by Jane Anthony
“Damn!” he hollers once inside. “Did you see that, man? She’s fuckin’ naked!” he whisper-yells, chucking his thumb over his shoulder.
“Pretend she’s not there!” Tom barks, but I know Mark finds that easier said than done. Every so often, his gaze drifts to the woman sitting a few feet away, his Penthouse Forum dreams working overtime. He’s such a pervert. A dirty old man eyeing up this chick who’s easily twenty years younger than he is. She could be his daughter, for Christ’s sake—if there was a woman out there who hated herself enough to actually breed with Mark. The thought alone sends a shudder down my spine. He’s a nice enough guy, I guess, but he has no morals. The only thing separating him from the animal family is opposable thumbs.
Still, she’s preening on the lounge chair as if she’s the afternoon movie, making sure all eyes are set on her. All eyes but mine. I want nothing to do with this whole situation. She’s a hot piece of tail, but I’m done with that. Banging chicks for sport loses its luster after a while, and I only have eyes for one.
The high-pitched ring of a cell phone carries over the soothing rush of running water. “There are some men here working. You should come over and protect me,” I hear her grouse. She throws her head back and laughs at something the caller says in response before disconnecting the call. Ten minutes later, a guy joins the show.
She rises from the chair with a smile as he rounds the patio and scoops her into his arms, his hand grasping her tight ass hard. She squeals with delight and pulls him closer. The couple locks lips as if they’re the only people here; meanwhile, I think I hear Mark’s heart deflate like a balloon.
“Sorry, dude.” I chuckle, spooning up a thick pile of putty on my knife. “Looks like your girlfriend’s stepping out on you.”
“Fuck you,” he grumbles, returning to his work.
Snippets of conversation filter through the yard. Words like “dirty” and “poor” falling from her lips with little care that we’re working five feet away.
“The world needs ditch diggers too, babe,” the guy replies.
The sound of splashing soon follows, and I assume he’s jumped in the pool, but I’ve long stopped caring. I learned early on to deflect the judgment of privileged assholes. They wouldn’t know a hard day’s work if it fell out of the sky, choosing instead to live off old money and prejudice. I don’t care what these people think about me.
Yet I find myself daydreaming what it would be like to live like this.
To walk out into your own personal paradise.
To have enough money that you never have to worry about it.
It would be nice. But it’s a bullshit fantasy I’m better off not having.
“Lunch!” the foreman yells, and we all turn to look.
I scrape my trowel on the edge of the bucket and wipe it clean with a rag before following the crew off the jobsite. “We’ll be back in an hour,” I hear Tom tell the couple, but I’m already halfway around the house en route to my truck.
“Vesuvius Pizza?” I call to Mark, wrenching open the door with a creak.
“Sounds good to me.”
We climb into my truck, but I realize too late that I’m not going to get very far. “Shit. Gimme a sec, dude.” I jump from the cab and jog back around, but the sight of Daddy’s Money riding Ritchie Ritch stops me in my tracks. Her head thrown back, her tits bouncing toward the sky. I stagger back, shielding my eyes. “Oh, fuck! I’m sorry! I just need my keys!”
The girl yelps and grabs her robe. Her boyfriend hurls her off him and hikes up the shorts caging in his slender ankles. “What the fuck? You some kind of white-trash pervert?” The deep baritone spooks a flock of birds. They fly from the trees above as the guy stomps toward me, red rage seeping across his expression. “You the guy eye-fucking Natasha all morning?”
“Nah, man, I don’t want anything to do with your girl.” I brace my hands between us in surrender, but I will fight back if provoked.
“Calm down, Elliot. It’s okay,” she purrs. Her heated gaze rolls up my torso. Trouble. I knew it the second she walked out here.
“Get off this property and don’t come back!” he shouts.
I step forward and meet the guy toe to toe. He’s tall and lean, a body toned and built for swimming, but I have no doubt I could tear this guy limb from limb with little effort. “I ain’t leavin’ without my tools.”
With flared nostrils, he holds me in a stare down, but his girl speaks first. “It’s okay, guy. Get your tools and go.”
I sidestep Ritchie Rich and speed walk to the pool house to collect my things. In another life, I’d beat this guy’s head into the concrete, but dudes like this have a team of lawyers on their side, and I don’t need that kind of heat. Besides, I’ll be damned if I lose my job over an asshole like this. He’s not worth it.
“You’re lucky I don’t call your supervisor,” he calls as I trudge past.
“Don’t worry, dude. After this, you’ll never have to see me again.” The words sit on my tongue like sandpaper, my trembling hands balling into fists. He’d better hope he never has to see me again. For his sake.
CHAPTER 5
Wren
A WARM BREEZE floats down Lakeside Avenue, bringing with it the savory scents of peppers and sizzling steaks. The saccharine smell of cotton candy following close behind. Live music thunders over the sound of children’s laughter. From beneath the spindly branches of a sycamore tree, I sit back in my chair and watch the merriment.
The Hoe Down marks the start of summer. Assorted tables line the blocked-off streets from one side to another, occupied by shop owners and organizations pimping their wares. It’s the event of the year. People come in droves to fill up on homemade sandwiches and play games.
Blue skies with nary a cloud pass overhead. The color strikingly close to azure eyes I’ve not been able to shake from my mind.
Why can’t I stop thinking about him?
Probably because he hasn’t missed a day at the diner in the last two weeks. The man’s got a thing for burnt coffee, I guess.
“Lovely day,” Enid croaks as she wanders to the table.
“Sure is. Perfect, actually,” I tell her, pulling out a chair to help the old librarian sit. The woman’s as old as Creek Falls itself.
She sets her walker to the side and falls into the seat with a warm pat on my hand. “You shouldn’t waste a beautiful day sitting here with me. Go.” She waves a wrinkled hand, gesturing at a gaggle of teenagers passing by. “Go be young. Have fun.”
“I am having fun,” I retort with a smile.
The old lady offers another dismissive wave. I turn my attention to the wandering people slowing down to see what we have to offer. They graze at the arrangement of colorful covers, barely stopping to look before moving past to the next table. In all honesty, manning the library table is a joke. No one wants these dusty, old books. Why spend a dollar on a used paperback when you have a thousand different cable channels to watch right in your living room?
People don’t understand that magic lies inside these covers.
It’s not just stories. It’s blood, sweat, and tears.
Tiny pieces of the author’s life spread out over hundreds of pages.
Sure, the bindings are tattered, and some of those pages have marks, but a well-loved paperback is worth a dozen or more big screen productions. There’s just something about the feel of it in your hands; the smell of the print as you flip through. It’s an experience. Stories are meant to take the reader to another place and time, the book itself is just another piece of the journey.
It saddens me to think the library might not be around next year. That this beautiful old building could be repurposed into offices or—worse—torn down and turned into a bank the way Jones Hardware was.
My gaze slides to the corner where the old store used to sit. Now a PNC Bank occupies the enchanting Victorian era structure with an old wooden porch and antique windows. Passed down through generations of Joneses until the day the larger
conglomerates in the next town over put them out of business.
How’s the little guy supposed to compete with discount tools and cheap labor?
People tend to forego quality to save a buck, and it’s gross. The Hoe Down is all about reminding people that our town matters. Showing them that, yeah, you may pay a little more, but behind the brick and mortar of these old-time structures are faces and families.
A community that needs to stick together.
As I glance among the sea of faces, one, in particular, steals my attention. A smile breaks across my features when Jesse catches my eye and meanders over, lifting his cap by the brim and jamming his opposite hand through his sandy hair before plopping the hat back down.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, drawn into his cool, blue stare.
His lips part in a cocky grin. That smile. Lord help me, I swoon the tiniest bit watching the crinkles form above his nose. “I was told this is a good place to pick up women.” He waggles his brows and pulls his fingertips across the light stubble covering his face.
He claims he’s too lazy to shave, but part of me wonders if he’s lying. It’s almost too light to be a plan, but the way it highlights the angles of his jaw and accentuates the brilliance of his eyes, I’m almost tempted to say it’s a well-thought-out look he maintains just to drive the opposite sex into a tizzy.
Or maybe it’s just me tizzying.
I don’t know.
But I leisurely cross one leg over the other, pushing down the flight of flapping wings fluttering in my gut. “It’s your lucky day. Enid here is single.” I chuck a thumb over my shoulder, throwing in a wry grin. Being with him is just so comfortable. There’s no bullshit. No need to be witty or attentive or well-behaved.
It’s just so . . . easy.
Jesse’s gaze shifts from me to the old lady, then snaps right back. “Is that the woman who works at the library?” He drops his voice an octave, though it’s unnecessary. Enid can’t hear for shit. “She’s still alive?”
“Last I checked, but it’s been a few minutes.”
“She was, like, a hundred years old when we were in high school.”
“A hundred and twelve last month,” Enid retorts with a wink.
He stifles a chortle in his throat as a beautiful young woman joins him at the table. My stomach sinks before I’m hit with the icy splash of a memory.
My jaw drops. “Holy shit . . . this can’t be Erika.”
Identical blue eyes stare back at me from two very different faces. Erika pushes a golden lock of hair off her shoulder. “Wren, right?” she asks with a dazzling grin.
Jesse wasn’t kidding. His sister is a knockout. It seemed like only yesterday she was toting around that stupid unicorn and tattling on us for smoking behind the shed, but the woman standing before me is no little girl. God, I feel ancient.
“You remember me?”
“Duh!” She rolls her eyes. She may be grown up, but she’s definitely still a teenager. “My brother was so in love with you it was gross.”
Jesse’s gaze hardens as he whips his head around to face her. “Don’t you have some friends to hang out with?”
“Eww. Fine, I’m going. Bye, Wren.” The sweet grin drops off her face as her glare passes across Jesse before being swallowed by the throng of passing people.
“Don’t mind her,” he mumbles, dropping his attention to the books between us. “So . . . what do you recommend here?”
“In the mood for a good book, are we?” I laugh, knowing Jesse’s probably never read a book in his life. Not one without graphic images of women with gigantic boobs and secret powers anyway.
“Sure! I love to kick back on a Friday night. A good book and a steamy hot mug of herbal tea.”
I pull my lips between my teeth, stifling the laughter stalling on my tongue. He’s such an ass, I swear. My eyes wander the titles until I find the one I’m looking for. “This one’s good,” I tell him, fingering the smoldering stare of the man on the cover as I lift it from its spot on the table.
“Lawless, huh? What’s this about?” He turns it over his hands, then opens the front flap.
“Read the prologue. Let me know if you like it.”
I wait with anticipation, knowing what’s coming next. Jesse’s cobalt eyes scan the pages, then widen right on cue for just a second before his face falls back into its neutral expression. “Well played, Bird.”
I lift my palm. “Two bucks, please.”
“Two?”
“Finder’s fee,” I reply with a wink.
He digs in his pocket and pulls out a five. “Keep the change.”
“Big spender.”
“I’m supporting the local arts,” he croons. A lazy grin pulls on the corner of his luscious lips, and I swear I feel it tickling the backs of my knees.
“Speaking of which, you should have a table set up here.”
Completely ignoring me, he tucks the book under his arm and scratches his stomach, lifting the hem of his shirt just so. Well-worn jeans sit low on his hips. The band of his boxer shorts peeks out from underneath, as does the tamed line of light hair trailing low on his flat belly. “I’m starving. Let’s go get one of them steak sandwiches.”
Apparently, so am I. But steak is the last thing on my mind.
“I can’t. I’m working here.”
A questioning brow arcs over one light eye. “I’m the only person who’s stopped at this table all day.”
I drop a hand to my jutted hip. “Stalker much?”
“Yeah, kinda. C’mon . . . I need sustenance before I read my lady porn.” He lifts the book and shakes it back and forth in his hand.
I pull my brows together, gearing up to defend my choice of literature. “It’s not porn.”
“The hired handyman pushes the crying chick up against the wall and fucks her brains out on page two, Bird.”
A burst of laughter erupts from my chest. “It’s a really good story,” I tell him, sobering. “You should read it.”
“I will. If you come with me.”
I turn toward Enid, assuming she’s not witnessed a single moment of the past five minutes, but her wrinkled mouth twists in a grin. “Would you go already?”
“Don’t you need me here?”
Her watery gaze scans Jesse up and down before sliding slowly back to me. “Nice strapping young man. If I were fifty years younger, he wouldn’t need to ask me twice.”
“Listen to your elders,” Jesse exclaims, reaching out to take my hand as I step out from behind the table.
“I’ll be back, okay, Enid?” She waves me off with a sigh as I turn toward the steak stand with Jesse.
When his hand finds the small of my back, a sliver of warmth zings up my spine. I’m acutely aware of every fingertip pushing against my skin as he leans in to whisper in my ear. “See? I told you it was a good place to pick up chicks.”
The timbre of his voice releases chills that combat with the heat pooling in my stomach. “This is hardly a pick-up.”
“I mean Enid! Did you see the way she looked at me? Old lady’s thirsty as hell! I think I might have a shot with her.”
“You’re disturbed,” I say with an anxious snicker. Standing this close, the scent of him wafts over the smells of the fair and tickles my nostrils. Spice and laundry. A weird combination that hits me right in the lady bits.
“You’re jealous. Me and Enid are gonna shuffle off into the sunset together.”
“Stop!”
His stupid wink has a butterfly effect. You know how they say a butterfly can flap its wings in Mexico and start a tsunami in Asia? It’s like that. His lashes flutter, and my whole body goes up in flames.
“What do you want?” He blinks in quick succession, waiting for my answer.
My stomach twists in nervous knots. I couldn’t eat even if I wanted to. I feel like I did on my first day of junior high. He popped out of nowhere, and I couldn’t think. Those baby blues hypnotized me, holding me hostage as I waded through their bo
ttomless depths, afraid I’d drown in the crystal sea.
Now here I am. A grown woman still hanging on for dear life.
“I’m not really hungry.”
The girl behind the booth leans in as Jesse places his order. He pays, takes the ticket, then scoots down to the receiving line while the men at the grill start on his lunch. Smoke billows from the stainless-steel top. The tapping sound of spatulas fights against the sizzling fry of charring meat.
“Order up! Number thirty-seven!” the cook yells, throwing the sandwich and an order of fries on the counter.
“Thanks, man!” Jesse calls, taking the tray. We settle onto a picnic table set up nearby. “No work today?” Jesse brings the sandwich to his mouth and tears off a huge bite with his teeth.
“No. I always take the Hoe Down off to help Enid at the library table. Besides, with all the street food setups, the diner isn’t that busy.”
Nodding, he finishes chewing, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows. “That’s nice of you.”
I shrug. “Sometimes I think it’s a losing battle. No one really appreciates the public library anymore.”
“Print is dead.”
I narrow my gaze. “Print will never be dead.”
He sets his sandwich down and stares at me with a wistful look.
“What?”
He shrugs. His pensive gaze drops between us. “It’s just really cool to see you so passionate about something,” he admits, raising his eyes to meet mine again.
The statement raises my hackles. Asher’s voice floats in my head, telling me it’s nice to have a hobby. As if my dream of becoming a published author is a ludicrous endeavor I’ll never achieve.
“Don’t make fun of me.”
He reaches across the table and drops his hand on mine. “I’m not making fun of you. I’m being sincere. You love books. You always have, and I love that about you.”
“Least someone does,” I grumble.
“Your guy doesn’t share your love of printed pages, I guess?”
“No. Asher thinks books are a waste of time.” Anger bubbles from deep inside. I steal a fry from the red-and-white-striped paper bowl sitting between Jesse and me and stuff it in my mouth before I say something I’ll regret. I don’t want to be that girl who talks shit about her boyfriend to all her friends. That’s just not cool.
