by Paula Cox
“I have been asking around in Dallas,” he said softly. “I have a friend that would like to talk to you, if you are interested.”
“In Dallas?”
“I know you don’t want to move to Dallas but —”
“Doing what?”
“I don’t know. Some kind of lab work for a medical testing lab. It’s entry level but…”
“But you found it for me?”
“I asked around, yes.”
“This is the kind of stuff that you do that pisses me off,” I whispered, then sat back as our food arrived.
“Trying to help you?”
“Doing everything for me. I’m not incompetent, you know!”
“I never said you were. But job hunting is all about connections. I haven’t gotten the job for you. You still have to do that. All I did was found you an opportunity. If one of your friends said, ‘Hey, give this guy a call,’ would you be pissed off at them?”
“No,” I mumbled.
“So why are you pissed off at me?”
“I don’t know! You just do that to me!”
He sighed again. “Do you want the contact information or not,” he asked, his voice brimming with annoyance.
“Yeah. Give it here,” I said as I turned and dug in my purse for pen and paper. When I turned back, he was sliding a business card across the table. I picked it up. “Cheryl Atkinson?”
“She’s the lab manager.”
“What kind of friend is she?” I asked just to be snotty. I didn’t like myself very much right then but I couldn’t help it.
“Does it matter?”
I slid the card back across the table. “I don’t want the help of some bimbo that you’re banging.”
I saw his lips narrow. “It’s Thad’s, the President’s, sister.”
I burned in embarrassment. “Sorry,” I mumbled as I pulled the card back to me. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, but he didn’t sound pleased at all. And who could blame him? I was being nothing but a bitch, and for no reason other than I could. I sat picking at my noodles, feeling terrible. Cain was trying to help me, asking for nothing in return, and I couldn’t even be civil.
***
“If I offer to pick up your lunch, are you going to bitch at me?” he asked when the waitress dropped off our ticket. The lunch had been a tense affair, neither of us talking much. And it was all my fault.
“You don’t have to do that,” I said with a feeble smile.
He looked at the ticket and tossed a ten and a twenty onto the little tray the ticket was in. “Are you ready?”
I rose as he stepped back, waited for me to pass in front of him and then followed. When we stepped outside I couldn’t stand it anymore.
“Cain… I’m sorry. I’ve been acting like a harpy all afternoon…and I’m sorry.”
“Whatever.”
“No!” I said as I stepped in front of him, turned, and placed a hand in his chest, forcing him to either stop or knock me down. He stopped. “It’s not okay. I shouldn’t be treating you like this. You deserve better. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Hormones, maybe. But I feel terrible about it.”
He stared down at me a moment then softened. “Apology accepted. Will you just cash my checks? If you will do that, and try to be pleasant the once or twice a month you see me, we can get through this with a minimum of pain for both of us. I don’t expect you to be thrilled to see me, but it would be nice if you weren’t twisting the knife every chance you get.”
“Twisting the knife?”
“Yeah. You don’t know what it has like for me. I want you. Or at least, I want a chance to get to know you, but you stiff-arm me at every turn. You’re the mother of my child, yet you don’t want me around. That’s a hard thing for me to accept. It’s a hard thing to let go. And it hurts, Alex. It hurts to be this close to you and know that you don’t want me.”
I looked at my shoes. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t mean to hurt you, Alex. I really don’t. But I’m afraid for you. What happens if you lose your job? You won’t have insurance. You won’t have any income. How will you survive? I’m afraid you think this is going to be some grand adventure. But it’s not. It’s going to be hard. I understand you not wanting to leave home, but I wanted to give you an option. I am just asking for peace of mind in knowing that you are okay and that my child will be properly taken care of. I think you are going to be a terrific mother. I just want to make it a little easier for you and help make sure that the baby has what I never did: a future.” He looked at me a moment and I saw his eyes become shiny with tears. He took my face in his hands and kissed me, as if he were saying goodbye forever, before he stepped back. “Will you give me a ride back to my bike?”
I felt such shame that I wanted to cry. “Yes. But don’t leave for Dallas. Come home with me.”
“Why? The last time you invited me to your house we ended up making love then you sent me away. I don’t need that again.”
“You’re tired. You can sleep on my couch for a few hours before you leave.”
“Why do you care?”
That stung. “I don’t want my baby’s father to become a smear on the interstate because he fell asleep on the way home.”
He stared at me a moment. “Thank you.”
***
I dropped him off at the clinic for his bike and he followed me home. As I exited my car in the garage, I saw him staring at my yard before he entered the garage and I shut the big door behind him.
“I’ll try to be quiet,” I said as we entered the house. I had to be at work in four hours anyway.
“I’ll just wait until you leave before I lay down. Who mows your yard?”
“I do. I just haven’t felt like it this week. Why?”
“Why don’t you hire someone to do it?”
“Because it only takes thirty minutes to do it myself, and because I kind of like piddling in the yard.”
He nodded once then turned back to the garage. “You have gas for the mower?”
“You don’t have to do that!”
He looked at me with that way he has. “Alex, you’re pregnant. You probably shouldn’t be mowing the yard anyway. So for this week, at least, you don’t have to. Isn’t there a kid in the neighborhood that would like to earn a few bucks?”
“I don’t know. Besides, the grass is about to stop growing anyway.” I could tell he wanted to do or say something, but was holding back. “Okay, fine. I’ll get a neighbor to do it the rest of the year. Happy?”
He relaxed a little. “Yes. Thank you. Promise me that you will get someone to do it for you.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I said with a dismissive wave of my hand. “I’ll ask Mel if knows of anyone.”
He smiled slightly and disappeared into the garage. A moment later I heard the garage door go up and, not long after that, my lawnmower start. I opened the garage to see my car sitting where I left it and I wondered how he got the mower out. I always had to back the car out to make enough room.
I itched to get my hands on the mower as I heard it roaring away outside. I took pride in my yard and it annoyed me that he was mowing it. I would never admit it to him, but I didn’t think he would do it right.
As he moved to the backyard I opened the front door and looked at the fresh cut grass. I mowed in straight lines to leave a pattern of tracks in the grass, but I had expected him to just go around and around the yard like everyone else. Instead he had mowed in a crisscross pattern that had left the grass with a checkerboard pattern that I rather liked. No wonder it was taking him so long. With a smile I closed the door. Cain Rodgers was just full of surprises.
***
After an hour of mowing, I heard the mower stop and I watched him through the kitchen window as he washed the mower down with the garden hose. I never bothered with that but for some reason it pleased me that he was taking care of my mower rather than doing the job as quickly as he could. Washing finished, he started it, le
t it run for a moment and then switched it off. As he pushed the mower around the end of the house, I opened kitchen door to see how he managed to get the mower out without moving my car.
“Do you want me to move my car?” I asked when he appeared in the drive.
“No. I got it.” With a grunt he hefted the mower up and held it over my car, his arm muscles bulging as he squeezed through the garage, my eyes opening wide in surprise and admiration. He must have been strong as an ox because the mower wasn’t exactly light. Past my car, he crouched and put the mower down, rolling it into its corner.
“What?” he asked as he turned.
“Nothing. Just seems like it would have been easier to move the car,” I said, but that wasn’t what I was thinking. It was the middle of September, which meant it was still hot and humid, and his shirt was stuck to him like a second skin. I had seen him naked, but never working hard, and I was imagining seeing those muscles working as he strained and sweat.
“Probably. But it’s done now,” he said as he wiped his hands on his pants.
“Come in. I have cold one for you.”
“One more thing,” he said as he lifted the trimmer off the hook. He stopped in the drive, gave the starter cord a couple of quick jerks, then disappeared as the trimmer snarled and whined.
A few minutes later the trimmer fell silent and I heard him clomp up the three steps to my kitchen door. He opened the door before he toed his boots off and stepped into the kitchen. As he entered, I handed him a beer.
“Just water, I think,” he said, taking the beer and putting it back in the refrigerator.
“You want a shower?” I asked as I filled a glass with ice and water.
“I don’t have any clothes. Thanks, but I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You smell. I have to run a load of darks anyway. I will just chuck your clothes in with mine.”
“What about underwear?”
“What about it? Do you care if your undies come out a little blue?”
He gave me a lopsided grin. “No, I guess not.”
“You know where everything is. Throw out the clothes when you get undressed.”
Two minutes later I had bundled his clothes in with mine and had thrown them in the washer. Five minutes after that, he stepped out of the shower wearing nothing but a towel around his waist. I tried not to stare, but it was hard… it was damned hard
***
The moment the dryer stopped, I pulled the clothes from it and shoved his into his hands. I wanted him to get dressed so I could stop thinking about all the things I was thinking about with him walking around in that towel. He made no move to seduce me, but I couldn’t help but wonder if that towel would fall off, and if it did, what I would do.
The moment he was dressed, I hopped into the shower, taking a little longer than necessary with the water a little cooler than I liked to dampen my bubbling desires. I had forgotten how sexy Cain was. I didn’t emerge until I was dressed and ready for work, to head off any potential pleasantness that might occur that could lead to hurt feelings later.
He had prepared me a paper sack of fruit and a pair of sandwiches, once again cut into bite size chunks. There was also a pair of plates with Farfalle noodles in a light white sauce sitting on the table. “I hope you don’t mind,” he said as he pulled out a chair for me.
“No. You didn’t have to cook,” I said, sliding into my place. I couldn’t decide if I was annoyed or pleasantly surprised.
“Not much to it,” he said. “Boiled some noodles I found in the pantry and opened a bottle of sauce in there… and ta-da!”
“You’re going to sleep after I leave for work, right?”
“Yes. And I will lock up when I leave.”
He had added some spices to the sauce that I really liked, but not so much to make it upset my stomach. Bland is the name of the game right now. “This is good. Thank you.”
He smiled and looked at his plate. “Just trying to take care of my girls,” he said softly without looking up.
Chapter 15
Tonight was another one of those nights, the type of night that seemed to go on forever. I had been nibbling at my fruit and sandwiches as the night progressed, but I’m just hanging on. Normally I do my thing, the showy spins, flips and twirls, to attract attention and to bring in the tips, but tonight I am only doing it when asked. And even then, I’m keeping it simple. Earlier I nearly dropped a two-hundred dollar bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue on a simple over the shoulder flip that gave me the rush of impending doom. I’ve been off my game, and I knew it, but I was getting through it thanks to the food Cain had packed for me.
By one-thirty I was counting the seconds until I could leave. I was tired, and still mildly sick, when the owner of The Cat’s Claw, Peter, stepped up beside me behind the bar. “You doing okay?” he asked quietly as he sat a shot glass on the bar and poured a splash of Bacardi. He offered one to me but I shook my head no.
“I’m hanging on,” I said softly as I promised myself I wouldn’t cry in front of him.
He took a sip of his drink, looking over the rim of the glass as me. “Still feeling down with the flu?”
“I’m feeling okay,” I replied, though I was feeling anything but at the moment.
He finished his drink and sat the glass on the bar. “See me before you leave tonight.”
***
I rapped lightly on Peter’s door. “You wanted to see me?”
“Have a seat. Shut the door.”
I eased the door shut and steeled myself for what was about to come as I sat in a chair.
“Do you know what I want to talk to you about?”
“I have an idea.”
“Alex… you are one of the best bartenders I have ever seen. But this last month, you have been seriously off your game. I’ve noticed and the clients have noticed. What’s going on?”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Ridell. I just have a lot going on in my life right now.”
“Anything I can help with?”
“No.”
“I don’t mean to be a hard-ass, but you’re part of the draw of The Claw, and you’re not pulling your weight.”
“I know. I’m sorry,” I said as I looked at my shoes. I wanted to meet his eyes, but I couldn’t.
“Alex, look at me.” I raised my eyes to his. “You need to get whatever is bothering you squared away, okay?”
“Yes, sir. I’ll try.”
“Don’t try. Do. I don’t want to lose you, but if you don’t get your act together, I’m going to have to make some changes. Understand?”
“Yes, sir. I understand.”
“Good.” He smiled at me. “I’m sorry to have to come down on you like this. You have been one of my better employees, but I can’t play favorites. Everyone around here has a job to do, and yours is to dazzle and amaze. So tomorrow, I want you to go out there and show me you stuff, okay? And if there is anything I can help you with…”
“No, sir. Nothing. Thank you for giving me a second chance.”
His smiled widened slightly. “Okay. Now go home, get some rest, and come back tomorrow full of that ‘Oh yeah? Well watch this!’ attitude you used to have.”
I managed to hold my tears until I got to my car, but the moment I sat down and closed the door, the tears started. I had never been reprimanded for my work in my life, and it hurt. It hurt a lot. I was doing the best I could, given the circumstances. I was caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place. I was afraid to push harder out of fear of dropping and breaking the bottles. But to tell Peter why I was holding back would cost me my job just as quickly. Maybe I should just end it. Maybe I should just call the doctor and end the sickness and the tiredness once and for all.
I had a right good old cry there in my car, but finally the tears stopped and I felt like I could drive home. As I sniffed and wiped at my eyes and nose, I decided that I would redouble my efforts. I would get more sleep and stay off my feet until it was time for work. It was only the last two or thr
ee hours of the shift that were so tough. I could do it. And once I was no longer sick all the time, things would be better. I just had to tough it out until then.
With a final sniff and sigh I started my car, wiped my eyes one more time, and started for home.
***
I eased my car past Cain’s hog. I had expected him to be gone when I got home and I wondered why he was still here. The last thing I needed tonight was another fight.
He was standing in the kitchen when I opened the door. “What happened?” he asked as soon as he saw me.