Awaken Me

by Farrah Rochon

  “Five hundred a head? Are you sure you don’t want to go the ball gown and tuxedo route?”

  He shook his head. “No. Superheroes. Because that’s exactly what my mom was to countless people.” He braced his palms on her desk and leaned forward. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

  His proximity made speaking damn near impossible, but Brooklyn still managed to say, “All I did was wear a shirt.”

  “You wore the perfect shirt.” His eyes crinkled at the corners and his smile had a devastating effect on her ability to form a coherent thought.

  Recognizing that her already tentative grip on her promise to not move past the harmless infatuation stage was beginning to slip, Brooklyn pointed to the short hallway that led to the bathroom and said, “I’ll…uh…I’ll be right back.”

  She raced to the trailer’s tiny restroom and closed the door behind her. Resting her head against it, she let her eyes slide shut and counted to ten, imploring her heartbeat to return to normal.

  Maybe it was time she redefine exactly how her workplace crush operated. Because this feeling was unlike any she’d ever experienced before.

  * * *

  Reid sat on the edge of Alex’s desk, his palms gripping the lip, his nails meeting resistance as his fingers tightened against the cold metal. He pulled in a deep breath and slowly released it in the hope of finding some control before Brooklyn made it back.

  As far as his plan went, he’d failed.

  The plan had been set into motion the moment Brooklyn extended her hand Friday night in a show of agreement that they start over. Prior to that moment, Reid’s intention had been to move in the opposite direction of where he found himself this morning, pretending that he was okay with being just her co-worker and nothing more. He was the one who’d erected these mental barriers, using the fact that she took Donte’s job, and because Alex would be upset, to justify his staying away. But as he’d watched her enjoying herself with the guys from the crew Friday night, he’d decided to stop fighting the obvious attraction he felt toward her.

  Until he witnessed just what those mixed signals he’d been sending had done to her.

  Because of his selfish desire to keep the budding camaraderie they’d started developing last week between just the two of them—because he didn’t want to share her infectious laugh and enchanting smile with anyone else—he’d caused her to think that he saw something wrong with her. When, in reality, nothing could be farther from the truth.

  The hurt he heard in her voice during her tirade Friday night would haunt him for ages. He didn’t deserve her laugh and her smile. He didn’t deserve anything more than whatever she was willing to give him. Which is why Reid’s new plan had been to allow their fresh start to be exactly what she’d asked of him, friendly co-workers.

  But, damn, it was hard.

  He liked her. He wanted to get to know her better. He wanted to learn where this love of super heroes had come from, and how she decided which wild, bright color to streak through her hair, and how she could possibly be as sweet as she appeared to be. He wanted to know what it had been like to work, as a fifteen-year-old girl, on a construction site, instead of doing the normal things fifteen-year-old girls did. There was so much he wanted to know about her. He’d never been the least bit interested in learning anything past the name of women he’d been with before—and sometimes not even that.

  But this woman? God, he wanted to know it all.

  He would have to earn the right to know those things. He would have to earn the right to be seen as anything more than just another plumber on the payroll at Holmes Construction. If she saw fit to open her world up to him a bit more, that’s when he would move in. It was her call.

  Being out in the field this week had been a blessing he hadn’t deserved, but one Reid appreciated all the same. It made it easier to respect her boundaries and gradually test what this new, fresh start they’d agreed upon would entail. The past twenty minutes had demonstrated the ease with which they slipped into that playful pattern of flirting. It seemed to happen whenever they were in this trailer together.

  He’d fought the impulse to escalate the easy, lighthearted teasing into something more, something that would make the color on her smooth cheeks deepen into an even more beautiful dark brown. But he could not be the one to push them in that direction. It had to be Brooklyn’s choice.

  Thank God he was needed in the field. The effort it took to go against his natural inclination to flirt was unsustainable. He would have to limit his time in the trailer to allow whatever might develop between them—if anything actually did develop—to happen organically.

  Reid stood at the sound of the bathroom door opening. She came around the corner, her steps faltering at the sight of him.

  “You’re still here,” she said.

  “Yes,” he answered. “But I’m about to go back out into the field, so—”

  Just then, the trailer door burst opened and Alex walked in. “Good. You’re both here.”

  He hung up his hardhat and made a beeline for the coffee pot.

  “Hey,” Brooklyn greeted him, her forehead creasing with the same confusion Reid felt. She pointed to the old-school wall calendar behind Alex’s desk. “I thought you had an AGC meeting in Baton Rouge this morning?”

  “I couldn’t make it,” his cousin answered. “In fact, I’ll have to step down from my position on the safety committee. I won’t have the time to commit to the Association of General Contractors with the amount of work HCC is about to take on.” Alex look over at Reid. “I’ve been down at City Hall. We won the bid.”

  Reid’s heart started to pound within his chest. “For the new annex?”

  Alex nodded.

  It had been two years since voters approved an annex building for one of the city’s courthouses. Holmes Construction had been involved in the bidding war, but quickly lost out to a larger company that came in nearly twenty thousand dollars cheaper.

  Less than a month ago, in a scandal that rocked the local political scene, two members of the city council—Cecil Washington and Russell Babin—were arrested for accepting bribes from the company. According to his soon-to-be sister-in-law, Mackenna Arnold, who sat on the council and who’d just thrown her hat into the mayor’s race, this was just the tip of the iceberg when it came to the council’s two disgraced members.

  Instead of going through the bidding process again, the city decided they would choose from the previously submitted bids.

  “Why didn’t you remind me that this was all going down today?” Reid asked.

  “Because I needed you here supervising the work on the sinkhole. I’ve been back there checking it out. It looks like everything is under control.”

  Reid nodded. “Brooklyn just ordered a catch basin. Everything’s handled.”

  “That’s good because things are about to get even hairier than they have been around here. Everybody will need to step up.”

  Alex rounded his desk and sat in front of his computer.

  Reid stood there, waiting for him to elaborate. When it was clear he wasn’t planning to, Reid asked, “You want to explain what you mean by that?”

  Alex held up a finger. “One minute.” He pecked at the keyboard with his two-finger typing method, clicked the mouse, and swung the chair to face both Reid and Brooklyn. “There’s been a change of plans with the library on the Westbank. The grand opening date has been moved up by two months to coincide with the birthday of Alice Dunbar Nelson, who it’s being named after.”

  “Whoa, Alex, you think we can make that deadline?” Reid asked.

  “It doesn’t matter what I think. Only thing that matters is that we have to make it. Full stop. If we pull a few guys from this job and if there aren’t any more mishaps on the French Quarter job, we can make it work.”

  “What about hiring more subcontractors?” Brooklyn asked.

  Alex and Reid both shook their heads. Reid turned to her. “HCC only uses subcontractors that have been completely v
etted. The ones we use are all booked.”

  “Are there people who can pull double duty?” she asked. “Like framers who are also dry-wallers?”

  Alex snapped his fingers and pointed at her. “Yes.” He turned to Reid. “You’ll need to check with the guys on the crew. See who has double licenses.”

  “I can tell you that in a couple of minutes,” Brooklyn said. She raced over to her computer. A minute later, she grabbed several papers from the printer bed and handed a set to Alex and another to Reid. “I’m not completely comfortable with the personnel management software, so I built a temporary database like the one I used back at LeBlanc & Sons. I also added a couple of fields that aren’t covered in your software, including licenses. Here’s a list of everyone who holds more than one license, both alphabetically and by trade.”

  Reid flipped through the printout, his mind sufficiently blown. If someone had told him he’d have to talk his dick out of getting hard over a database, he would have called bullshit. The joke was on him.

  “Damn, I may have to give you a raise your second week on the job,” Alex said.

  “When did you even find time to do this?” Reid asked.

  She shrugged. “It didn’t take long.” She turned to Alex. “So, do you want to go through the list and figure out who you want to pull from this job to bring over to the Westbank site?”

  “Jason and I will go over it once I get over there,” Alex said. “Right now, I want to make sure everything here is in order before I leave.” He pointed at Reid. “Who can take over your duties out in the field?”

  Trepidation skittered along Reid’s spine. “Why?” he asked.

  “Because I’m going to need you in here,” Alex said, confirming what Reid had suspected—and feared—would be his cousin’s answer.

  “You also need me out in the field,” Reid said.

  “Mainly in a supervisory role. Next to you, Craig and Rolando are the best two plumbers on this job, right?” Alex asked. Reid nodded. “Get those two to pick up the slack. I need you in the trailer, even if it’s just in the afternoon.”

  The finality he heard in his cousin’s voice told him that Alex had already made up his mind.

  Was this payback for past misdeeds? What other explanation could there be for the field day karma seemed to be having with his life right now? He’d spent all these years going from one random woman to the next, only to now be forced to sit in this trailer with the one woman he actually wanted to get to know better, but whom he’d just vowed to lay off until she was ready?

  Yeah, karma was definitely paying him back.

  Alex gathered a stack of papers and manila folders, then grabbed his coffee cup and stood. “I need to get going. Now that we’re GC on the annex project, I need to meet with the three biggest subcontractors. Jennie is going to set something up in that back room at Superior Grill,” he said, speaking of his longtime assistant, Jennie Marconi. Alex snapped his fingers. “That reminds me. I may have found a place for Holmes Construction’s new headquarters. I’m meeting with the real estate agent tomorrow.” A smile drew across his cousin’s face. “Ten years ago, when I was still running this business from my kitchen table, who would have thought we’d be here, huh?”

  It had been so long since Reid had seen the normally stoic Alex like this; he thought his cousin had forgotten just what it felt like to be excited about his business. But there was definitely excitement dancing in Alex’s eyes right now.

  He stuffed the papers under his other arm and clamped a hand on Reid’s shoulder, giving him a thoughtful squeeze. “Thanks for sticking with me all these years. I don’t tell you enough, but I appreciate it. And I need you now more than ever.”

  Aaannnd cue the biggest fucking guilt trip in all the guilt trips that had ever been taken. Just when Alex needed him the most, he was preparing to leave and start up this business with Anthony.

  Reid watched as Alex left the trailer. The man damn near had pep in his step.

  “So,” Brooklyn said, jerking him out of his thoughts on one problem and reminding him about another. “It looks as if we’ll be working together a lot more.”

  Reid nodded. “Yeah, looks that way.” Lord, help me. He hitched his head toward the door. “I should get back out there. I need to explain what’s about to go down to the various crew supervisors so they can share it with the guys on their crew.”

  He hightailed it out of the trailer. He would have more time in here with her than he’d ever bargained for. He needed some time away so he could get his mind and body ready for it.

  When he pulled up to Harrison’s house later that evening, Reid’s stomach performed an uncomfortable flip flop at the sight of a black Tesla Roadster in the driveway.

  This laid all doubt to rest: the universe had decided to drop-kick his ass.

  What other explanation was there to account for his running into the one person he’d been trying to avoid for weeks? He’d promised Anthony he would talk to his brother’s law partner months ago. It was the only thing Anthony had tasked him to do. But Reid had made a sport out of thinking up excuses to evade Jonathan.

  With a sigh, he climbed out of his truck. It was time he stopped playing this avoidance game and handle his business.

  He started up the driveway and spotted Harrison and Jonathan standing next to the fountain that had just been installed in the landscaping in the front of the house. His brother had joined Jonathan’s small law firm years ago. Just last year, they’d officially become partners, renaming the firm Campbell & Holmes, and hiring their first associate. Reid figured it was only a matter of time before they hired Holmes Construction to build a fancy new building for their growing law practice.

  Which is why Reid needed to get this free legal advice now, before their law firm became even more in demand.

  “Hey,” Reid said as he came upon them.

  “Hey man! It’s been a minute since I’ve seen you,” Jonathan greeted, pulling Reid in for a half hug and thumping him on the back.

  “Yeah, I’ve been meaning to come by,” Reid said. “I…uh…been needing to run some stuff by you.” He glanced over at his brother, who—shit—was definitely paying attention.

  Jonathan glanced over at Harrison as well. Reid could tell by the slant to Jonathan’s brow that he understood that whatever Reid had to talk to him about, it was something he didn’t want Harrison to know about.

  “Yeah, sure,” Jonathan said. “Hit me up when you have a minute. You know I always make time for family.”

  Although he wasn’t technically family, no one would refute that statement. Jonathan had been family from the time he’d accompanied their cousin Toby down for Christmas break back when the two were in college together.

  Jonathan turned to Harrison. He held up an expandable file folder. “I cancelled a date in order to go over these tonight. You owe me.”

  “Yeah, I owe you,” Harrison said. “Lunch is on me for the rest of the week.”

  “She’s a former Ms. Louisiana. Lunch is on you for the rest of the month.” He tapped Reid on the shoulder. “I’ll catch up with you later. Good luck with the party planning. Oh, I almost forgot.” Jonathan stuck his hand in his pocket and retrieved a piece of paper, which he handed to Reid. “This is for the kickoff party.”

  Reid unfolded the paper. It was a check for a thousand dollars.

  “Whoa. Thanks, man. This will help out a lot.”

  “The firm will make a formal donation to the foundation at the kickoff party—something nice and big to get the ball rolling. This is just a personal donation from me to help with the party expenses.” He held up the foil-covered paper plate he’d been holding. “Tell Willow thanks for the brownies,” he said to Harrison before heading to his ridiculously badass car.

  Reid turned to his brother. “Wills made brownies?” he asked before taking off for the front door.

  “Don’t get too excited,” Harrison called. “They’re made using black beans instead of flour. She’s trying a bunch
of diabetic-friendly recipes.”

  Reid stopped and waited for Harrison to catch up with him. “How serious is this pre-diabetes thing with Athens? Will he have to start taking insulin shots or something?”

  “Not if we get a handle on it. He has a doctor’s appointment at the end of the week. Hopefully they can tell us if the changes to his diet are having an effect.”

  Harrison ran a hand down his face, and for the first time in a long time, Reid noticed how exhausted his brother looked. Exhausted and stressed.

  “Hey, man,” Reid said, putting his arm around Harrison’s shoulder. “You okay? Is there something I can do?”

  “You can tell me about whatever cloak and dagger shit you and Jonathan have going on.”

  He dropped his arm and took a step back. “You’ve got more important things to worry about.”

  “I can worry about more than one thing at a time. Are you in some kind of trouble?”

  “No.”

  “Reid.”

  God, he hated that tone. It was one usually reserved for parents, but being the eldest of the four and the only one with kids of his own, Harrison had perfected it.

  Reid blew out an irritated breath and folded his arms over his chest. “A friend from work is trying to start a business. He had some legal questions and I told him I’d ask Jonathan.”

  “When your own brother is a lawyer?” Harrison asked.

  “You’ve got enough on your plate,” he answered.

  Even before he’d learned about his nephew’s medical issues, whatever was going on between Harrison and Willow had been enough for Reid to avoid bringing his brother into this. But Harrison’s family troubles was just one of the reasons Reid hadn’t wanted his brother to get involved. He knew what Harrison would think if he learned that Reid was considering leaving Holmes Construction. He would think Reid was abandoning his family.

  Well, that is what he would be doing.

  No, it wasn’t. He wasn’t abandoning Alex; he was making something happen for himself. This was his first step on the road to building his own legacy.