by Liz Crowe
“Then maybe the better question is, why is she here?”
Trent shot Sheila a hard glare. She met it halfway. “It’s a legit question, Trent. Who does she think she is, coming up here before us?”
Trent swallowed hard, hearing the gist of his words to Melody spit back at him. He looked from his ex-wife to Melody, then back again. By the time he met Melody’s eyes again, she was holding out her hand. When he didn’t move, she grabbed his arm and dropped the necklace—her collar—into his palm, and closed his fingers around it.
“Wait, Melody. I’m sorry. I was…”
“No, it’s all right. You were just speaking the truth. I had no business. So, I’m divesting myself of your business.”
He attempted to arrange his face in please-be-calm lines. “You’re overreacting. Now is not the time…”
She smiled at him, brushed her fingertips along his cheek. “Goodbye, Trent.”
She walked out, leaving him holding a piece of jewelry that to his mind was for all intents and purposes, a wedding ring, surrounded by his hell-cat of an ex-wife and his sixteen-year-old daughter who was being held by the cops on charges of breaking and entering and possession of booze and pot. He took a long, deep breath, shoved the necklace into his pocket and turned to the officer who was watching this particular trauma drama play out.
“All right. Tell me what happens next.”
Chapter Eighteen
Four weeks later
In the time between that horrible moment at the police station in Petoskey and now, I’d never been more grateful for the coping skills I’d developed. As I re-inhabited that space—somewhere between sleepwalking and brutally focused on anything but myself—I even admitted to myself how much I’d enjoyed it. That its warm, familiar contours, corners and edges were something I’d actually missed, in a sick way.
Luckily, the work at Fitz Pub was a near twenty-four-seven challenge. Evelyn had put me in charge and left me alone to run it the way I saw fit, which meant first drilling down to see why the place was hemorrhaging money. That meant poring over daily reports until my eyes crossed. But it also meant I could not think about Trent.
“I need some space to think about what happened,” I’d told him in the one and only communication I’d allowed since that night.
“I need to see you,” he’d pleaded. “Let’s talk about this face-to-face.”
But I’d left it at that. Easily the hardest thing I’d ever done, and I’d done some hard things in my life.
“Hey,” Evelyn said one evening a solid month since that bizarre, amazing, horrible weekend. She used to come down a few nights a week for a beer after work with me. But that had turned into every night, now that she and Austin were on the outs.
“Hey yourself,” I said, pouring her a stout and myself an IPA. I turned my laptop around to face her. “I found the leaky spot. Your ex-manager was siphoning cash. Pretty easy to do when deposits are made daily. I want to change that system. Keep more cash on hand so money isn’t being handled every day like that.”
“Fine.” She put her head on her arms. I patted her shoulder. My sympathy for her was real, if tinged with a bit of frustration. She was being way too stubborn and I’d told her as much. But she also had a side bonus to distract her, which made me jealous all over again.
“How’s the hunky German?”
“Oh, he’s…fine.”
“Evelyn,” I said, sitting beside her and taking a sip of my beer before continuing. “You look awful.” I lifted her face and inspected it. Sallow skin, dark circles under her huge, blue eyes. Even her hair was stringy and wrung-out. “Why won’t you just call him—?”
She smacked my hand away, frowning as she pulled her beer closer. “You have no room to talk. My friend Trent is beside himself and wearing me out asking about you.”
I sighed. She sighed. We smiled at each other and lifted our glasses for a toast. “To us,” I said. “And our stupid, bull-headed personalities.” I spotted Ross Hoffman, the new brewer for Fitzgerald and the man doing the Evelyn-distracting. He was indeed Viking-like in his appearance—very tall, broad-shouldered, long blond hair he kept tied back, light reddish beard along his jaw. His smile was usually mischievous. I liked him, on a certain level.
“Ladies,” he said, sliding into the seat on Evelyn’s other side. She sighed and leaned into him a second, then pulled away fast, in case anyone had seen her do it. As I sipped and observed them, I saw how their shoulders touched, the way he put his arm around her, briefly, brushing her hip with his fingers. They were sleeping together, of course. Evelyn had told me that. I didn’t get it. But she was my friend so I didn’t pry.
“Trent finally got his approval on the city block in K-zoo,” Evelyn said, eyeing me for a reaction.
“Good for him,” I said, unable to stop the rapid flutter in my chest at the sound of his name again. “That will keep him busy.”
“I suppose. Whatever happened with Taylor?”
“I don’t know. Stop making me talk about him. I don’t make you talk about…” I leaned on the bar and caught Ross’s eye. He raised his eyebrow at me. “About him.”
“Fair enough,” she said, hopping down off her barstool. “Ross, I have to finish up some work upstairs. Meet me later?”
He nodded, kept drinking and ignoring me. I noodled around with my sales projections, then snapped my computer shut. Time to start the third half of my day. The part where I avoided going home, since all I could see, smell or hear in my space was Trent.
Why won’t you talk to him? You’ve had your damn space. It’s been a month. You miss him. You probably love him. Get over yourself.
I shook my head, clearing it of my inner advice column. I smiled briefly at Ross, then headed around the bar, aiming for my small office behind the kitchen. I figured I could stretch out the work from today well into the evening, with careful planning. “Hey, um, Melody?”
I turned at the sound of the brewer’s German-inflected voice. “Yes?”
He looked almost as bad as Evelyn at that moment. The usual light had gone out of his eyes. His shoulders slumped. His cheeks were gaunt under the facial hair. “Can I ask you something?”
I hesitated. We hadn’t really talked much beyond the basics. I admired his professionalism, managing his own staff in relation to mine. He kept a super tight ship and a stringently clean brewery, which mattered, since I planned to double our income once I convinced him to make a few funkier, trendier brews just for pub consumption. But we were hardly buddies. The awkward fact of his presence and my knowledge of how he, Austin and Evelyn had been a real live threesome for a while made my face flush.
He grinned that boyish, troublemaking grin, which put me at a bit more ease. “So, um…” He fiddled with the coaster under his beer. “What’s the word? I mean, the gossip. You know about me…and…her.”
I crossed my arms and stared at him, a little surprised by this question. He’d not struck me as the sort of guy who gave a shit about gossip. “Well, it didn’t help that Amy walked in on you guys a few weeks ago…up in her office, you know?”
He actually blushed as he looked up at the ceiling. “Yeah. Guess not.”
“It’s not a secret, Hoffman, if that’s the fantasy you’re indulging. She and Austin broke up but he left her and you in charge here while he runs his father’s food supply company. You guys were…ah…” I put my hand to my neck. I did that a lot lately, feeling the phantom weight of Trent’s collar that I’d worn for all of six hours.
Ross slumped even farther. I patted his arm, not at all surprised by the bulky muscles under my palm. Guy was built, there was no doubt about it. He ran a hand around the back of neck, then across his bearded jaw. “I don’t want it to be…bad, you know? Nasty talk. I’m not just…um…with her, physically.”
“You mean you’re not just fucking the boss for shits and giggles?” I grabbed his glass and refilled it, leaning forward on the bar, eager to talk as it allowed me to drag my evening make-work out e
ven later.
His eyes narrowed at me, then he chuckled. “Yes. That. You have a lovely way with words.” He held up his glass to me, then took a long drink.
“So I’m told.” I studied him a few seconds. “How is Austin?”
“He’s…not great.” Ross ripped the coaster in half then crumpled it in his fist. “God damn it.”
I peeled his fingers open and retrieved the soggy cardboard. “Those cost me money, Adolf,” I said, hoping to lighten the mood. The last thing I needed was more downers.
He gave me a half-smile. “All right, señorita. Sorry.” He slid off his barstool and stretched his long arms up, then out to his sides. “Gotta go. The boss lady summons me.”
“I’ll just bet she does. Lock the office door this time, hot stuff.”
He waved a hand as he headed around behind the bar and back to the back room that led to the old brewery space, and Evelyn’s office.
I was half-sorry for, half-jealous of my friend all over again. I believed that she loved Austin Fitzgerald—that they were meant to be together. That she was using Ross and his admittedly useable body to deflect from her heartbreak. But who was I to criticize? I was using work. Not quite as nice, but still. I propped my elbows on the bar and watched the staff doing their thing, aware of my presence. I honestly believed the same thing about me and Trent Hettinger but I would be damned if I’d let him talk to me like he had that night.
“We have matching tempers,” he’d said to me. I’d laughed it off. But it was pretty damn clear to me now that he’d spoken the truth. I held my phone out, staring at the screen, willing myself to stop being such a total butt-head about this. If I were in one of the novels I’d read as part of my research in the BDSM lifestyle, readers would be screeching at me right now and throwing their e-readers against walls.
I gathered up my laptop and headed to my office, checking in on the night’s cook, already concocting excuses to stay later in my head.
* * * *
The next week was more of the same. The following, just another set of days where I kept my head down and my brain focused on my job. I’d fired some people, hired a few more, including a new chef for the kitchen. Convincing Evelyn to let me pay him a going rate had been almost too easy.
And finally, a Friday came where I didn’t feel like I had to stay and watch everything like a hawk. Which both thrilled and depressed me. I would have to go home. Alone. And stare around at the space where I’d been so happy for a few, short weeks. As I was packing up my laptop and a few papers, I heard raised voices coming from the back hallway. I peeked around to tell them to cut it out, that their constant squabbling was scaring the natives. The voices got louder, but I couldn’t see anything.
The Evelyn and Ross Show was, on one level, highly entertaining. They were well-matched in stubbornness, pride and their willingness to have loud, public arguments. I could tell that their dynamic included the ongoing friction. I knew my friend well enough to realize this. But I also knew she was miserable without Austin. Something had to give. Ross was falling right off a cliff over her and it would end nowhere but in a hole of shit, which would not help this company one bit.
The gossip was loud and moved fast through all sides of the brewery. Ross was a prickly guy when he was at work—particular about every aspect of brewing as he should be but many times too impatient and overly critical of his staff. That had only gotten worse in the past two or three weeks. Now that I was established as a sort of go-between from the staff to Evelyn, as she’d made herself into something scary and unapproachable, I heard it all—the stories of thrown office supplies, screaming matches and, of course, the sex. Those two would go at it just about anywhere. Making up, it would seem, was just as important as the daily breaking up.
I burst through the main brewery doors and found them, their faces inches apart, yelling at each other, neither of them doing a second of listening to the other. “Hey!” I clapped my hands to get their attention. “Cut the shit!”
They stopped, turning to look at me. Their faces were flushed, eyes bright, but they were both in a steep personal decline over this, robust, daily sex or not. I put my hands on my hips and gave them my most stern, boss-lady glare. “To your corners.”
“I… He…” Evelyn spluttered.
“I don’t care. Go upstairs to your office and cool off. I’ll be up there in a minute.”
She glanced at Ross. I pulled her away from him. The fury was rolling off the man in waves, almost physically palpable against my skin. She headed up the metal steps at a run. “And you,” I said, turning back to the man who was now leaning against a fermentation tank, his smirk firmly in place. “You need to find some other outlet for your frustration. This is killing her. And you. But I’m more concerned about her right now.”
He rolled his eyes and tried to turn away from me. I wrapped my hand around his arm and dug my fingertips in. He glared down at my hand, then at my face. His expression had gone from red-faced furious, to up-yours fuck-off, to almost helpless and anguished so fast it took me a second to process it. I let go of him. He stood there, staring at me, his handsome face fallen, his entire body slumped in an utterly defeated posture.
“I have to get them back together,” he said, his voice hoarse. I blinked, not expecting this.
“You are not responsible for them.” I backed away from him. “That’s crazy, Ross.”
“No, it’s not.” He pressed his hands against the stainless-steel vessel. His head dropped low, between his shoulders. “I have to do it. She is not for me. As much as I want that. I can tell. We…we make love and I see another man’s face in her eyes when she looks at me.”
I felt my face flush hot at his words.
“But it’s a man who is my good friend. Who brought me into this, with her. I’ve got to fix this.” He shoved past me, muttering in German, and stomped to the exterior door, slamming it shut behind him. I stood, watching the night shift assemble itself around the daily drama. The shared looks, the sideways glances, they all knew. And if they didn’t, they sure as hell did now after that confessional moment.
Deciding to let people come to their own conclusions, since they would anyway, I headed up the stairs to the office Evelyn used, overlooking the main brewery floor. I hesitated outside her door a few seconds, gathering my thoughts, wondering what in the hell I could possibly offer by way of advice. When I heard her suck in a breath and let out a sob, I decided that advice was not required. She just needed a friend.
I shoved open the door and found her, crumpled in a wrinkly-suited heap on the floor, weeping as if her heart were truly breaking. “Ah, chica,” I said, dropping to the floor next to her and pulling her into my arms. “Ésta bein, mi amiga. Todo estará bien.” Everything was fine. Everything would be all right.
I sighed and quelled my urge to join her in the weep-fest and wondered if I even knew what I was talking about. After a few minutes, she swiped at her eyes. I handed her a tissue. She got slowly to her feet and blew her nose, looking for all the world like a sad little girl dressed in her mama’s clothes.
“Come on,” I said, grabbing her purse. “Let’s go find some ice cream.”
“I want a pizza,” she said, following me out, contrite, crushed and not like my usual feisty friend in the slightest.
“Your wish,” I said, holding on to as she wobbled down the metal stairs. “My command.”
I heard his voice in my ear then. But I shoved it aside. This was not about me right now. I bundled her into the passenger’s side of her car and climbed behind the wheel. She’d given back the super sporty German sedan Austin had bought her and was back in her POS Honda. This was familiar ground. We’d been here plenty of times before, when we were working together at the distributor and pissed off after dates. Well, when she was pissed off after them. I didn’t date. Suppressing the strong compulsion to head downtown so Trent could help me with this, I bit the inside of my cheek instead, hard, drawing a satisfying drop of blood.
“My place or yours,” I asked, praying that she’d want to go home.
“Yours. Ross is at mine and I can’t look at him right now.”
I put the car in gear and headed to my place in silence.
“Fair warning,” I said, unlocking the door and having to give the Trent-memories an extra shove so they’d cease harassing me. “My place is trashed. I haven’t spent much time here lately.”
She sighed and slumped against the doorframe as I opened it, then stumbled in, heading for my couch. I’d been sleeping out here for weeks, unwilling to wash the Trent-smell out of my pillows yet unable to tolerate them against my face. I dropped my stuff on the cluttered counter between the kitchen and the rest of the space and looked around, my anxiety at being here making my gut churn.
Evelyn flopped face forward onto my nest of blankets, pillows and wadded-up tissues. A cloud of dust rose, reminding me that I really ought to clean a little. I made a quick call for pizza—bacon, feta cheese, spinach on thin crust, our usual go-to—then checked my alcohol supply. Deciding that this warranted a good bottle of wine instead of a few low-octane beers, I popped the cork on one of the two I still had from one of Trent’s wine deliveries—an Italian blend which likely retailed for seventy-five bucks—and grabbed a couple of stemless glasses.
I sat near Evelyn’s head and meted out two healthy pours. Nudging her shoulder, I tried to keep my urge to advise, to tell her what she should be doing right now instead of sobbing into an expensive serving of ripasso. “Here. Drink.”
She sat up, grabbed a tissue from the box on the coffee table then took the glass. After taking a sniff, she whistled and held the glass up to the light. “Damn. Let me guess. Something Trent picked out.”
“Yes. And that is your one chance to say his name. No more. Please.” I held up my glass. She clinked hers to it and we sipped, both of us smacking our lips in appreciation afterward. Italian wines were my favorite, as he had discovered. There really was nothing like them in terms of richness and full-bodied flavor. Evelyn took another drink then cradled the glass to her chest, curling her legs beneath her after kicking off her high-heeled work shoes.
