by Quint, Suzie
“This afternoon?” Her voice was high with panic. “I—I can’t. I don’t have a babysitter.”
“What’s the job pay?”
“What’s it— I don’t know. I figured the tips would—”
“I’m not talking about bartending. I’m talking about the babysitting gig. How much does that pay?”
“I—I—”
Zach couldn’t help smiling at having caught her so unprepared.
“Why are you being so nice to me?” Maddie asked abruptly.
“Why do you think?” Zach knew his voice betrayed his smile.
“Because … you want something.”
Zach’s smile faded. She was right, of course, but he hated that she was so suspicious. Something in her past had made her as skittish as a colt in a lightning storm. He liked the way they played together, but if it was always going to come back to this every time, to her being afraid to trust him beyond a certain point, then it was time to let her see his hand.
“Look, I like you; not much point in lying about that. I think you’re lightnin’ in a bottle.” Zach was gratified to hear her giggle and discovered he liked making her laugh. “If something happens between us, Maddie, I’d like that a lot, but this, today … there’s no strings attached. I don’t expect anything in return. In fact, I’ll be disappointed if you only see me again out of gratitude.” He put a smile into his voice, knowing he was about to say something she didn’t expect to hear. “Don’t lead me on, girl, if that’s all you feel.”
A long silence followed his speech.
“Maddie? You still there?”
“I’m here.”
He waited for her to say something. Finally, he couldn’t stand it any longer.
“Maddie, I—”
“Zach—” Maddie said at the same moment.
They both stopped.
“Go ahead,” Zach said. If she didn’t talk first, he was afraid he’d say something stupid, just to fill the silence.
Maddie’s voice had a smile in it. “Are you good with children?”
Zach took a deep breath, releasing it slowly. “Kids love me.”
“Is that really true or are you just telling me what I want to hear?”
“Both. Does this mean I got the babysitting gig?”
Zach crossed his fingers in the long silence that followed his question. She was obviously hesitant about leaving her child with him. Given that she didn’t really know him, he understood that. But he wanted to see her again. Damn near craved it. In the silence, he could almost hear how badly she wanted the interview Rachel had set up. He hoped it was enough to get her to take a chance on him. Finally, she said, “Maybe. If I can’t line up a babysitter, I’ll bring Jesse with me, and you can watch him while I meet the bar manager.”
“I see. You don’t trust me to know where you live,” he teased, glad to be back to a place where he could.
“Well, I don’t have my gun back yet.”
“I can’t win, can I?”
Her voice was pensive. “I don’t know yet.”
“Maddie?”
“Yes?”
“I’ll be waiting when you get here.”
*
What with getting shot and being kept up another couple of hours until Rachel was done with him, Zach was short on sleep.
He looked longingly at the bed but he didn’t dare lie down. Instead, he took another shower and shaved. He should get his hair cut, he thought; it was curling under where it hit his collar. But maybe Maddie wouldn’t like it as short as he usually wore it. The curl did hide how ragged the ends were. Hard to get a good cut on an offshore oil rig. He’d wait until he was surer of her, he decided.
Zach shook his head. He hardly knew the girl and here he was, as concerned about showing off his plumage as any bedraggled peacock.
He dropped the towel around his waist where he stood and pulled a fresh pair of jeans from the bureau. Rachel always made sure he had new, clean clothes when he came off the rigs. Her consideration sprang more from concern that he’d reflect poorly on her than because all his clothes came back heavily stained with crude.
There was one thing he could show off—he grabbed a clean, white muscle shirt from another drawer.
The pristine white would set off his tanned skin nicely, but what he really wanted to display was the muscle he built up on the rigs. He clenched his left hand into a fist and watched the muscles up his arm spring into sharp definition in the mirror.
When he went to pull the shirt on, it caught on the bandage on his arm. “Dammit!” He kicked the fallen towel into a corner and threw the shirt after it. It wouldn’t cover the bandage. Folks would ask what happened. Maddie took his teasing surprisingly well, but even if he lied about it, she might be uncomfortable with others asking questions. He couldn’t risk it. She was skittish enough.
He went back to the drawer. Good grief! Was that a pink shirt in the bottom of the drawer? What the hell was Rachel thinking?
He found a bright yellow T-shirt with a Chinese dragon embroidered on the breast pocket. The bandage was high in the meaty part of his arm, so the sleeve covered it. If he couldn’t show off his muscles at least the yellow looked good against his tan.
Zach started for the door, but turned back to pick up the shirt and towel in the corner. No sense letting her see what a slob he was this early in the game, he thought as he stuffed them into an empty drawer.
*
He was right there, waiting for her, just as he’d said he’d be, slumped down on the love seat, his long legs stretched out in front of him, cowboy boots crossed at the ankle.
Except his eyes were closed and his chin rested on his chest.
As she stood over him, Jesse leaned from her arms, reaching for Zach, his little fists opening and closing with acquisitive glee. “You are so like your mother,” Maddie muttered at the child. “Wanting everything you see.” She shifted, moving unconsciously, and the pudgy little body swung back against her chest. She tugged Jesse’s bonnet back into place.
How long had Zach’s sister kept him up? she wondered. Maddie might have felt bad about waking him, but with a small child who liked to be fed early, she hadn’t gotten enough sleep either.
She had almost convinced herself to take Jesse to the interview with her, but she knew they’d wonder if she’d create scheduling problems if she couldn’t even get a sitter for the interview. Blast Peggy’s afternoon classes. That left her with only one option, and as much as she didn’t like it, her worries that Zach might have a connection to Derek were so farfetched even she recognized them as bordering on paranoid. Yes, he was a stranger, but so was everyone around her. She had to start trusting people again.
She bumped her foot against the sole of his cowboy boot. Zach’s entire body jerked, then he surged to his feet.
“You’re here.”
“This is where the interview is, right?”
“Yeah. Just go to the bar and ask for Claudia.” Jesse glommed onto the finger Zach held out. “This must be Jesse. Here, let me take him.”
“Ba-ya-ya,” Jesse said as Maddie reluctantly surrendered him.
“How old is he?”
“Six months.”
“He’s big for six months.”
“He’s always been big. Nine pounds, ounces when he was born.”
“Good natured, too, I bet.”
“Almost frighteningly so most of the time,” Maddie agreed. “But he’s going to be grumpy later. This is his nap time.” She set Jesse’s monstrosity of a travel bag on the seat next to where Zach had been sitting. Throwing the flap back, she said, “There’s a bottle in here if he wants it, and diapers and—”
“Wow! He doesn’t have a lot of hair, but it sure is red.”
An electrical charge ran through Maddie. Zach had pushed Jesse’s bonnet back and was stroking his hair.
“Don’t do that.” Maddie kept her voice soft as she snatched Jesse’s bonnet. She snugged it down onto his head, retying the strings under his c
hin. God, her hands were shaking. “He—he catches cold easy.”
Zach looked at her, as though she were some kind of mutated fruit fly, until Jesse grabbed his lower lip and pulled it out. Zach made unintelligible noises of complaint, but they were clearly token protests.
“Are you going to be here when I get done?” Maddie asked, afraid her tension was coming through in her voice.
Zach freed his lip. “I thought I’d take Jesse up to my room, if that’s okay.” He held Jesse’s little fist in his so it wouldn’t get into trouble while he talked to Maddie. “Maybe I can get him to sleep.”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea.” A much better idea than sitting in the lobby with Jesse’s red hair shining like a beacon.
“You remember the room number?” Zach asked.
“Uh, no. Not really.”
“. Here’s a spare key card. Just come on in. In case he’s sleeping.”
Everything Zach said was perfectly reasonable. Was she imagining the speculative look in his eyes? She knew it was best to pretend it wasn’t there, to act as normal as possible, but it wasn’t easy.
“Thanks.”
“Take whatever time you need. I got no appointments.”
Maddie leaned over and kissed Jesse’s cheek. “Be good, Charlie Brown.” She always hated leaving him with someone new. What would she do if he wasn’t there when she got back? The thought made it hard to breathe.
“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of him. Go knock ‘em dead.”
“Thanks.” Maddie turned resolutely and headed for the bar.
She pushed Jesse to the back of her mind and tried to focus on the job. I don’t need this job, she told herself. There are others out there.
Logical as that argument was, it didn’t calm her down. She hated lying but telling the truth was too risky. People couldn’t accidentally tell what they didn’t know.
Please, God, don’t make me have to do this more than once.
The bartender gave her an application. When she had it filled out with her lies, he took it back to the bar manager. While she waited, Maddie studied the autographed pictures that lined the top of backbar’s mirror. She wondered who the rodeo fan was.
Claudia came out and invited Maddie into her office. A polished, confident woman somewhere around thirty, she tried to put Maddie at ease by chatting about the hotel for a few minutes before getting down to the details Maddie dreaded.
“Where did you learn to bartend?”
“A tavern in Coos Bay, Oregon, ma’am. A place called The Cove.”
“Coos Bay? So you’re from Oregon?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You don’t have to call me ma’am. Claudia will do.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Claudia smiled. “I guess we can work on that. How long have you been bartending?”
“Since I was twenty-one. My first job was in a beer and wine bar, but I only worked there a year. Then I got a job at The Cove. They had a hard liquor license. I was there three years.”
“What kind of clientele do they have?”
“In the summer, there’s a lot of tourists. Coos Bay’s on the coast. In the winter, it’s mostly regulars.”
“You’re nervous, aren’t you?”
“A little.”
“I suppose it doesn’t help to tell you that you don’t need to be.”
“I wish it would but— no, probably not.”
“Okay, then let’s just get this over with so you can relax again. How big a bar is The Cove?”
“Legal capacity was ninety-five. Sometimes in the summer, we’d get close to that.”
Claudia brow furrowed. “Is the bar still in business?”
“No, ma’am. It closed last year. Mitch—the owner—he and his wife got a divorce. Kind of a nasty one. He shut the bar down and moved to Montana. He sold the building a few months ago, but the new owners are remodeling before they reopen.”
“Is he available to give you a reference?”
Maddie pulled a folded piece of paper from her purse. She opened it, pressing it flat on the top of the desk. There was only one name on it—Mitch Marshall with a Bozeman address and phone number. She passed it to Claudia. “He gave me his number before he left. I talked to him a couple of months ago so it should still be good.”
Claudia scanned the page.
“I know my references are thin but I’m a hard worker. I don’t date the customers, and I know my drinks. I—”
Claudia held up a hand to stop the flow. “It’s okay you don’t have a lot of references. At your age, more than a couple only makes you look flighty.” She refolded the paper and stuck it into the corner of her desk blotter then pushed her chair back and stood. “Let’s go back out to the bar. I’ve got a little test I like to give prospective bartenders.”
Maddie followed her out, surreptitiously wiping her sweaty, palms on her skirt. Claudia motioned her behind the bar. Standing directly across from Claudia, Maddie laid her palms flat on the bar so her trembling hands wouldn’t be so noticeable.
Pointing at the chimney glasses, Claudia said, “Build me a Bloody Mary from scratch. Everything you need should be in the cooler behind you.”
Maddie wiped her palms on her skirt again and took a deep breath. Her hands steadied when she opened the cooler and started gathering the ingredients she needed.
“In my opinion,” Claudia said, watching Maddie confidently adding ingredients, “there are only two kinds of Bloody Marys. Fantastic ones and totally undrinkable ones. If you can build me a fantastic one, you might just have yourself a job.”
Maddie finished the drink with an olive and a stalk of celery. She slid the glass across the bar.
“Cheers.” Claudia tipped the glass gently in salute and took a sip. “Not bad.”
Maddie took a deep breath, letting her tension flow out on the exhale.
“Have you gotten your certification for Texas yet?”
“Yes, ma’am.” She’d taken the required online course as soon as she’d gotten settled.
“Good. Then if your reference checks out, you’ve got the job.”
Maddie’s stomach fluttered. Mitch would come through for her. He had to. She only hoped he lied better than she did because Mitch was a retired driller who had never been behind a bar in his life, though he’d spent decades on the drinking side.
Maddie thanked Claudia for her time. It was too soon to feel euphoric, she reminded herself as she waited for the elevator, but she couldn’t help it. Things were starting to fall into place. With an apartment, an identity, and now maybe a job, she could make a new life in Galveston.
She tapped lightly on Zach’s door. When he didn’t answer, she used the key card.
Soft light from the crack in the drapes illuminated the room. A small crib—the type most hotels supplied for couples traveling with a small child—stood on the far side of the bed, but Maddie didn’t have to look in it to know Jesse wasn’t there. The child lay, belly to belly, on top of Zach. They were both sound asleep on the bed. One of Zach’s hands cupped Jesse’s well padded bottom; the other cupped his round head. The soft strains of violin on the iPod didn’t disturb the hush of the room.
That was what a father and son should look like, she thought. How could something as basic as sleeping look so much like male bonding?
A deep yearning filled her. She wanted what she saw in front of her. She wanted to feel as safe and protected as Jesse looked. The yearning twisted in her heart, revealing a sharp edge. She’d wanted this with Vince. Her eyes grew moist as she ached for what she would never have. Maddie looked up at the ceiling and blinked back the tears.
When she’d pushed Vince firmly out of her mind, she lay down on the empty strip beside Zach and Jesse. Propping her head on her fist, she seemed to be looking at some sort of time lapse photography. A long time ago, Zach must have looked much as Jesse did and someday, difficult as it was to imagine, Jesse would grow into a man like Zach.
Maddie laid her head down,
her crooked arm pillowing her head. The contrast between the obvious strength of Zach’s fingers and the gentle way they cupped Jesse’s head intensified her yearning.
She didn’t intend to sleep, but in only moments, her eyes slowly closed. As she began to sink into slumber, she recognized there was something odd about Zach’s hands, but she was asleep before the deep, instinctual part of her brain could tell her what it was.
Chapter Five
The music had ended when Zach slowly came awake. The room had the muted peace of a church. He was content to just lay there, eyes closed, with Jesse’s warm little body sprawled on top of him. He opened his eyes to look at the clock beside the bed and found Maddie lying beside him.
His first thought was how sweet it was to wake up to find her there. It only took a moment more to imagine how much sweeter it would be to wake her and make love to her, but he didn’t know how much of her willingness the night before had been the alcohol.
Zach eased off the bed, careful not to jar Jesse awake. He laid the boy in the crib, then went to the bathroom to relieve himself.
Maddie hadn’t moved when he got back. Zach lay down on his stomach beside her and studied her face. She was a few years younger than he was, he thought, but there were the beginnings of faint worry lines on her forehead. He wanted to rub them away. Instead he flipped onto his side, scooting in close to her, and softly kissed her forehead. When that didn’t wake her, he kissed the tip of her nose, then her eyelids.
Without warning, she shoved both hands hard against his chest and rolled off the bed.
“Maddie! Maddie, what—?”
She crawled halfway to the door before she stopped.
“Zach?”
“You were expecting someone else?” Zach caught his breath. “You were expecting someone else,” he said in a more sober tone. “Good Lord, Maddie. What did the son of a bitch do to you?”
Maddie slid around until she was sitting on the floor facing him, her legs drawn up protectively in front of her. She shook her head helplessly then dropped her forehead onto her knees.
Zach scrambled off the bed. There on the floor, he wrapped his arms around her and began rocking her gently back and forth.