by Liz Crowe
He left his hand outstretched as they made for the front door, still feeling her hair, still seeing the sweet spot of her neck she’d given him access to, if only for a brief moment. Finally, he stuck his fingers back in his pockets and waited a few beats, giving them time to find their ride before making his way to the door.
Chapter Nine
“Yo! Stokes! God damn, boy, you’re gonna get yourself killed.”
Noah flinched when something hit the back of his head. “What the fuck?” He whirled to face his assailant, who stood with his gloved hands on his hips and a smirk playing around his mouth. “I was working.”
“You were daydreaming. And that thing you’re holding will slice off your fuckin’ foot if you’re not more careful.”
Noah flipped the guy off and got back to work. He had been drifting. But he was also exhausted, which didn’t help. After stumbling into his apartment Friday night, he’d been disappointed to discover he was wound up on too many levels to sleep. Every square inch of his skin seemed to crawl. His ears rang. His legs were restless.
And of course, he was hornier than a boatload of sailors.
Celibacy did not agree with him. Not one bit. But he’d endured it as a sort of detox from his old life in California and up to this exact point, it hadn’t been a real hardship. But the night before, it had been exactly that.
And had only gotten harder.
He’d tried everything—cold shower, hot shower, ten miles on the stationary bike in the corner of his small space, huge glass of bourbon—and all these things after he’d jacked off not once, but twice, to the thought of pressing his too-eager lips to the back of Yoga Lady’s neck. It had been maddening and frustrating. And he still couldn’t even manage an hour or so of fitful dozing before he had to get up and meet his crew for a long day of yard maintenance.
He wiped the sweat off his forehead with the bandana he kept in his back pocket, pissed that his hand shook as if he had the world’s worst hangover. He supposed he did, in a way. A Yoga Lady hangover, perhaps. Whatever it was, it was damn close to killing him. He had to let it go. But he had no idea how to do it. Everywhere he looked he could see some part of her—either in her sexy dress, or in her minimal exercise gear. Her eyes, her lips, the set of her jaw, the fall of her hair, the length of her legs—he was obsessed beyond all reason.
Plus, he was still convinced she was married to some rich asshole and had only been playing out of school the night before, getting back at him for some ill-chosen tumble at a convention with a stranger or a quick-and-ugly with his secretary. Men still did that. He’d know. Half of the women he’d serviced in his former life confessed they were only doing it to get back at their husbands.
God, man. Get a grip already. Get two. They’re on sale.
For the next three hours, Noah went about his assigned business—weeding gardens, trimming hedges, blowing grass clippings off sidewalks. But his mind never left the long, porcelain line of her neck, the deep red of her short fingernails, the raw panic in her eyes over the necklace which had held what looked like a man’s wedding ring.
Something about that memory made him pause, mid-clip. He stood, the dangerously sharp tool he used gaping open, along with his mouth. Realizing this before the crew boss caught him again, he closed the shears around the green frond destined for death, then went on down the row, opening and closing the thing without even paying close attention to what he was clipping off.
He finished and did a quick phone check behind the truck. This particular boss had a thing about the guys always ‘chasing pussy on their phones’ as he put it, rather poetically, Noah thought. Which meant he couldn’t afford to get caught looking at his, since he’d already taken a water bottle to the back of his head earlier. He had another thirty-five minutes to his shift so he found some make-work he could do without thinking, spreading the last of the mulch around some trees and shrubs. The minute he was able, he jumped behind the wheel of his third-hand truck, plugged his phone into the cigarette lighter charger and did an internet search for something that had hit him like the proverbial bolt of lightning earlier.
Once he’d figured out who the hot, if somewhat bossy blonde had been—Evelyn Fitzgerald, the woman who would technically be his boss come Monday—he’d had a quick flash of insight combined with a random memory and realized just who his mystery Yoga Lady might be. It only took a couple of minutes to find what he was seeking. He held on to the wheel with one hand and thumb-scrolled down an article titled Beer and Wine Distribution Mogul, Entrepreneur, Philanthropist Ethan Connolly Dies in Private Plane Crash over Texas.
He’d had a few widows on his client list—women who began as regulars to the bar where he danced who’d actually been among the first in line for his direct attention, once Drake had determined him ready for such a thing. One in particular had been in what she called the ‘early stages of grief’, which had not, if he remembered correctly, damped her libido one iota. If anything, she’d been insatiable.
But those had been early, heady days of his life as…whatever the fuck he wanted to call it. He’d been called a male escort, gigolo, Bringer of Extreme Fantasy with Happy Endings…but he’d been a common prostitute. He’d taken money—an inordinate amount of it—in exchange for having sex, paid a portion of it to his pimp and pocketed the rest.
Sweat clouded his vision and his phone screen went dark when he tried to muscle past the fury rising in his throat at the thought of himself then. One thing he did recall about his horny widows—they sometimes wore their dead husbands’ rings on necklaces. Just like Yoga Lady had done the night before. He’d put the thing back on her himself.
Which had brought him here—reading about Yoga Lady’s dead husband in an article from almost three years ago. He’d been in California when it had happened, at rock bottom after getting busted for possession of way too many bottles of prescription pain killers and summarily fired from his bar dancing job. He’d been so sick of having sex with strangers for money he’d been methodically collecting the pills from the medicine chests of his various ‘clients’ with a serious eye towards chasing every single one of them with a liter of Jack Daniels on the beach.
Something in him had made that strange connection and sure enough, there she was in a photo, dressed in something incredible and no-doubt designer, on the arm of her tall, gray-haired, slim and super-handsome hubby. Dear Jesus, but she was a goddess, an exquisite picture of feminine perfection to his eye—strong, smart, savvy, fit, tall—all his favorite things in a woman.
She was obviously in mourning for a man who’d been almost fifteen years her senior, wealthier than God, never been married, and, according to one of his many rich and famous friend quoted in this Wall Street Journal article, never happier than when he’d met and wooed the young saleswoman in his San Francisco-based distributorship. Noah wiped his eyes free of sweat and touched the phone screen again, eager for more details.
Gayle.
Yoga Lady had a name and he’d found it.
Gayle Jackson Connolly.
Noah sat in the stifling hot truck for so long, scrolling around and finding out as much as he could of her horrific personal tragedy, that when he looked up, the rest of the crew had gone and the owner of the obnoxious McMansion where he’d been working was glaring at him suspiciously from her front door. He gave her a friendly wave with a shaking hand, thanks to the heat and his lack of food intake in the last half a day, before firing up the rebuilt engine and driving out of the gated neighborhood toward his apartment.
He ate two bananas and downed nearly a gallon of Gatorade standing in his kitchen, phone in his other hand, eyes darting down the screen, reading yet more about his new obsession. When, after reading through an industry-based article about the crash, he realized that Ethan wasn’t the only Connolly to be killed, his hand shook so hard he dropped the device and slid down the cabinet until he was sitting on the cracked linoleum, staring into space.
Finally, he got control of himself, picked the phone up and di
d one final search for ‘Gayle Connolly’ in recent beer-industry press.
“Bingo,” he whispered. He read through the information, his eyes widening in shock when he had to accept he might just be running into the beautiful, tragic Gayle a lot sooner than she might think.
Chapter Ten
Monday morning couldn’t come quickly enough. Gayle had spent the weekend huddled under a blanket, reliving the huge mistake of Friday night’s adventure even while her mind wouldn’t let go of the memory of the kid from the construction lift outside her yoga studio—he’d been at the dance club, of all the places in the city he might’ve materialized. It confounded her, which was nothing compared to her confusion about how calm and protected he’d made her feel for a split second.
When Evelyn had pulled her away, she’d been half inclined to throw herself at him, to beg him to put his arm around her again. Or, worse, to touch her shoulder the way he had after re-fastening her necklace.
Dear God, but she was a sap. She should’ve just let the drunk guy she’d been making out with do what he’d wanted. That would’ve driven all thoughts of being a sexually whole woman again right out of her brain, and how. But the second he’d reached between her legs and actually touched her, it seemed a negative electric shock had flown through her body. She’d wanted to throw up, frankly. But instead she’d slapped his stupid face.
Ugh. She hated herself by the time Monday morning finally arrived. But thankfully she had a long, challenging week ahead—just the thing for forgetting how she’d behaved Friday night. She’d barely even been able to talk to Evelyn on Saturday, she’d been so mortified by herself.
“Honey, please do not worry,” her friend had reassured her, repeatedly. “It was your first outing. We’ll do it better next time.”
“Trust me, Evelyn. There will never be a next time. I’m not cut out for…”
“Fun? A life? Please, Gayle.”
“I don’t know. I was…it was…I don’t know anymore. But thank God you were there, especially when I lost my damn necklace.”
“Yes, well…”
Gayle had snapped to, recalling that Evelyn had her own issues going on at the moment. “So, have you talked to him?”
“Of course. The damn man was home when I got there.”
“Home? I thought he was in Denver.”
“He turned around and came back.” Evelyn had sighed and Gayle had sensed a thick curl of jealous smoke enter her consciousness. “Silly man. But we kissed and made up.”
“Good,” Gayle had said, not wanting to hear anymore lest she say something rude and inappropriate. “I’m glad for you both. Gonna go now, hon. Enjoy your weekend.” She’d hung up without letting the other woman say anything else and sat for a long time, the phone pressed to her forehead, her jaw clenched in an effort not to scream.
But finally, Monday morning arrived, as it always did. She rose at five, ran six miles in the already warm morning through her old neighborhood, showered and grabbed coffee. Realizing she’d be sitting at her desk a solid hour before most people even got up, she smiled at herself in the rearview mirror. But it was a grim smile.
So what? I’m entitled. I tried to act like a regular person and go out for drinks and dancing and almost lost my mind. Obviously, I am no longer a regular person.
She jammed the car into reverse, then squealed her way down the quiet road toward the only thing she knew how to do anymore—work.
By the weekly nine-thirty a.m. all-hands sales meeting, she’d gotten so many things ticked off her to-do list, she figured she should make a point to be in the office by seven every day. “I emailed you my latest spreadsheet with corrections,” she said to her assistant with a quick smile. “Would you tidy it up for me, so I can present it at Thursday’s management lunch?”
“Sure thing,” the woman said. “Oh, and Gayle…”
She turned, her mind already on the meeting ahead, since she’d be announcing the breweries getting slashed from her book for good. “Hmm?” She checked her tablet distractedly.
“Someone sent this for you.” Gayle looked at the woman, who was pointing to a huge bouquet of summer flowers on the table between a set of chairs where people sat when they were waiting to see her. “Here’s the card. Your door was closed when they got delivered so…” The woman’s voice trailed away. Gayle frowned and took the square envelope with her name fake hand-written on it. She glanced at the woman—Susan, God damn it. Her name is Susan—before ripping it open and staring at the words a few seconds before they settled into her brain.
Dear Gayle, I swear I’m not a stalker, but I would love to buy you a coffee, or a beer, or a water sometime and talk. I hope you don’t take this the wrong way. I will see you soon. Noah (a.k.a. Yoga Window Guy)
Once she’d read the words for a sixth time, her mind accepted what she’d known the second she saw the flowers. Noah, the cute, young, construction worker guy-slash-hero-from-the-nightclub, was not going away anytime soon. To her surprise, she was smiling by the time she tucked the note into her leather portfolio, which currently housed the bad news for a fair number of breweries in their market. When she met Susan’s eyes, the other woman was smiling too. Gayle’s face flushed hot and she tried not to run out of her office door toward the conference room.
Taking a deep breath to center herself and get straight in her head that today was about work, not a ridiculous flirtation with some…kid who knew how to call a florist, she pushed open the door and walked into the half-filled room. She’d always run great meetings—efficient, to the point, useful for anyone who attended and this one had been required for all sales and warehouse staff. She saw the IT people had set up the screen with one of her favorite motivational quotes from Estée Lauder— “I didn’t get there by wishing for it or hoping for it, but by working for it”—displayed in large red font. Gayle met the gazes of each man and woman waiting for her and took her seat.
She immediately spotted three people were missing, which aggravated her, but there were still three minutes to go before the official start. A few people asked after her weekend. A few others asked how she was settling back into life in Michigan. Most people averted their gazes. It was amazing how being the object of such ongoing sympathy after tragedy changed the way people treated her—as if she had a contagious disease, or as if her bad luck in life would rub off on them if they got too friendly.
But it was all fine and dandy with her. She wasn’t here to make buddies. There was work to be done and she’d been hired to do it. Ben ducked into the room and sat at the far end of the table, after giving her a small wave. The other three missing staff—two sales people and the warehouse manager—finally honored the rest of them with their presences. Gayle swallowed the urge to snap at them and glanced down at the chart she’d prepared for the AV portion of the meeting. A corner of the card from the flowers caught her eye. She touched it, marveling at her ability to let it distract her from these crucial next sixty minutes.
When the conference room door shut behind the last tardy staffer, she looked up and beamed at the room. “Well, guys, you’ve done it.” She waited, letting it sink in. Almost everyone smiled at her blankly. “No, really. You have. You’ve done it. You’ve set a record for July sales of craft beer.” She touched her screen and the TV screen changed to a chart reflecting the last three years’ worth of sales. It did, indeed, show a significant spike in sales from the previous one and a huge jump from two years ago. She gave a slow clap and waited until the room joined her.
The conference room door opened, sending a puff of air-conditioned air into her face. She frowned when someone stepped into the room. “Oh, sorry, Gayle,” Ben said. “I had Susan add something last minute to the agenda for this morning. It’s my bad. Come on in, Noah.”
Gayle’s heart actually stopped beating for about a half second. At least, that was what it felt like when she watched the man who’d made her almost break her ankle, who’d pulled her out of her yoga class for reasons she still couldn’t
parse and who’d rescued her from her ignominious return to a social life on Friday night, look right at her with a half-smile and a shrug of ‘I told you I’d see you soon.’
Her hand went to her throat. But she’d left Ethan’s ring draped on its chain on the corner of the mirror over her dresser earlier, figuring she could make it through a workday without worrying it to death. She wanted it now so badly it hurt. The young man’s compelling brown gaze hadn’t left hers. They were staring at each other like a pair of star-crossed lovers for so long someone had to clear their throat to break up the moment. Gayle flinched at the sound and her gaze flew to Ben, who was looking around the room in confusion.
“Right,” she said, before swallowing hard. “Okay. So…Ben. What did you add?” She glanced down at her tablet and saw the addition now. It was something she probably should have noted before walking in here, since the addition had the name Noah Stokes, new brand ambassador for Fitzgerald Brewing Company, right on it. “Ah, I see.” She smiled in Noah’s general direction without looking at him. “So, let’s continue, shall we?” Her voice was high, tight, tense-sounding—weak. And nothing pissed her off more than appearing to be weak.
She frowned at Ben, who shrugged and looked down at his agenda. She frowned at him—at Noah—who smiled, which made a shiver shoot down her spine. She tried to convince herself that it was embarrassment over how they’d last met. But it wasn’t and she damn well knew it.
Her portion of the meeting ended after exactly forty minutes in near total silence. She’d dropped some serious bombshells on them in this second round of cuts. A few of the more competent sales people had complained and she’d listened, stating, “If you have a serious argument in favor of keeping an account, make an appointment with my assistant in the next two weeks and make your pitch for them. Please include actual sales numbers and your personal projections for how we can turn them around.” She’d met every pair of eyes around the table. “I will consider your well-structured arguments. But not a bunch of bullshit about breweries who give you freebies or treat you like royalty just because.” Gayle rarely cursed in the office, so when she did, people sat up and paid attention.
