“Given that he’s between you and the door, I don’t think he wants you to,” Remy said. “This change is safer. He may come out of it feeling grumpy, but he will be a man, not an animal, and grumpy men are not likely to take a swing at their girlfriends.”
“Okay,” she said, nodding. She scooted back. “I’ll stay here.”
Jules closed his eyes. His nose dropped to the floor. The change back started at his hands and feet. As his legs finished changing he dropped to his knees. It was even stranger watching the great bear shrink back down into the man, even a man as large as Jules. He stayed that way for a long moment, his forehead resting on the floor. Finally, he said, “That was very different.”
“Is it okay to touch you?” Kaylee asked.
Jules shook his head. “Still feels like pins and needles everywhere.”
“I’m going to leave the cage door open and leave you two. Connie’s waiting upstairs. She may try to feed you.”
“I might let her,” Jules said. “Remy.” He looked up. “Thank you.”
Remy nodded and went out.
After a long while Jules sat up. Kaylee handed him his clothes with a shy smile. He dressed and offered her a hand up. “Are you okay?” he said.
“I should be asking you that. Some of that sounded painful.”
“Awkward and uncomfortable, but not painful, not anymore. I guess we get used to it. I didn’t scare you or hurt you?”
“No. You’re amazing. If it was safe, I’d get you to do that more often.”
He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her forehead. “I love you. Now come on, before we overstay our welcome.”
Jules’ car was in his usual parking spot in the staff lot at the print shop at the end of the day. Jules was leaning against the trunk, his arms crossed. His shirt clung to his chest and arms. It would have looked like a commercial photo shoot for an automotive company, except that the car was a secondhand piece of crap. Kaylee came out the front door, which meant her back was to him. She had her eyes on her phone.
He whistled and said, “Hey there hot stuff, you want a ride?”
She whipped around and her face lit up in a smile when she saw it was him and not just a random asshole. She jogged across the parking lot and all but threw herself into his arms. “Jules! I didn’t think I would see you until the weekend!”
“I told Remy it was important, and he let me out of my cage early today. I missed you.”
“I just saw you yesterday.”
“Does that matter?”
“Not one bit.” Jules was large and this close to him she couldn’t really see past him. Still, just past his arm, she saw movement and leaned to the side. “Is someone in the car?”
“Come on, get in. We’re going for drinks.”
“Is that your dad?”
“Yeah. He wants to spend some time with us. Please come, Kaylee. I don’t know how long he’ll be in town, and this is important to me. Please. I don’t want to have to choose between the two of you.”
“Okay,” Kaylee said. “I’ll come along.”
“Thank you.” He kissed her. “Thanks. Climb in.”
Kaylee went around the passenger side, ready to slide into her normal seat, only to find that Gabriele was sitting up front. She climbed in the back.
“I’m glad you could join us,” Gabriele said.
“Sure,” Kaylee said. “First round is on me.”
“Deal,” Jules said.
“Jules, should you be making her pay?”
“Who’s making me?” Kaylee said. “I’m making a nice pay check, now that Jules switched companies. It’s my treat.” She wanted to add, ‘if it makes you feel better I won’t buy your drink,’ but even in her head it sounded bitchy. This is important to Jules and it’s not a forever arrangement. His father will go home and things will settle down again.
As they entered the pub, Jules said, “I’ll grab the table by the window.” He kissed Kaylee’s cheek.
Kaylee went over to the bar with Gabriele trailing after her. The bartender, the usual guy, smiled at her. “What’ll it be?”
“Two Guinness, two baskets of wings, and uh,” she glanced over her shoulder. “What would you like to drink?”
“Just a water for me.”
“Sure thing. That’ll be an even twenty.”
Kaylee reached into her purse to fish out her wallet but Gabriele reached past her, a twenty in hand. He ignored her hard stare and even collected the drinks off the bar.
“I could have paid.”
“Unlike my son, I have a sense of chivalry.”
“Your son understands independent women,” she shot back. Since there was no way shy of stuffing a twenty in his pocket for her to pay for the round, and since the idea of being that close to him left her with a sense of revulsion, she turned on her heel and strode to the table she and Jules regularly shared.
She slid in beside Jules, leaving the other bench open for his father.
“Hey, is everything okay?” he said, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
“Sure. Everything’s fine. The wings will be right out.”
“You’re in for it tonight,” Jules said. “There’s no way you’re keeping up.”
She laughed. “I’ll settle for holding my own.”
“Good luck with that. I missed lunch.”
“Damn. I should have gotten three baskets off the bat.”
“You two come here often?”
“I brought Jules here for wings just after we met,” Kaylee said. “They’re good wings, service is good, and this place is close to work. A little hidden gem.”
“You came here a lot then?”
Kaylee nodded. “It was a nice place to kick back after an exam or a rough assignment.”
He eyed Kaylee for a moment, then her drink, and then turned his attention to his son. “You were telling me about working for Brock.”
“Yeah, it’s a big change. I really liked working for Freddie, even if he was a creeper and a bit shady.”
“Creeper?”
“You know, a guy who makes creepy advances and won’t take no for an answer,” Kaylee said. “Ah, here’s the wings.”
The waitress glanced at Jules, who still had his arm around Kaylee’s shoulders, and kept her smile polite. It wasn’t until she turned to look at Gabriele that the corner of her mouth went up in a flirty smirk. Kaylee didn’t blame her. Gabriele was smaller than Jules but obviously fit. He was clean shaven and there was no grey in his black hair. He was well-dressed and he had both arms up on the back of the bench, lounging there like he owned the place.
“Another two baskets please,” Jules said.
The waitress turned her attention back to him. “Feeling hungry today?”
“Sure am. Are the buffalo ones almost ready?”
“I’ll put a batch on for you.”
“Better make both batches buffalo,” Gabriele said.
She turned again. “Do you like it hot?”
“The hotter the better.”
“Coming right up.”
When the waitress was gone, Kaylee said, “I thought you were married.”
Jules stiffened beside her but Gabriele laughed. “I’ve found a little harmless flirting goes a long way to getting the very best service, in many situations. You’re dating my son and yet you work for a man you profess to be a creeper.”
“And I don’t flirt with him,” Kaylee said. “He knows I’m with Jules and he minds his manners with me.”
“So, which office building do you work in, Jules?”
Kaylee grabbed a wing. She was fighting to keep her anger hidden. The way he changed the subject like that, just dismissing her out of hand with his words and his body language, infuriated her. She’d fought too hard as a young black female to be heard and seen and recognized as having value beyond her sex appeal; his slights were everything she hated about the world.
“The main office. I’ve got very low seniority, of course, but I work in the s
ame building as Remy. Brock doesn’t work there anymore, of course. He had to put the company assets into a blind trust for the duration of his term as mayor.”
“Really? Well that’s the responsible thing to do, of course. So, that’s the Tandell Building, downtown, right?”
Jules nodded.
“Where do you park? Parking at that end of the city is atrocious.”
“There’s an underground parking garage.”
As the conversation continued and Gabriele asked question after question about Jules’ office, Kaylee focused on the food, her beer, and keeping her mouth shut. Remy hadn’t told her much, but she was under the impression that Gabriele’s relations with the entire clan were sour. So why is he so curious about Brock’s businesses?
Finally, after a few more beers and a lot more wings, Jules stretched and said, “I think I’m done for the night.”
“You’re my ride home,” Kaylee said. “I missed the last bus to my street.”
“Dad?”
“No, you two go on without me. It’s been a while since I was in New Orleans, and I haven’t really had the chance to walk the streets in a while. I’ll find my own way back to the hotel.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Kaylee tugged Jules’ sleeve and he followed her out.
As she buckled up, now in the front seat of the car, she said, “You don’t have to take me straight home if you don’t want to.”
“I’m pretty tired.”
She leaned over and kissed him, deeply and thoroughly, one hand on his cheek, the other on his thigh.
“Okay. My place it is,” he said, a little breathless.
“I’ve missed you.”
“I can tell. Shit.”
“What is it?”
“I don’t have my keys. They must be in the booth.”
“Weren’t you complaining about them earlier?”
“That’s right. They were poking my leg so I put them on the table.” He kissed her cheek. “I’ll be right back.”
When he went in the table by the window was empty. He swooped in and grabbed his keys and paused to take a look around for his dad. Gabriele had moved to the bar and was talking with the waitress. From his vantage point Jules couldn’t hear them, not even with his superior hearing, but he could read their body language just fine. She had her hip out towards him, her hand on the bar. He was leaned forward, a sign of interest, and he was smiling. She kept playing with the collar of her shirt. He kept touching her hand.
Harmless flirting, that’s what he said. Kaylee’s waiting for you. He headed for the door but paused and looked back over his shoulder. They were leaned towards each other now, and he was saying something close beside her ear, something that was making her smile.
He retreated to the car and dropped into the driver’s seat.
“Is everything okay?” Kaylee said.
He looked at her, let her fill his mind and block out all other thoughts and images. “Everything will be perfect as soon as I get you home.”
She smiled at him. “Then let’s go.”
Kaylee let herself in with the spare key Saturday morning. Jules was just loading the dishwasher and looked up as she came in. “Good morning,” he said, his face lighting up with a wide smile. He closed the dishwasher and went over, wrapping his arms around her.
“’Morning. Is your dad around?”
“No. Actually I thought you were him, except that he doesn’t have a key. I haven’t seen you in a few days. How is work going?”
“Work is fine. Hey, can we talk quick before your dad gets here?”
“Sure. Is everything okay? You look so serious.”
She took him by the hand and led him to the couch. She took a deep breath and said, “I’ve been trying to figure out how to say this for days. I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Kaylee? What’s wrong? Did I do something?”
“No. Oh, God no. I’m not breaking up with you!”
He let out his breath in a rush and wrapped his arms around her. “Okay. You were scaring me there.”
“I’m sorry.” She untangled herself so she could look at him again. “Okay, look, I don’t know how to say this so I’m just going to say it. Please don’t be mad, okay? I don’t trust your dad.”
“What? Why?”
“I don’t know, Jules. I wanted to, I really did. I was so happy for you that your dad was here and that he wanted to get to know you. But the way he’s acting, I just don’t know how you don’t see it.”
He pushed thoughts of the waitress and what could have made her smile like that out of his mind. “See what?”
“First of all, he’s asking for a lot of information about Tandell Holdings. If this was a movie I’d say he was using you to case the joint, but he doesn’t strike me as a master thief type.”
“He’s not. He may have been a jack ass when I was younger, but he’s not a criminal.”
“I know, Jules, I know. But that’s just it. He’s manipulating you. He’s twisting your emotions. I’m watching you trying so hard to impress him, and he’s stringing you along. I’ve been in enough bad relationships to recognize it.”
“You’re seeing things, Kaylee.”
“Then why is he still here? Doesn’t he have a job?”
“He’s here to spend time with me.”
“A whole month?”
“What? You don’t think I’m worth that sort of attention? Or are you jealous that I’m spending time with him instead of you?”
“That’s not fair.”
“Look, just because your dad is a useless drug addict and you have no chance of a normal relationship with him doesn’t mean I can’t try to have a normal relationship with mine!”
“How dare you.” Her face hardened. “I didn’t come here to pick a fight with you. I just wanted to voice my concerns because that’s what people do when they care. I guess I shouldn’t have bothered.” She started for the door.
“Kaylee, wait!”
“No. I’m going home.” She put the spare key on the table. “I’m going to be busy for a few days. Your dad might want this.” She went out, closing the door firmly behind her. Her anger carried her all the way out of the building and down the block. By the time she reached the bus stop, the anger had given way to a raw, empty sorrow. She looked back. He wasn’t following. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and shook her head. She kept the tears bottled up inside until she was home and locked safely in the privacy of her room.
Jules and Gabriele arrived at the warehouse early on the night of the full moon. They easily could have stayed at the apartment for another fifteen or even twenty minutes, but his father’s persistent questions were starting to grate on his nerves, so he suggested leaving a little early. No, he thought, it wasn’t the questions themselves, it was the fact that every question made him think about Kaylee and her concerns. It was the guilt that was grating at him more than annoyance.
Kenny (Shifter Football League Book 2) Page 54
