by Amanda Young
As if it were a homing beacon, his gaze immediately fell on his cell phone upon exiting the bathroom. He dragged his feet on the way over to it, putting it off as long as he could. Nearing on eight, it was now or never. Though it scarcely mattered, he couldn’t fathom not making the call to let Mark know he was on his own for the day. Mark had already proven he was an efficient taskmaster and could run things without Aaron’s guidance. And Logan would know good and well why he wasn’t there. Just because the man was a two-timing cheat didn’t mean he was an idiot.
Himself, on the other hand, he wasn’t so sure about. Adulterer, coward, and naïve dumb ass seemed to fit him pretty well this morning. Those same words ran on a constant loop through Aaron’s mind while he picked up his cell phone and dialed the number for the office. As it rang, he prayed he’d called early enough that Logan wouldn’t yet be in the office.
“Remora’s Construction, Mark speaking.”
Thank God. “Mark, this is Aaron.”
“Oh, hey, Aaron. Uh, shouldn’t you be here by now? It’s almost eight.”
Aaron took a deep breath. “Yeah, about that…I’m not feeling so well this morning. I think I’m coming down with a touch of the flu or something.” He summoned up his best fake cough, but it came out weak and pitiful sounding. “I won’t be able to make it in to work today.” By the time he finished, his heart pounded a mile a minute and his palms were so slick he could barely hold on to the phone. He’d never been a good liar. Even over the phone, he sucked at it.
“Oh, that’s too bad. Wasn’t today supposed to be your last day, though?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, well, I hope you feel better then, and good luck with your ‑‑” Mark’s voice cut off, as if he’d placed his hand over the phone, and his voice was muffled as he spoke to someone else.
Logan must have come in. Aaron quickly hung up the phone. He hit the power button and watched the screen go blank before laying it on the end table, valiantly trying to ignore the way his hand trembled.
Pussy, his inner voice chided. Maybe so, he argued, but if burying his head in the sand helped save his sanity, he was all for it.
* * * * *
The weekend was spent sequestered in his apartment.
By Monday, Aaron was a basket case. Every time he turned his phone on, it rang. After endless hounding repetitions of his frog ringtone and the vibrating buzz of voicemail notification, he’d turned the phone off and kept it that way. He didn’t want to talk to anyone anyway. The urge to check his messages was tempting, but he refused to give in to curiosity. He had no interest in talking to either of the two people most likely to call him.
Running on only a handful of hours’ worth of sleep in the last four days, he wasn’t even close to being prepared for his first day of work at Lowe’s. Since beggars couldn’t be choosers, he dragged ass through the routine of getting ready for work. He needed the money too badly to blow it off just because he’d rather stay home and feel sorry for himself. Self-pity would not pay the rent, no matter how much he wanted it to.
After shaving, showering, and getting dressed, Aaron locked and left his apartment. Since Lowe’s was on the other side of town, he had to leave an hour early. The bus ride across town was notoriously slow, and he didn’t want to be late.
Since the bus was almost empty, he got to work with half an hour to spare. He went inside anyway, instead of loitering around outside until it was closer to the time he was supposed to arrive. Inside, the store was already abuzz with activity. People shoved oversized buggies between aisles, and employees, identifiable by the red smocks they wore, hurried about restocking shelves and waiting on customers.
He worked his way to the back of the building and walked through a set of swinging gray doors that led to the employees-only area, where the general manager’s office was located. Not in his best form that morning, he hoped being early would earn him a few brownie points.
Stopping outside the first door to his left, Aaron raised his hand and knocked. A loud voice bellowed, “Come in,” and he pulled the door open and stepped inside. “Good morning, Mr. Reynolds.”
Sitting behind an archaic metal desk, his new boss frowned up at him. “To you, too, Mr. Samuels, but I’m not sure what you’re doing here. Didn’t you get my message?”
Aaron grimaced. Damn, what a shitty time to decide not to answer the blasted phone. “No, sir. I’m sorry, but my cell’s been on the fritz for the past couple of days.”
The man scratched his bald head and nodded. “Well, I’m sorry to have to tell you this, son, but we offered you the position on the contingency of your references checking out. When my assistant called your previous office, he was told that you quit without notice.”
“But I didn’t ‑‑” Aaron began to sputter before Mr. Reynolds held up a hand, shushing him.
“I’m sorry, son. In this business, we’re only as good as our help, and I have to be able to depend on my management being reliable.”
Aaron floundered for something, anything, he could say to make this right. He couldn’t tell the man the truth, and nothing else came to mind that wouldn’t make him sound like a belligerent child.
The phone rang, and his opportunity to save his ass was gone. Mr. Reynolds tipped his head toward the phone, compassion in his beady gray eyes. “I need to take this. Best of luck to you in your job search, Mr. Samuels.” He picked up the phone and turned his back on Aaron, dismissing him.
Aaron walked out of Lowe’s in a fog. He couldn’t believe Logan would be vindictive enough to give him a bad reference. How could he be such a poor judge of character? The pedestal he’d kept Logan on, still whole even after Thursday’s fallout, went up in a fiery ball of smoke.
He had no job and no prospects. With less than fifty bucks in his checking account, it wouldn’t be long before he was flat broke and out of luck. No reference for the last four years meant he’d be lucky to get a job flipping burgers.
In a nutshell, he was screwed.
Absorbed by his thoughts, Aaron stepped off the curb in front of the store without watching where he was going. A horn sounded just as the chrome grill of a truck jumped into his peripheral vision. He slapped the hood, pissed off at the world in general, and looked up to give the careless fucking driver a piece of his mind.
Aaron sucked in his breath. Logan. Their eyes met through the windshield of the crew cab truck and clashed. Why was the bastard here? Had he came to gloat about his misdeeds?
Logan had the audacity to smile at him over the steering wheel. A red haze clouded Aaron’s vision. He stalked around the side of the cab, his muscles tensing up and his hands balling into fists at his sides.
Logan opened the door and slipped out, slamming the door closed behind him. “Hey, Aaron, I’ve been trying to get a hold of you ‑‑”
He clenched his fingers, pulled back his arm, and punched Logan square in the nose. Logan’s head popped backward and hit the truck. A hand flew to his nose, his spread fingers spanning outward over the lower half of his face.
Aaron stepped back and tried to shake the sting out of his knuckles. Though shocked he’d actually hit someone, part of Aaron was proud for having done it. He’d never stood up to anyone in his life, not physically, and the way he figured it, his timing couldn’t have been better. Someone needed to hit the jackass. He had as much right to do the honors as anyone else.
His satisfaction was short-lived. Logan dropped the hand covering his face, revealing a dull red nose and a snarling upper lip. He advanced on Aaron and grabbed him by the shoulders, spinning him around until his back was pressed into the hot metal and cool glass of the truck door. Aaron struggled against the hand Logan pressed into the middle of his chest, but it wouldn’t budge. Finally, he quit wiggling and stared up at Logan, waiting to see what he’d do next.
“What in the hell is your problem? First, you run off on me Thursday. Then you bail on me Friday. Now you’re throwing punches? Are you on something? This isn’t like you, Aar
on.”
“Fuck you, Logan. You know exactly why I punched you. Don’t even try to pretend you don’t.” Aaron attempted to jerk away again, only to end up plunking his head back into the glass. That only served to piss him off more. “Let me the fuck go, or I’ll tell your wife exactly what you were doing to me on Thursday.” The threat may not have been the best course to take, judging by the way Logan’s face drained of color. Not that he had any intention of doing it. The woman deserved to know what her scumbag husband was doing behind her back, but he wasn’t going to be the one to do it. Let someone else break the news to the little missus. He just wanted to forget the whole thing. Which was easier said than done with more than six feet of angry man towering over him, ready to tear him a new asshole.
“Is that what this is about?”
Aaron sneered. “Ding, ding, ding, we have a winner. You finally figured it out, did you? Good for you. Now, let go of me.”
The hand digging into his breastbone dropped away, and Aaron heaved a sigh of relief. With Logan pressing a considerable amount of his weight into his chest, it had been a little hard to breathe. He would have rather suffocated than admit it, though.
Logan took a half step back but put his hands on the truck to either side of Aaron, pinning him in. “We need to talk.”
Aaron ducked under Logan’s arm on the side not hampered by the rearview mirror. Sometimes being short had its advantages. “No, we don’t. I have nothing to say to you.”
Aaron only made it two steps before Logan’s paw wrapped around his biceps and jerked him to a halt. “You may not have anything to say to me, but I have some things to say to you.”
“I don’t give a flyin’ ‑‑”
Logan hunched down until they were eye to eye. “You’re going to hear me out, and that’s final.” He shoved his shoulder into Aaron’s middle and lifted him up off his feet.
“Put me down, damn it!” Aaron screeched as he was lugged up and over Logan’s shoulder. As the man carried him around to the passenger side door, Aaron stared down at the fine ass he’d spent years daydreaming about and magically didn’t think about fucking it. All he wanted to do now was kick it into next week. “Who the fuck do you think you are? Put me down!” He punctuated his demand with a wiggle and a kick to the front of Logan’s body. He couldn’t tell what he’d hit, but Logan grunted at the impact. That was good enough for him, so he did it again.
In retaliation, the flat of Logan’s huge hand crashed down on his ass, stinging like fire. “Ouch. Fuck!”
Logan pulled open the passenger door. “That’s what you get for kicking me in the gut, you little shit.”
“Put me down like I asked, and I wouldn’t have had to kick you, asshole.”
“Your wish is my command.” Logan unceremoniously dumped him onto the bench seat, slammed the door closed, and started around the front of the cab.
Aaron immediately reached for the handle and tugged. Nothing. He would’ve tried the window, but the controls were electric and there was no chance he could break it before Logan got in. “Fuck.”
Logan slipped behind the wheel. “Thought you might try that. Child safety locks are a beautiful thing.”
Aaron slumped back against the seat and glared at Logan. “Bastard.”
Chapter Seven
Silence stretched like a yawning void between Aaron and Logan as the truck’s wheels ate into the pavement. Staring sullenly out the window, Aaron wore what felt like a permanent scowl on his face. With every few miles that passed between Lowe’s and wherever the hell Logan was taking him, he shot wayward glances at Logan. Each time he would open his mouth, ready to demand Logan stop the truck and let him out, only to go back to silently staring out the window. Though he was ashamed that he cared, he was curious to find out what Logan had to say. Not that he would ever admit it.
When Logan bypassed the off-ramp leading toward the office and instead turned off the highway at an unfamiliar exit, a hint of unease wiggled into his gut and wouldn’t abate. It didn’t lessen until Logan pulled off the main road through a copse of trees and started up a long gravel driveway that led to a secluded log cabin.
The house wasn’t Aaron’s idea of what a cabin in the woods should look like. Nothing about it was small or quaint. Huge, reflective windows peeked out of the redwood siding, dominating the front of the house. The goliath cabin stood tall and proud, amid a backdrop of wild foliage and tall oaks standing like sentinels in the background.
Logan pulled the truck to a stop next to the house and turned off the engine. Silence reigned for a moment, neither of them speaking. Aaron glanced at Logan out of the corner of his eye, waiting.
Finally, Logan broke the quiet. “Are you going to come in under your own free will, or am I going to have to throw you over my shoulder again? I ask because you aren’t as light as you look, and I’d rather not give myself a hernia if I can help it.”
Aaron snorted and suppressed the grin trying to crawl over his face. “It would serve you right for acting like a fucking caveman.”
Logan chuckled. “Maybe so. Well, what’s it going to be, walk or ride?”
The smile withered and died when something else occurred to Aaron. He twisted around in his seat and faced Logan, wanting to read the man’s face as he spoke. “What about your wife? I don’t feel comfortable going into the home you share with her after everything that’s happened.”
Logan looked directly into Aaron’s eyes. “You don’t need to worry about her. We need to talk about that and a lot of other things, but I don’t want to do it sitting out here in the truck. Come inside with me and I’ll explain everything, I promise.”
“Okay,” Aaron whispered, wondering if he would regret taking Logan at his word.
They got out of the truck, and Aaron followed Logan up to the door, waiting outside while Logan punched numbers into a keypad to turn off the security alarm. Finished, Logan waved him in, and Aaron trailed after him. Nervous and expecting to be ambushed by a pissed-off spouse at any moment, Aaron followed him through the house.
Logan guided him through an open foyer, the walls white and the hardwood flooring beneath their feet stained to a deep cherry. Aaron tried to keep one eye on Logan ahead of him, while scanning his surroundings at the same time. He caught quick glimpses into a lower-level living room, decorated in shades of blue and cream, and what looked like a wood-paneled office with rows of bookshelves. Finally, they rounded a corner at the end of the hall and stepped into a large, airy eat-in kitchen. One end of the huge room was fashioned into a dining room of sorts, including a table long enough to fit a small army and a hutch filled with china. On the other end of the room were the appliances and double sink ‑‑ all gleaming chrome finishes ‑‑ and a long countertop fashioned out of beige-and-gray, swirled marble between the stove and fridge. Everything was spotless and harmonious in its symmetry. Small details here and there caught his eye the most. Small, potted herb plants sitting on the windowsill behind the sink, a white lace runner on the dining table, even the delicate china shelved in the hutch. All were little things that spoke of a woman’s touch more than the gruff man he’d come to know. A realization which made him slightly queasy.
His gaze drifted to Logan, who stood regarding Aaron with the same intensity Aaron had been paying to his house. “So,” Logan said as he pulled out a chair at the table and sat, waving to the one beside it for Aaron, “What do you think?”
That I want to puke. “Nice house. Your wife has good taste.” The last bit came out a little more snarky than he’d intended, but he couldn’t very well call it back now that it hung out in the air between them. Frankly, he wasn’t sure he would have even if he had the option. Better to get this unpleasantness finished quickly so he could get back to trying to figure out what he was going to do with his life now that he’d hit rock bottom.
Logan laughed. “I decorated the house, Aaron, but thanks anyway.” He nudged the chair beside him with the toe of his boot. “Have a seat.”
&n
bsp; Aaron crossed his arms over his chest. “I’ll stand.”
Logan shrugged and sat back. “Suit yourself.”
When nothing more was said for several terse moments, Aaron gave in and plopped down in the chair. He glared at Logan. “Fine, I’m sitting. Now talk.”
Logan scooted his chair up to the table and leaned forward on his elbows, narrowing the distance between them. “First of all, I’m not married.”
Aaron rolled his eyes. “Uh-huh. And if I were naïve enough to believe that, I’m sure you’ve got a real nifty bridge to sell me too.”
Logan tried to lay his hand over Aaron’s, but Aaron jerked away at the last minute. “I’m telling you the truth.”
He pointedly glanced down at the gold band on Logan’s left hand, where it rested on the table. “And the wedding ring?”
“It’s a reminder never to let myself be forced into something I don’t want.”
“Uh-huh.”
“What do you want me to do, dig up my divorce papers? Call my ex and have her spell everything out to you?”
“I don’t know. Just prove it. If you can…”
Logan ran a hand over his stubbly head. “How?”
“Don’t care.”
Logan sighed and pushed away from the table. “All right. Sit tight and I’ll be back in a second.”
Aaron fidgeted in his seat. In a matter of minutes, Logan walked back into the kitchen with a file folder. He set it on the table in front of Aaron. “Here. These should tell you what you want to know. Elaine and I haven’t been together in over a year. The divorce was final two months ago.”
Aaron picked up the folder and flipped through the thick stack of pages inside. He didn’t understand half the legal jargon, but it was easy enough to get the gist of it. Logan was telling the truth. His divorce was final on the last day of April. The papers were even notarized, alleviating any worry about them being faked. Not that he thought Logan would go to that much effort anyway. Not for him. He set the folder down and slid it across the table. “Okay.”
