enough to make me forget about everything that happened earlier in the evening. Maybe a part of me wanted to forget…
I moved to the far side of the bed to make room for when she came out, and tried to position myself to appear both casual as well as enticing.
After several long minutes of waiting, however, I rested my head on the pillow.
Before Stacy returned from the en suite, exhaustion overtook me, and I fell asleep.
Chapter Three
One moment I was fast asleep, and the next I was wide awake. For the span of a heartbeat, I had no recollection of where I was.
Opening my eyes, I saw the glow of an unfamiliar alarm clock as the time rolled over from one fifty-nine to two o’clock. My heart skipped a beat from disorientation, then I remembered that I had slept over at Stacy’s house, and I took a deep breath.
I could feel the heat from a body lying next to me, and heard the sound of gentle snoring. Stacy was on her side, her back to me, and in the dim light, I could make out the feminine curves of her body under her thin nightshirt.
Gingerly, so I wouldn’t wake her, I eased out of the bed and reached for the robe.
I wrapped it around me, and softly padded out of the room and down the stairs.
Thirsty, I intended to make my way to the kitchen for a glass of water or milk, but I saw there were still lights on in the living room, and changed direction.
Poking my head through the doorway of the hall, I saw Chuck sitting on the sofa. He still held a gaming controller in his hands, and moved his arms erratically. I couldn’t hear any sound from the television, but I saw that he had a headset on.
Tall and thin, he was more awkward than lanky. Chuck had the same curly black hair as his sister, and though it was nearly as long as Stacy’s, he wore it in a ponytail. It made him look like a throwback to the hippie movement.
He jerked suddenly when he noticed me there, and he quickly replaced his startled look with a wide grin. Taking off the headset, he put it and the controller on the coffee table.
“Hey, Richard,” he said. “Can’t sleep?”
“I guess.” I took a step inside the room. “What are you playing?”
“Just a racing game. Wanna try?”
I shook my head. “I’ve never really liked video games,” I said. “They give me a headache.”
“Right.” Chuck gave me a little nod and pointed to his eyes. “The flashing lights.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s gotta suck.”
In the few times I had been over, Chuck had never seemed abashed or apologetic about his forward manner. He didn’t go out of his way to offend anyone with his comments or remarks, but it didn’t seem to bother him if someone took it the wrong way. If they took offense, it was their problem, not his. In a way, it made me feel a little more relaxed around him.
I let out a dry laugh. “Sometimes it does suck.”
Giving me a wry smile, Chuck got off the sofa. “I was just going to grab another beer. Want one?”
“Thanks, but no. I should probably head back upstairs. Six o’clock comes pretty early.”
“Work,” Chuck said as he edged past me on the way to the kitchen. “Ugh.” After a moment, he gave me a sidelong glance. “You’re at Worldwind Avionics, right?”
“Yeah.” Then I added, in a lower voice, “My mother got me the job after I—” I wasn’t sure how comfortable I was talking to him about my time away. “It’s just temporary until I can find something better.”
“I think Stacy mentioned something about you being a janitor there?”
“I’m on the maintenance staff, actually. Move things around, change light bulbs, odd jobs like that. It’s honest work,” I said, perhaps a little too defensively.
Chuck pulled a beer out of the fridge and popped the cap. He took a swig and held his hands up. “Hey, I’ve done crappier jobs than that. If it keeps your fridge stocked with beer, what’s the difference?”
“Yeah, I suppose.”
Conversationally, he asked, “So, what’s the big plan? I mean, have you thought about what you’re going to do with the rest of your life?” When I shot him an alarmed look, he shrugged and lifted one eyebrow. “Hey, you’re dating my baby sister and everything. Just looking out for her, you know. You and I never really sat down and talked.”
“Well,” I said, drawing my words out. “When I was a kid, I always wanted to be a pilot. But that was a stupid phase or something.”
“Why didn’t you go for it?” Chuck took another swig of beer. “Because of your eyes again?”
“That and I’m afraid of flying.”
Chuck spat out a mouthful of beer and laughed. Then he saw that I was serious.
“Really?” he asked.
I lifted my shoulders in a noncommittal shrug. “I get the sweats when I think about being in a plane.”
He pointed his finger to punctuate his statement. “Dude, you work at an airport. How whacked is that?”
Starting to get uneasy with the conversation focused on me, I said, “So, what about you?”
It occurred to me that I didn’t know what Chuck did for a living. I didn’t recall Stacy mentioning much about it. Whatever it was, he either did shift work, or made his own schedule. It was a weeknight, and he was up playing video games until the small hours.
He made a puzzled face. “I have no problem with heights.”
I blinked, not understanding his answer right away. Then I said, “No. I meant, what do you do? For work?”
Eyes brightening, he smiled. “Let me show you.”
With that, he quickly walked past me to the door leading into the basement of the condo. I hadn’t been down there, and never guessed that it was used for more than a storage or laundry room.
Half the room was filled with metal shelving containing computer towers, printers and monitors. Several laptops rested on two workbenches, and there was one low-backed office chair on a thick plastic floor mat. All the machines were on, and the screens flickered with rolling text.
I was never much of a technology junkie, so I had no idea what I was looking at. “Are you a web designer or something?”
Chuck laughed. “Not a chance. Tried that once; wanted to throttle every last one of my clients.”
Glancing at several monitors one at a time, I couldn’t interpret what I was looking at. “Stock market?” I asked, pointing to a column of
words that changed every few seconds.
“Good guess. Close, but not really.” He sat in the chair and rolled up to one of the laptops. Whipping his finger along the touchpad, he brought up a new screen for me to look at.
There were dozens of subject lines that, at first, made no sense to me: “Requested Docs”, “Updated Specs”, “Sell Sheet”, “Communication Approval Form”, “Contact for Certification Board”, “Shipment Delay Notification”, and many more.
“Email headers,” Chuck said, gesturing to the screen. “Look. Let me open one for you.”
* * *
Subject: Upcoming Teleconference.
As we continue to increase momentum on the agreements with Xi’an Industries, the management team would like to have a regional conference call with all production heads to go over the new procedures and manufacturing guidelines sent over from the Chinese Safety Commission. It is mandatory that all shift supervisors attend.
* * *
“Are you a hacker or something?” I asked, blurting it out. Immediately, I chastised myself, not because of the possibility that Chuck might take it as an insult, but because I had forgotten the most important lesson I learned in prison: keep your mouth shut.
He shot me a sharp look. “You cool?”
I composed myself and spoke in a casual voice. “Yeah.” I wasn’t a rat.
“Hacker crap is for pimply teenagers and spammers. I consider myself more of an internet Samurai, a web warrior, an online outlaw.”
Clearly, he was proud of himself, and wanted me to appreciate what he could do, though I wasn’t certain I understood what that was exactly. “This isn’t a credit card thing, is it?” I asked, mostly being polite. I really didn’t want to know any more about what Chuck was doing than I already did.
“Are you kidding?” he said, smiling. “That’s for amateurs. No, what I’m doing is levels beyond that. I’m data mining, sure, but why bother Joe Ordinary, or scam Grandma and Grandpa out of their Social Security? Too easy to get caught with that. And you’d get crucified if you went to trial. No, we live in an information age, and information is king.”
I wasn’t following, and it must have shown in my face.
Angel's Breath: The Second Book of Fallen Angels Page 2