by Cynthia Sax
A cleaning service will wash windows using environmentally friendly products. They don’t hire illegals yet charge less than minimum wage.
For five dollars I can learn how to stuff envelopes for money. I can stuff envelopes and I do need money. I pull off a tab, the contact information neatly printed, a post office box number given as the address.
“Why couldn’t we leave the bags in the car? You have me loaded up like a pack mule.”
I hear Michael Cooke’s deep voice behind me and I stiffen.
The last time I saw my stunningly handsome coworker, I rejected his romantic advances. As we work together at Feed Your Hungry, I know I’ll have to face him on Monday.
I don’t want to face him today. I stare intently at a posting for at-home bikini waxes, calling upon my power of invisibility, a power I’ve perfected over the years.
“Just carry them, son.” A woman sighs dramatically. This must be Michael’s movie star mother. “I didn’t bring you along for your good looks.” Other women laugh and a wave of perfume sweeps over me. Shopping bags brush against my bare calves.
I slide my gaze to the left. Michael leans over the barrier between the ordering and dining areas. His khaki pants pull across his shapely ass and his wide shoulders stress a navy blue hemp shirt. Birkenstocks are on his tanned feet. He plops a half dozen high-end shopping bags on an empty tabletop
A trio of blond-haired women fill the seats, chattering happily, cosmetics and plastic surgery supplementing their aging beauty. One woman’s face is stretched unnaturally tight, giving her a catlike appearance. Another woman’s forehead is eerily smooth, her range of emotions limited. The third woman smiles at Michael and I catch my breath, the family resemblance unmistakable.
Michael’s drop dead gorgeous mother has his sky-blue eyes, golden tan, and blond hair. She doesn’t have his casual style. She’s impeccably dressed in a simple white sheath dress, the impossible-to-keep-clean designer garment accentuating her generous bosom.
I glance down at the faded tank top clinging to my small breasts and take a step toward the door. I should leave. The manager will never have time to talk to me, not with the crazy day she’s having, and I don’t want to meet Michael’s mother looking the way I do, like someone unworthy of bussing the table she’s sitting around.
“No more changing your orders.” Michael laughs loudly, shaking his index finger at the ladies. They twitter, clearly enjoying his teasing, and he saunters toward me. He looks perfect, stunning, and I hold my breath, my heart beating wildly, my mind spinning. What should I say to him? Should I mention Friday’s kiss or should I pretend it never happened?
Michael joins the end of the coffee line, standing close enough for me to reach out and touch. He runs his fingers through his shaggy blond hair, takes his phone out of his pocket and stares down at the screen.
He doesn’t see me. My powers of invisibility hold. I exhale and my shoulders slump. I should feel relieved. I don’t. I feel disappointed.
Michael orders four organic ice teas, each one a different flavor. He pays more for those teas than I spend on groceries in a month, leaves a monstrous tip, and returns to the table. The ladies send him back to the counter for organic artificial sweeteners, stir sticks, and lids.
Finally, Michael settles into a chair, the wood slab seat sagging under his weight. He tips a dome-shaped container over his ice tea and empties a hive worth of golden honey into his beverage.
When he kissed me on Friday, he didn’t taste sweet. I sweep my tongue over my bottom lip. He tasted like beer and fried food.
Michael rumbles happily and leans back in his chair, the metal legs creaking a protest. He sips on his ice tea as the ladies chat.
I watch him covertly.
I see the way he takes care of his mother, adding the artificial sweetener to her drink, unwrapping the tissue paper around the bright red leather purse she’s purchased, retrieving the phone she drops.
I notice how she leans into him, how she gazes proudly at him when he isn’t looking, how she smiles at his jokes.
Michael’s mother loves him and he loves her. I drift closer to their table, secure in my invisibility, not as secure about my self-worth. I loved my mother and that love hadn’t been enough for her. After my father went to prison, she skipped town and never looked back, leaving her fourteen-year-old daughter to fend for herself. I did fend for myself because, as Blaine tells me, I’m strong, stronger than both of my parents.
Right now I don’t feel strong. I’m envious and lonely and needy. The cat woman looks up from her heavily sweetened pomegranate ice tea and meets my gaze. Her face contorts, her eyes appearing sympathetic, almost pitying.
I pivot on my heels and hurry out the door before she brings my presence to Michael’s attention. I might not know what else I want, from him or Blaine or anyone else. I do know I don’t want to be pitied.
About the Author
CYNTHIA SAX lives in a world filled with magic and romance. Although her heroes may not always say “I love you,” they will do anything for the women they adore. They live passionately. They play hard. They love the same women forever.
Cynthia has loved the same wonderful man forever. Her supportive hubby offers himself up to the joys and pains of research while they travel the world together, meeting fascinating people and finding inspiration in exotic places such as Istanbul, Bali, and Chicago.
Please visit her on the web at www.CynthiaSax.com.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.
Also by Cynthia Sax
He Touches Me
He Claims Me
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpt from He Touches Me copyright © 2013 by Cynthia Sax.
HE WATCHES ME. Copyright © 2013 by Cynthia Sax. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition JULY 2013 ISBN: 9780062300300
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062300317
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About the Publisher
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Table of Contents
Dedication
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
; An Excerpt from He Touches Me
Chapter One
About the Author
Also by Cynthia Sax
Copyright
About the Publisher
