by Sybil Bartel
“I don’t have moods.” Goddamn it.
“Then you’re one sorry son of a bitch. Do her a favor and get your shit together or leave her the fuck alone.”
“She’s not staying at your place another goddamn night,” I warned.
His Southern drawl came back. “She’s stayin’ wherever the fuck she wants.”
“The hell she is,” I argued.
“Right.” Talerco snorted. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but goddamn, Ranger, I almost feel sorry for you.”
“Fuck you.” I hung up.
Then, because I was a fucking glutton for punishment, I dialed Kendall.
When the call connected, I didn’t wait for her to say shit. “Talerco gave her a fucking job at his surf shop.”
“Well hello to you too.” Dry and without emotion, she gave me her usual Kendall attitude.
“He has the asshole surfer working there.”
Kendall laughed. “Jealous much?”
“Fuck you.”
“Your vocabulary, as always, lacks originality.”
“She doesn’t need a job.”
Kendall’s tone took on an edge. “Yeah? Why’s that? So she can be beholden to you for the rest of her life and never have a taste of freedom?”
My eye twitched. “I didn’t say that.”
“Then what did you say besides I’m a dick alphahole and what I say goes?”
“You got something to say, say it.”
“Oh, I am saying it. I have been saying it, but you’re not listening. That girl needs something of her own. And she needs time to adjust like you and I needed time to adjust. You think she’s any different than when we got out of the compound? Open your eyes. She’s been a prisoner her whole life, for fuck’s sake.”
I wasn’t a fucking idiot. “I know what she’s been through.”
“Do you?”
“Yes,” I ground out.
“So you’ve asked her?”
My nostrils flared.
“That’s what I thought,” Kendall continued. “You haven’t asked her shit. You probably haven’t even talked to her. And I mean really talk. Not bullshit, but the kind where you ask her what she went through, listen without judgment, then tell her what you went through. That’s conversation one-oh-one. Sharing and exchanging information. If you want any kind of a chance with her, then you need to get on board and just talk to her. Fuck, Candle, even I didn’t know the shit you were keeping locked up tight in your head. And I can get anyone to talk.”
“There’s nothing to tell.” Rehashing shit we went through wasn’t going to get us anywhere. “The past is the past.”
“Then why are you so fucking angry?”
My hand tightened on the phone, my shoulders went rigid, and my empty left palm itched for the carved piece of wood I’d stopped carrying around a week ago.
Not waiting for me to answer, Kendall’s voice softened. “You need a plan, T.”
“I’m not Tarquin anymore,” I bit out defensively.
“Well, maybe Shaila needs you to be him again.” She paused. “Maybe she needs you to be the guy who gave a sad girl a flower.”
My jaw ticked. “I already tried that.”
“What?” she asked, surprised. “When?”
“Last night.” I didn’t even know why I’d done it.
“You gave her a flower,” Kendall stated.
“That’s what I said.” Goddamn it.
“How many flowers?” she demanded.
“That fucking matters?”
“Jesus Christ, Candle.” Kendall sighed. “Yes, it fucking matters. How do you not know this?”
Fuck her, fuck the flower, fuck this goddamn conversation. “I’m done talking.”
“Then start listening. Man the fuck up.”
“I am a goddamn man,” I yelled, not giving a fuck what the assholes around me heard.
“You’re a goddamn pussy!” she yelled back.
“You should know.”
“Oh my God, how the hell did you ever get laid?”
“You were on that goddamn compound same as me. How the fuck do you think?” The men bred the women, period.
“You’re not River Ranch anymore!” she screamed.
“Why the fuck is she working for Talerco?” I roared.
Dead air.
Then, quiet and reserved, Kendall laid in to me. “Because you broke her heart, Tarquin.”
I didn’t have a response, and she didn’t have anything else to say.
I hung up.
My dogs barking, my bones tired, I rubbed my temple as Braige drove me home.
“You sure I can’t talk you into dinner?” he asked.
“Thanks, but no thanks.” I was already beholden to him for picking me up and driving me home. Once he’d figured out that I’d truly been living under a rock, he’d yammered on all day about cell phones and food delivery apps and ride share apps and every other damn snippet of technology I’d missed out on while he intermixed his entire rambling dialogue with shit about surfing like it was his religion. All day in his presence and I not only appreciated how Tarquin had never wasted words, but damn, my head hurt.
Even though a solid diet of free coffee from the break room paired with being on my feet all day had proved to be too much for my out-of-shape, days-off-being-a-junkie self, I wasn’t going to dinner with Braige.
“You gotta eat, mamacita.”
“Why do you call me that?” I didn’t know if I should be offended or not. I’d never heard anyone use the term. But then again, I’d never heard half the words Braige used to describe surfing or his life.
He chuckled like he was caught red-handed. “Figured I can’t call you hottie without getting my ass kicked by Candle.”
It wasn’t no laughing matter. “You figured right. I can guarantee he wouldn’t appreciate it if he heard it.”
“Mamacita it is then.” He grinned.
Jeez. My first paycheck, I was getting me a cell phone with all those damn apps he spoke about, and I was gonna ride share my ass to work by myself each day. Speaking of money… “When do I get paid?”
Braige frowned. “You should have told me you need money. I could’ve paid you out tonight before we left.”
“Everyone needs money. I ain’t selling bikinis for my health.”
“You’re not like other girls, you know that?” He smiled, and it was just innocent enough to have me letting my guard down.
“That’s because I ain’t a girl. I’m a woman.” Tarquin had made me one seven years ago.
“Sorry, babe.”
I merely nodded in response.
Part of me wanted to weep for that naïve girl who’d pulled a beaten man out of the swamp and into her daddy’s garage, and another part wanted to be angry all over again for the life I’d been born into and the shit I’d endured. But a small, almost ignorable part of me wondered if maybe I’d had to go through everything I went through just to get to today.
Not that today was any great shakes.
But Stone Hawkins was dead. I didn’t whore for any Hangman assholes. I’d worked an honest day’s worth of work, and Tarquin Scott didn’t belong to another woman.
Maybe it was a start.
“Tell you what.” I glanced at Braige and all of his blond-haired, blue-eyed pretty boy surfer-ness. “You Uber app me, or whatever you call it, a big ole delivered cheeseburger, french fries and a strawberry milkshake, and I’ll call it even for whatever you owe me for today.”
He grinned. “I can do you one better.” Turning the truck around, he didn’t wait for my consent. “I know just the place.”
“Oh, no, I said delivery. I ain’t goin’ nowhere.” I didn’t want to drink ever again, but that didn’t mean I trusted myself one hundred percent around alcohol. Not to mention, I wasn’t going out to eat with the happy-boy surfer.
“Trust me, you’ll love it. And it doesn’t count as going somewhere, because The Spot doesn’t have any indoor seating.”
/> “Braige,” I warned. “I ain’t goin’ on a date with you.” Or sleeping with him.
He laughed. “Babe.” Glancing at me, he winked. “It’s food. You gotta eat.”
Goddamn blond-haired men.
“Fine.” I sank lower in my seat. “But if you try any shit, I’m layin’ you out.”
Still smiling, he chuckled. “Okay, Shaila.”
I didn’t say nothing. I gave him the eye.
Sparing me a glance, his eyebrows hit his hairline. “Damn. You serious?”
“Do I look serious?” Did all that time in the sun make him dense?
“I don’t know,” he admitted honestly. “That’s why I’m asking.”
“Trust me, I got no reason to lie.” What the hell would I have to lie about, besides fucking bikers for drugs? Which, hell, if he asked, I’d probably tell him that too. Maybe if I said it enough times, it’d take away some of this damn guilt.
“I hear you, babe. I hear you.” He pulled into a tight parking spot along the boardwalk fronting the beach and cut the engine.
I took in the view of the ocean I’d been staring at all day as I got out of the truck. Today I’d learned how to enter inventory into the computer, then price and tag it and put it out on the floor. The job wasn’t a bad deal as far as jobs went. And I had to admit I’d never imagined working and getting to stare at the ocean all day. But the constant parade of girls coming into the store to flirt with Braige and shake their asses I could’ve done without. Not to mention, most of them gave me attitude the second they saw a woman near the pretty-boy surfer. Smiling and holding my tongue was harder than trying to learn how to use the damn computer.
Braige stepped up next to me. “Best view in the world.”
His serious tone made me glance up at him. His expression matching, he took in the waves like he was studying something, and I suppose he was. He’d told me today he’d professionally surfed, right up to the point it’d become more about the money than the waves. Now he made surf boards in the back of the store and surfed for the real reason, whatever that was.
“Looks good on you,” I blurted.
Dragging his gaze off the ocean, his hands in his pockets, he looked down at me. “What?”
“Serious Braige.” Little lines around his eyes, high cheekbones, unruly hair. “It’s a good look on you.”
He broke out in one of the smiles he’d used on all the ladies today. “Shaila Hawkins, are you hitting on me?”
“No.” I didn’t know how to hit on a guy. Not that I wanted to.
His smile dropped. “You really Candle’s girl?”
I looked back at the ocean, and suddenly, my eyes were welling and every second of walking away from Tarquin hit me all over again. “I was once,” I managed before my voice broke.
A strong arm came around my shoulders, and Braige pulled me into his side.
The move was so unexpected, I flinched, but he didn’t so much as ease up on his grip. Solid, warm, and all wrong, a pretty-boy surfer who was nicer than any man I’d ever met held me to his chest and stared straight ahead.
Tears spilled over, and I couldn’t help it, a quiet sob escaped.
Braige’s hold tightened.
I could remember the last time a man put his arm around me, and it made the tears stream faster. I tried to contain it, sweet mercy I tried, but it was as if the floodgates opened and I didn’t have any self control.
To make my meltdown even worse, the stranger with his arm around me didn’t utter a word. I didn’t know if he was being stoic or supportive or simply putting up with me, and I couldn’t take the embarrassment.
I pulled away.
He let me go, but then he stepped in front of me, shoved his hands back in his pockets, and bent his knees so he was eye level with me. “You know what I think you need?”
“A new life?” Trying to make a joke, I swiped at my face.
“No, that strawberry milkshake you mentioned.” He smiled shyly.
“Yeah. A milkshake.” And a new life.
Standing to his full height, he kept his gaze on me like he was worried I’d cry again. “We can even get takeout if you want.”
“What? You afraid to be seen with a cryin’ junkie?”
Anger touched his pretty features. “You’re not a junkie. I didn’t mean that when I said it this morning.”
“Meaning it or sayin’ it in jest, it doesn’t matter. You were right.” I inhaled and looked away. “Because I am a junkie, or I was. Pain pills and alcohol, but I’m tryin’ not to be an addict now. No,” I corrected, “I’m determined not to be one.”
His knuckle tipped my chin, and he waited to speak until my eyes met his. “I’m not judging.”
“You should.”
Dropping his hand, he shrugged. “We all have our vices.”
I made an unladylike sound. “Surfin’ doesn’t count.”
“Why not?” he challenged.
“It’s not bad for you.” Drugs and whoring was.
“It can kill you,” he stated practically.
“Pretty sure you know how to swim.” I didn’t know the first thing about surfing, but drowning seemed like the biggest risk.
He pulled his cell out and scrolled through pictures, then held the phone up to me. “Knowing how to swim isn’t going to help you paddle your way out of a barrel like that.”
My mouth dropped as I stared at the screen. “Is that you?” Looking like a tiny speck on a surf board, his crouched form was merely a wet-suited dot on a wall of water curving over itself. It was the biggest wave I’d ever seen in my life. “That has to be twenty-five feet tall, at least. Where the heck is that?” I had a newfound respect for the flirtatious blond in front of me.
“Fifty feet. Mavericks in Cali, three years ago. That was my last season of big-wave competitions.”
“Damn.” I stared at the picture a moment longer. “You’re lucky to be alive.” I looked up at him. “So why’d you quit?”
He shoved his phone in his pocket. “I didn’t quit surfing, just competing.”
“So you still surf waves bigger than a high-rise?” He was certifiable.
He smiled wistfully. “Every chance I get.”
I could appreciate his love for the sport, but I didn’t see it as an addiction, not like drugs. “I’m still not convinced that counts as a vice.”
Staring at me a moment, he looked like he was deciding whether or not to tell me something incriminating. “I quit competing because it interfered with my connection to the waves.”
“Connection,” I stated, more than skeptical.
“I didn’t want anything between me and the energy of the water.” Dropping the serious expression that’d taken over his usual carefree attitude, his smile came back, and he winked. “Like a lover. I don’t want anything interfering between me and her.”
The asshole surfer pulled up to Talerco’s a goddamn hour and a half after the surf shop closed.
Unlike me, he entered a code on the keypad by the gate and the arms swung open. He pulled his truck through and turned it around in the driveway before stopping.
It was dark as shit, but I still stood in the shadows.
The passenger door opened and my woman got out. “Thanks for the rides. And dinner,” she added like she was embarrassed.
I couldn’t hear the prick’s response, but I wanted to kill him.
“Yeah, okay. Thanks.” Shaila shut the door and headed toward the house.
The asshole surfer didn’t even wait to see if she got inside. Talerco’s security gate was closing behind him before my woman had even made it to the front door.
Walking like shit hurt, she pulled a key out of her small-as-fuck shorts pocket and aimed for the lock.
I stepped out of the shadows. “You went to dinner with that asshole?”
Jumping a foot and shrieking, she dropped the keys and clutched at her chest. “What the hell, Tarquin? Don’t do that!”
“Do what? Ask if you went on a fucking date
?”
The ocean breeze blew her hair around. “No, you jerk. Sneak up on me.” Still pressing her hands to her chest, she didn’t push her hair out of her face.
Itching to touch her but trying to hide it, I fisted my hands.
She noticed. “What the fuck does that mean?” Glancing at my fists, she scoffed before looking back at me. “You gonna hit me because I ate dinner?”
“Why are you working at Talerco’s?” I demanded, not even dignifying the shit she asked with a response.
Picking the keys up, she crossed her arms. “I can’t get a job now?”
“You don’t need a job.” My jaw clenched, I tipped my chin at Talerco’s front door. “And you sure as hell don’t need to stay here.”
She stared at me a long moment. Then she shook her head, used her key and opened the damn door. Without looking at me, she threw an insult over her shoulder. “Not that I’d expect you to understand, Mr. I-Was-A-Ranger, but everybody needs a job eventually.” She stepped inside.
I put my foot in the jamb. “I’m not done talking to you.” None of this conversation was going as planned.
“Well, I don’t really care, because I’m tired and I’m done talkin’ to you.” She made to close to door.
Fuck.
“You’re not ready to work. You shouldn’t have been on your feet all day.” I glanced at her boots and forced the anger out of my tone. “I can tell you’re hurting.”
“I’m fine, not that it’s any business of yours.”
Goddamn it. “Everything about you is my business.”
“Since when? Since you decided you were too angry to have me around, or since you decided you were too angry to have someone else have me around?”
“Don’t talk bullshit circles around me,” I warned.
She smirked. “See? Angry.”
“I’m not fucking angry!” I roared.
Lifting an eyebrow, she stared at me.
“Fine!” Fuck, fuck, fuck. “What do you want?” I demanded.
“Nothin’.”
“Don’t lie to me.” She wouldn’t be standing here talking to me if that were the truth. I may not know the new version of her, but I knew the old, and I knew that much hadn’t changed. When Shaila Hawkins was done with you, she didn’t stand around shooting the shit, let alone bother to throw insults.
