by Maria Geraci
During her lunch break Allie drove into Destin and stopped by the Target store. She picked out the sexiest pair of white panties she could find, and tried not blush when the cashier rung them up. On her way out the store, she decided to call Tom at his job.
“Ace Hardware,” answered Dell, Tom’s boss.
“Hey, Mr. Kutchens, it’s Allie Grant. Is Tom available?”
“Well, hey there, Allie. Sorry, hon, but Tom called in sick today.”
“Oh, okay, sorry to bother you.”
She immediately called Tom’s house. His mother answered. Geez! Talk about embarrassing. Allie hoped there was nothing in her voice that would make Betsy Donalan suspicious. “Hi, Mrs. Donalan, it’s Allie. Is Tom all right?”
“Allie?” she said it like Allie was the last person on Earth she’d expect to be calling. Considering that Allie had been dating her son all summer… Okay. His mother was definitely acting weird. Oh God. Allie hoped she hadn’t found the condoms Tom was supposed to buy for tonight. “Um, how are you, dear?”
Whew. That was more normal. “Oh, I’m great.”
“Tom is…he’s not able to come to the phone right now.”
“Can you please tell him I called? And that I hope he’s feeling all right.”
Allie drove back to work and finished the rest of her shift. By eight, she still hadn’t heard from Tom, which was definitely not like him. Maybe he was so sick he couldn’t even come to the phone. Should she drive by his house? It seemed like the logical thing to do. But when she rang the doorbell, no one answered. Allie could hear Brandy, the Donalans’ beagle barking from the back of the house. She rang the bell a second time, just for good measure, then got back in her car.
Her only option was to go back home. Or she could go to Zeke’s and wait. Just in case. So she drove to her brother’s and let herself in with the spare key he had given her. She tried not to feel guilty, but she knew Zeke wouldn’t be thrilled to know that his baby sister was planning on using his house as her own personal love shack.
An hour went by and no Tom. Confused (and more than just a little worried), Allie went to lock up, when the house phone rang. She checked the caller I.D. It was Tom!
“Oh, thank God! What’s going on? Are you okay?” she said, rushing through all the words.
“I’m okay,” he said, but he sounded even weirder than his mother had this afternoon.
“I went by your house but there was no one there. I was afraid they had to take you to the hospital.”
“Allie…can you meet me by the bridge?”
“Now?”
“Um, yeah, there’s something really important I have to tell you.”
“Okay, I can be there in ten minutes.” She locked up the house and jumped in her car. Tom wanted to meet her by the bridge. It was their favorite parking spot. The place where he’d shown her his acceptance letter to the University of Florida. Where they’d shared almost everything about each other. But why meet her there now?
Allie’s hands began to tremble. She gripped the steering wheel and tried her hardest to drive within the speed limit, but she was nearly giddy with anticipation. There could only be one reason Tom had canceled their date to meet her at the bridge. It was the perfect place to tell her that he loved her, too!
It was dark, but she could still make out his car overlooking the water. She parked her car next to his and ran out to hug him. “I was so freaked out when I heard you were sick!”
He held onto her tightly. Too tightly.
“Um, Tom, you’re kind of squishing me here.” She disentangled herself from his arms and looked him over. His eyes looked hollow and there was a strange expression on his face that made Allie’s heart leap to her throat. “Oh, God, you are sick. Should you be out? Shouldn’t you be—”
“Allie, I’m getting married.”
Her heart came sliding back into her chest. She laughed with relief. “Okay, so that’s kind of funny, but—”
He caught her hand. “I’m serious. Lauren’s pregnant…and I’m the father, and…” He shrugged.
Her heart shifted around again. Only this time it began to fall south. “This is a joke, right? I mean, you do know you have to have sex to get pregnant.”
He wouldn’t look her in the eye. “I’m sorry, Allie. I’m so damn sorry, but…I have to do the right thing here.” His voice cracked.
“The right thing? Are you friggin’ kidding me?” Allie pulled her hand from his grasp. She began pacing the grassy strip next to the water. This didn’t make any sense! She stopped and whirled around to face him. “How far along is she?”
“Four months.” He looked so miserable that Allie wanted to put her arms around him and tell him everything would be okay. But it wasn’t going to be okay. It was never going to be okay again.
Tears welled in her eyes. “Do you love her?”
He hesitated, then for the first time tonight, met her gaze square on. “Yeah, I guess a part of me does.”
“A part of you? Let me guess which part. Captain Fucking Crunch, that’s just peachy.”
He flinched. “I don’t blame you for hating me.”
Hate him? She didn’t hate him. She… Oh, God. When she thought about all the things she’d let him do to her. And all the things she’d wanted him to do her. Her face felt like it was on fire. How could she have been so stupid? He was getting married because he’d knocked up Lauren Handy. If the whole thing wasn’t so ridiculous, she would have laughed.
Anger oozed like a river of lava through every vein in her body. She wanted to yell at him. To tell him to go fuck off. But somewhere beneath it all, she could hear Buela’s voice telling her to hold on to her pride.
She straightened back her shoulders. She wasn’t going to ask for any more explanations. And really, what more explanation did she need? He hadn’t wanted to sleep with her, but he had no problem screwing perfect little Lauren.
“Congratulations, Tom.” He started toward her but Allie put up her hand to ward him off, stopping him dead in his tracks. “No really, have a great life. Maybe I’ll see you around sometime.”
*~*~*
And that was the last time she’d seen Tom Donalan. Until last night.
They arrived at the senior center. Mimi parked her van along the side of the road. The parking lot was abuzz with activity. There were all kinds of big machines and lots of men in hard hats milling about, but it was still easy to spot Tom. He wasn’t the tallest or the loudest but there was an air of authority about him that made him stand out.
Allie weaved her way through the parking lot teaming with construction workers.
“Lady!” yelled a guy in a hard hat, “You can’t be here. We’re about to tear down a building.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know, but that’s my car right there.” She pointed to the VW bug parked in the middle of the lot.
He looked her up and down. “So you’re the Flaky Biscuit who broke into the building last night. Boss says I’m supposed to bring you to him when you show up.”
Flaky Biscuit?
Was that Tom’s terminology or Hard Hat’s?
She took a deep breath of the crisp gulf air and tried to stay calm.
You can do this, Allie. Part Three of her Life Plan depended on it.
Hard Hat escorted her to Tom, who was busy talking on the phone. In the bright sunshine Tom’s eyes looked impossibly blue. He wore snug bleached out jeans, a black T-shirt that stretched over his broad shoulders, and ankle high steel toe boots. He couldn’t have looked yummier, even in a tux.
She might be a flaky biscuit, but she had to begrudgingly admit Tom was definitely what she’d call, a tasty biscuit. If you liked tall, handsome, and ridiculously stubborn. Which, thank God, she was immune to in his case.
Tom slipped his phone in the back pocket of his jeans then picked up a clipboard from a nearby makeshift table. “Thanks for coming early.”
“Sure, no problem. I’ve got Kitty Pappas and my sister-in-law here to help me move my car.”
“Great. I appreciate that.” Tom didn’t react to the mention of Kitty’s name, but Allie had to wonder what he thought about the fact that his boss’s wife was here. Or if he even knew that Kitty had tried to intervene on Allie’s behalf by going above his head.
She couldn’t help but think for the umpteenth time how much simpler all this would be if Steve Pappas had just shut things down for one day. But nothing in life worth having was easy.
Tom glanced down at his clipboard, effectively dismissing her.
Okay, she got it. He was a very important person and he had work to do.
But so did she.
A trickle of perspiration ran down her spine. She didn’t have to do this. There had to be some other way to get this story. Unfortunately, she just couldn’t think of one right now.
A vision of Chris Dougal sitting at his desk typing away at his big illegal immigration piece jumped into her head. Allie couldn’t begin to imagine what he did to research that but she wouldn’t put it past him to have gone undercover, big show off that he was. Ben was probably salivating at Florida! headquarters, waiting for Chris’s article to come across his desk. Despite Emma’s support, Allie’s little ghost story didn’t stand a chance. Especially since there was no such thing as ghosts.
Maybe she could drive to Tallahassee and do a follow-up on Perky. She could see the byline now. Perky the Duck, Three Years Later…
It sounded pathetic. But what where her choices? Too bad there wasn’t some manatee trapped in a reef somewhere. Or a flock of endangered pelicans or some sick sea turtles to write about. Or better yet, a dolphin in trouble. People loved dolphin stories. Especially if it had a happy ending.
But no. Emma wanted a ghost story. And Emma was her chief supporter at Florida! so this was a no brainer. Her only other option was to bow out of the competition gracefully. But Allie had wanted this job at Florida! for so long and to just give up was unthinkable. She’d been stuck in the middle of Life Goal Number Two for far too long now.
She swallowed past the lump of pride swelling her throat. “Tom, do you think, maybe, I could have a word with you?”
Hard Hat raised a brow and made a great big gurgling noise like he was about to spit out tobacco or something, which Allie certainly hoped was not going to happen. Her stomach felt queasy enough already. “We need to get going, Boss. The guys have already had their morning coffee.”
Tom frowned, although she couldn’t tell if his displeasure was meant for Hard Hat or her. Probably her. “I’m busy, Allie. Can this wait till later?”
“I just need a minute. But it definitely can’t wait until later.”
Tom glanced at his wrist watch. “Okay, you got one minute.” He handed the clipboard off to Hard Hat. “Do me a favor, Keith, tell the guys to be ready. I’ll meet you in front of the building as soon I’m finished here.” He placed his hand on her elbow and led her to the edge of a trailer where they were essentially hidden from the rest of the parking lot’s occupants.
“What did you want to talk about?” Tom asked.
She tried to think of something compelling, something that would convince him that delaying the teardown on the building was in everyone’s best interests, but all that came out was, “Kitty asked Steve to delay the demolition, but he says it’s all up to you. I know I’m asking a huge favor here, because this is your job and you’re on a tight schedule. I get that. I really do. But all I need is one night. Just one more day so that I can spend tonight in the building and write my story.”
“Allie—”
“Don’t say no. Because I really need this. And because…because you owe me.”
She blinked.
Then he blinked.
And then no one said anything.
Because you owe me. Talk about hitting an all-time low!
The trickle of perspiration running down her back was now a river. It was barely eight-thirty and already humid, but nowhere near hot enough for her to be sweating like this.
She followed Tom’s gaze to all the waiting men, at the big machines primed and ready to tear down the building. What she was asking was not only impossible, it was impractical. Expensive. And crazy. She was asking him to put his job on the line. And for what? For a girl he knew back in high school. A girl he’d used as a rebound fling. A girl he hadn’t seen or talked to or probably even thought about in over twelve years.
He was going to laugh in her face and say no. And Allie couldn’t blame him.
“You know, I wouldn’t ask for your help if I didn’t need it.” Those words wouldn’t change anything, but at least it allowed her to save a bit of pride.
He frowned and shook his head. “What did you just say?”
Great. He was going to make this even harder for her.
“You heard me, Donalan. I need your help here.”
Instead of answering, he turned and shouted to a nearby group of workers, “Hey! Turn down the radio.”
The men all stared back with blank expressions.
Okay, that was a little freaky.
“What are you talking about? There’s no radio,” Allie said.
He whipped around. “What do you mean? You don’t hear the music?”
“What music?”
He closed his eyes for a second and shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. “Did you just say you need my…help?”
She frowned. Tom wasn’t faking this clueless routine. There had been a time when Allie could have read his mind, they’d been that close. It might have been over a decade since she’d last seen him but no one changed that much. Maybe after all these years of working construction sites he’s gotten hit on the head one too many times by a rogue ply board.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
There were dark smudges under his eyes like he hadn’t slept well. What had he said last night? That he’d been “patrolling” the senior center?
He took off his hard hat and squinted up into the sun as if searching for something.
“Donalan, you’re kind of scaring me here. You look tired. Maybe you should go lie down.”
This seemed to pull him out of whatever trance he was in. “I’m fine.”
He didn’t seem fine, but he also seemed irritated by her questioning. “All right, so are you going to help me or not?”
“Okay, okay.” He threw up his hands in surrender. “You win. I’ll give you twenty-four hours.”
“You mean it?”
“Of course I mean it.” He glanced around apprehensively. After a few seconds, he let out a big breath and muttered, “Thank God.”
Allie wasn’t sure what God had to do with it. Or what had just happened. Not that she was complaining, but this sudden reversal of his seemed almost too good to be true.
“Twenty-four hours,” Allie repeated, wanting to make sure she’d heard him right. Because honestly? Tom still looked a little disoriented. “This building is staying intact for the next twenty-four hours. You promise?”
“Yeah,” he said. “But you have to promise me something in return.”
Was he serious? She’d promise him just about anything right now. Well, almost anything. “Name it.”
“This is it. No matter what happens. Ghost or no ghost, and I can pretty much guarantee it’s going to be no ghost, but one more day, that’s all the time I can give you because tomorrow the building comes down.”
“Sure, sure! I promise. No more delays. Twenty-four hours, that’s all the time I need. I’ll even toss the first wrecking ball myself,” she said, giddy with relief. “So, I can go in the building now?”
“Not now,” he said, looking more like the old Tom. In control again. “I can’t let you in the building unsupervised and if I’m going to call off this demolition then I’ve got to get this crew off to another work site.”
Yikes. Was she putting all these men out of work for the day? Her Catholic guilt tried hard not to think about that. “All these workers? They’re still going to get paid, right?”
“Would it matt
er if they weren’t?” Before she could answer, he said, “We have a project going on in Mexico Beach that’s short of workers. If I can the crew out there in time then no one will lose a work day.” He stared at her hard. “You can get in tonight at eight. Not a second before.”
“Works for me,” she said trying to sound humble. Because despite the fact that she’d hated asking him, she was grateful that he’d capitulated. She should be ecstatic. Except… “Can I ask you a question? What made you change your mind?”
For a long time Allie didn’t think he’d answer. Then he did this twitchy thing with the corner of his mouth that she’d seen him do once, twelve years ago, when he’d lied to his mother about where they were going. “You’re right. I owe you.”
Kitty drove Allie’s car, while Mimi followed them in her minivan. The plan was to then drive Kitty back to The Bistro so she could get her own car. All this brouhaha because Allie couldn’t be bothered to read the back of a traffic citation. She was embarrassed by all the trouble she’d caused, but she was more stunned by what had just happened back at the senior center.
Apparently, so was Kitty. “I can’t believe Tom postponed the demolition. I mean, that’s great for you and all, but I really got the impression…why do you think he did it?”
“Who knows? I’m just glad he did.” As casually as she’d just answered, Allie had been racking her brain with the same exact question, but she hadn’t been able to come up with any sort of answer that made sense.
Why had Tom changed his mind?
The only logical answer was that she had guilted Tom into giving her a break. She should probably feel ashamed for using their angsty teenage history against him. But she didn’t. Especially since she was pretty certain their history had nothing to do with his reasoning. The only thing Allie was one hundred percent sure of, was that he was all ready to say no, and then out of the blue, he said yes.
“Do you think he’s still into you?” Kitty asked.
“What?”
Kitty made a dismissive motion with her hand. “Mimi told me the two of you used to be a hot item. First love, and all that. And now that he’s divorced—”
