“She says that?”
“Yes. She thinks you’re amazing, Jeremy. As do Mary-Margaret and Max and I.”
The praise from his boss and the other adults he most admired shored him up, and, sitting taller, he released his seat belt. “Let’s take my stuff in.”
“Can you grab that? I have some things for you in the back.” She climbed out of the SUV and went around to open the hatch.
He bypassed the backseat where he’d put his stuff and followed in her wake. When he looked over her shoulder, he saw the compartment was filled nearly to the top of the backseat with boxes and bags. “Oh, wow—all that’s for me?”
“It is. It’s mostly secondhand, mind, but when we told people you needed everything for your new place, they were very generous about contributing to the cause.”
“This is—” He broke off, overwhelmed. Then he cleared his throat. And grinned at her wholeheartedly. “Awesome!”
They had carried one load into his house and come back for a second when he heard a vehicle pull into the drive and looked over the roof of Harper’s SUV to see Max’s truck. Behind it was Tasha’s blue Jeep and behind that a car he didn’t recognize. He gawked as everyone parked, and Max and his two brothers climbed out of his truck. Tasha, Jenny and Tiffany got out of Tash’s Jeep and Peyton and her friend—a girl he’d seen in Bella T’s but had never actually met—exited the third car.
For a second he was so surprised he could only stand rooted to the patch of asphalt in front of Harper’s open hatch. Then he shook himself free of his momentary paralysis and went to meet everyone. “What are you all doing here? This is so frickin’ beast!”
“And that’s a good thing, I’m guessing,” the new Bradshaw, Luc, said before he went around to the back of the truck to lower the tailgate.
“It is,” Peyton replied in that snooty nose-in-the-air way she sometimes had when, Jeremy now understood, she was nervous. Her tone was completely different when she walked over to him, grabbed his arm and said warmly, “We came to help you move—and we brought stuff.” She pulled him over to her friend, and he watched her face light up in the company of the other girl. “This is my best friend, Marni,” she said, then turned to the dirty-blonde. “Mar, this is Jeremy, and over there is my boss, Tasha.”
“It’s great to meet you, Marni,” Tasha said. “Peyton’s said nice things about you.”
Peyton colored and hastily told her friend, “And of course you know Tiffany.”
“I do,” Marni agreed, looking at the waitress. “And not only for the pizzas you’ve delivered. You gave me the tip on the MAC lipstick.”
“And I see you took my advice,” Tiffany replied. “I knew it would look great on you.”
Peyton gave the men and two women she didn’t know a regal wave. “I’ve sort of met you,” she said to Luc, referring to the night the two of them had pitched in to help Tiff. “But for the rest of you, I’m Peyton, and this is my friend Marni.”
Max’s brothers and Harper and Jenny introduced themselves in return. Then everyone dug in and began carting all the things they’d brought into his new rental.
“Man, this is like my birthday and Christmas all rolled into one,” Jeremy said as he opened a box and found a nearly complete set of dishes.
“The Myers, who gave those to me, said to warn you that they’re old Corelle,” Jenny said. “So they can’t go in the microwave.”
“That’s okay.” He laughed. “I don’t have a microwave.”
“Yeah, you do,” Luc said from the door. “There’s more stuff out here.”
“My mom sent some food to get you started,” Marni said, indicating the big grocery bag she’d just carried into the house. “It’s mainly the basics—eggs and milk and bread and butter and some canned soups and stuff. I’ll put the perishables in the fridge.”
“This is so epic I don’t even know how to begin thanking everyone. Or even who all.”
“That’s what we have Jenny for,” Tasha said with a hip bump for her friend. “She’s got a list for everything, so of course she made one for you and brought thank-you cards to fill out and the stamps to mail ’em. So a word to the wise—be sure you send them, or you’ll have her to contend with.”
“Oh, please,” Jenny said. “I’m not as scary as all that.”
“Yes, she is,” Jake said and gave Jeremy a crooked smile. “Don’t let the packaging fool ya, kid. She might look like a stiff breeze could blow her down the canal, but trust me, you do not want to run afoul of this woman. If she comes after you and has a steely glint in her eyes, you’re toast.”
Jenny blew a rude noise, then ignored them. “Marni, give me your address,” she said. “I’ll add you and your mom to the list.”
“Oh, good, sheets,” Harper said, digging through a box. “Hmm. I’m thinking either the white or the green. We’ll save the pink floral ones for, um—”
“The day Jeremy bleeds out on his other ones and there’s not a damn thing else to put on the bed,” Max stated categorically.
Jeremy snorted his agreement.
“This from the guy who has ribbons on his bath towels,” Jake said sadly.
“Keep it up, smart guy,” Jenny told her fiancé. “I still have my eye on that set with lace for your bathroom. We’ve had this conversation before, but you seem to forget that men and women live in our houses, and we women? We don’t think everything has to be industrial-gray.” She shook her head. “Men. It’s a good thing they’re handy.”
All the females hooted their agreement, and Jake strolled past Jenny, giving her a slap on the butt and a smoldering smile. “I’ll show you handy later,” Jeremy heard him promise in a low voice.
Harper and Marni made up the bed while Peyton carried in a little table he could use for a nightstand, then came back out into the living room and picked up a nice brass lamp with a beat-up shade. She looked over at him. “This okay for your bedroom?”
“Yeah, that’s great.” He couldn’t believe all the stuff they’d gotten to make his house a home. He’d swallow a razor blade before he’d admit it to the other guys, but he’d have slept on the pink flowered sheets. They beat what he’d had, which was no sheets at all.
“Peyton,” Tasha called from the other end of the room. “I have a new shade for that lamp in one of these boxes. I think it’s— Ah, here it is!” She looked up as Peyton walked over to collect it. “I meant to put it on at home, but the lamp had already been packed into my car at least three layers deep.”
“Oh, this is much nicer,” Peyton said and sat down on the floor to remove the old one and put on the new.
“There are a couple more lamps around here somewhere. Jeremy can move things around later if he finds something works better in one place than another.”
Overhearing, Jeremy smiled to himself. He hadn’t even thought of lamps when he’d mentally compiled his list of the basics he’d need for day-to-day living—and here he had choices between more than one.
Max called his name, and he looked up to see him beckoning from the concrete stoop outside his front door. Turning away from the new box he’d been about to dive into, he went out to meet him.
Max led him to the truck and opened the jump-seat door. He reached in and dragged a big box closer, then lifted it out. “This is from Tasha, Mary-Margaret and Harper and me,” he said, turning so Jeremy could see the front of the box. “You’ll need a computer if you’re going to college. We’ve prepaid a year of internet access for you, too. The installer’s supposed to be here this afternoon between noon and three.”
“Oh, man,” Jeremy whispered, staring at the picture of a laptop. “Oh, man, Max.” To his mortification, his voice cracked in the middle of the deputy’s name, and he sucked in a deep breath and held it for as long as he could before he was forced to expel it. “Thank you. I’ve never had a gift this huge.” Tears rose in his eyes and, horrified, he turned to furiously knuckle them away.
Max’s big hand was a sudden heavy weight on the crown of h
is head, and he felt its rough stroke down to his nape, where the man gave a quick squeeze before dropping his hand. Something about the strength and warmth of that brief contact comforted Jeremy, and he sucked in another breath and hauled his emotions under control. “I don’t know what to say,” he admitted in a low voice. “This is just all so...great.”
“You don’t have to say anything. Just work hard when you go to school.”
“I will. I swear it.”
“I know you will. Tash is really pleased with your work, you know. And Bella T’s is her baby, so she doesn’t give praise lightly.”
“I feel really lucky to be working for her,” he said to the ground between his feet. “To have the help of all you guys.” He turned back to Max. “I couldn’t have done any of this on my own.”
“Yes, you could have,” a feminine voice said behind him, and he turned to see Tasha approaching. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” she said, giving him a level look, “but since I did overhear your conversation, I have to tell you that while it would definitely be harder to do it all on your own, I know you could. You have a maturity about you, Jeremy, that’s nothing short of amazing for an eighteen-year-old boy. I think probably Max had that kind of maturity as well when he left here to join the Marines when he was your age. And if he didn’t, he sure came home with it. You have the drive and the work ethic to succeed. We just want to give you whatever boost we can to help you toward that success.”
Luc strolled up, his hands in his jeans pockets. “I came to town with just a duffel bag, so I don’t have anything concrete to contribute to your cause,” he said. “But I want you to let me know if you need something that you didn’t get today, and I’ll help with that. I’m also good with my hands, so if you need anything fixed or maybe a lesson in fixing it yourself, I’m your man.”
“Thanks,” he said. He didn’t really know Luc Bradshaw, but along with everyone else who had come out today, the guy had chipped in to haul in and set up Jeremy’s amazing array of loot, so he resolved to take him up on his offer if the need arose. “I’m not bad with American car engines, ’cause my dad’s a mechanic and I’ve done a couple of summers with him in the shop where he works. But I’m clueless about house repair, so I really like the teaching-me-to-fix-things idea.”
A strange look flashed across Luc’s face, but it was there and gone so fast that Jeremy couldn’t get a fix on it. Then he figured he must have imagined it anyway because the new Bradshaw gave him an easy smile. “I’m serious about you letting me know if you need anything, as well. I’d like to contribute.”
“Good, you can contribute lunch,” Jenny said. “Usually we’d call Tash for pizzas, but clearly that’s not gonna work today. Want to get some Vietnamese sandwiches or pho from Saigon Boat?”
“I can do that.” He pulled his smartphone out of his pocket. “Give me your orders.”
By three o’clock Jeremy’s place looked like a home. It had just about everything he needed—as well as a lot of stuff he’d never even considered—like a rug on the floor and throw pillows and an afghan on the couch. In the almost-too-small-to-be-called-an-extra-bedroom he, Max and Luc had arranged a rickety desk that he planned to paint once the dust settled and under which Luc had shoved some shims to make it sturdy. Jeremy had grabbed one of the wooden chairs from the little kitchen set, then set up his new pride and joy: the laptop they’d given him, along with the smallest of the lamps he’d co-opted, which wasn’t actually all that small. He planned to hit the General Store for a desk lamp since they tended to be both more compact in size and have brighter, directional lighting.
Tasha came up to him just as he was saying goodbye to the cable guy. “Come in to Bella’s at five,” she said. “I’ll do the prep today.”
“Thank you,” he said fervently. He’d love to be all sophisticated, but everyone had done so much for him that it was simply beyond him. “For everything.”
“You’re welcome, sweetie. You’re a valuable employee. You know that, right?” She didn’t wait for him to respond. “More importantly, Jeremy, you’re one of the good guys.”
Then, in what seemed like seconds, after tidying up the empty packaging and cardboard boxes that most of his goodies had arrived in, the adults climbed into their various vehicles and drove out, leaving him with Peyton, Tiffany and Marni. Tiffany ran out to her car for something, and the three teens took seats in the living room.
“This looks really nice,” Marni said, and Peyton nodded her agreement.
“It does,” she said. “Tasha and her friends sure have a knack for making a bunch of castoffs look cool.”
“I heard her tell someone once that she and Jenny grew up on the wrong side of the tracks,” he said. “So I guess they have experience making the most of stuff.”
“Whatever their deal,” she said, reaching out to touch the back of his hand, “you’re pretty damn lucky to have them as friends.”
He stilled and for a second just stared down at her fingers touching his knuckles. It wasn’t until she slid them away that he remembered what they’d been talking about. “Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “I really do get that, without that whole crew on my side, I’d probably be living hand to mouth.” He looked around. “And it would definitely look a lot emptier in here.”
Tiffany came back in with a little cooler. “Now, don’t get the wrong idea and think that I plan to make a habit of contributing to the delinquency of minors,” she said, pulling three bottles of beer out of the cooler. “But I thought this one time called for a celebration.” She looked from the three beers to the four of them. “We better grab some glasses. Sorry, Marni,” she said as Peyton hopped up to get them. “I didn’t know you were coming or I’d have brought another.”
The dishwater-blonde shrugged good-naturedly. “I can have a Coke. I don’t really like the taste of most boozy drinks anyway.”
“I’ll get it, Mar,” Peyton called from the kitchen and was back in an instant. She handed the can to her friend. “Sorry about the lack of ice. It hasn’t frozen all the way through yet.”
Tiffany handed out the beers and held her own aloft. “To Jeremy’s new digs,” she said.
“To new digs,” they chimed in, clinked bottles and can and drank.
When everyone had gone, Jeremy walked around his house, touching things and smiling to himself. Several times he walked past the pay-as-you-go cell phone he’d bought, then finally stopped, picked it up and punched in a number. It rang four times before a man answered, and the clangs and whirs of an automotive shop sounded in the background.
“Hey, Dad, it’s me,” Jeremy said. “I don’t know what you’re doin’ at work on a Sunday, but I wanted to let you know I’m all moved in to the place I told you about—and to give you my new address and phone number.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“WOW. IF I tried to do that, I’d probably hack off all my fingers.”
Tasha looked up from her furious vegetable chopping to see Peyton entering the pizzeria’s kitchen. She wasn’t sure if she was irritated to have her exorcising-the-demons time interrupted or beyond relieved. But even if it was the former, she couldn’t take it out on the teen, so she drew a deep breath and, exhaling it, changed her mind-set. “Hey, girl. What are you doing here early? I thought you kids would still be at Jeremy’s.”
Peyton executed an elegant little roll of her shoulders. “We thought we’d give him a little space to soak in his new place in peace.” She flashed a smile that, to Tasha’s surprise, seemed almost shy. “It looks awesome. You guys sure know how to decorate on a dime.”
“Neither Jenny nor I had any money growing up, so we’ve had lots of practice.” She gave the girl a wry smile. “And really, who doesn’t watch HGTV these days?”
“Um...” The teen raised her hand. “Me?”
“Really? Well, maybe it’s more the late-twenties-and-beyond crowd’s thing.”
“Must be.” Peyton looked at the heaps of veggies on Tasha’s work space. “Are you e
xpecting a huge crowd tonight?”
“What?” She stared down at them. “Well, crap.” She’d allowed herself to get sucked into all the ways in which Luc was driving her insane when she’d gotten back from Jeremy’s, but she hadn’t realized how carried away she’d gotten with her food prep. “I have enough here for two days, easy.” Mentally cursing herself for not paying attention, she reached for the storage containers.
“Daydreaming, huh? I do that sometimes—especially in the car. There’ve been times I’ve been so far in the zone that I’ve arrived at point B from point A without actually remembering the drive.”
“I’m not sure which is scarier when your attention is elsewhere, piloting a ton of metal in motion—or speed-chopping with a precision-honed knife.” But she was grateful to the girl for giving her an out. At least she didn’t have to come up with an excuse for her aggression. Handy, that, considering she wasn’t sure herself where it had come from.
She’d had a good time today fixing up Jeremy’s place and getting to see his reaction to each new thing they set up. She’d managed to be around Luc for hours and survived just fine, being civil and pleasant whenever she had to interact with him, but mostly just sticking with the women.
In truth, he had seemed to avoid her as assiduously as she had him, so that had been a good thing.
Kind of.
No, no, it had been. It was exactly what she’d been demanding. And she was...happy...that he’d finally listened.
But clearly she was still pissed at him for constantly making her act out of character. Okay, sure, at the end of the day her behavior was on her—but, dammit, he drove her to act in ways she ordinarily wouldn’t dream of—had done so from the instant they’d met in the Bahamas. That had ended in disaster, and now here she was, acting like a crazy woman again.
That was what had driven her to blindly chopping onions and peppers—thinking of her every misstep since Luc Bradshaw had come to town. Not the fact that today he’d done what she’d asked and left her alone.
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