Rocket Man

by Melanie Greene

  “You’re really done talking about all this for now?”

  “Are you?” she asked.

  “Question with a question. With a question.” He rolled his shoulders and stood up, then pulled her to her feet. His hands were dry and warm and an anchor around hers, and she wanted, she really wanted, to leave them there.

  But he let go.

  “I think, for tonight, maybe you should just leave.”

  Serena closed her eyes a moment to absorb that. She knew the fact that it felt like he’d swept her legs out from under her would be a significant one in her calculations. She knew that what she wanted, but would not ask, was for Dillon to say, “Let’s just order in and watch a movie and have a quiet night,” so she could be assured that those quiet nights weren’t out of reach for her now. But she also knew that if he hadn’t said he loved her, they wouldn’t have lost those quiet nights to start with, and the hard knob of anger she still nurtured about that wasn’t even close to dissolving.

  So she didn’t take his hands back.

  With a small smile, she nodded and hoped her face didn’t reveal any devastation. Any desperation. Any regret. Any fury.

  He walked her to his door, his cursed front door, and held it open while she slipped on her shoes. Dillon did reach, briefly, to her shoulder as Serena leaned in to kiss him goodbye, but he dropped it as soon as she moved back. So what could she do but leave?

  “Lunch tomorrow?” she asked.

  “It’s Tuesday.”

  “Right. Basketball, right.”

  “I’ll see you, though.”

  “Sure. See you.” Serena looked into the familiar blue of his eyes, the black hair that had strayed towards his eyebrows. She leaned in for another kiss, her lips abraded just slightly on the afternoon bristle of his cheek. “Good night, then.”

  “Night, Serena.”

  By the time she’d gotten to her car at his curb, he’d gone inside and closed the door.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Serena spent serious time ranting on the drive home, startling the boy at the drive through window when she’d allowed herself some stress-junk for dinner. “Be better off just stopping all this right now.”

  “Excuse me, ma’am? I didn’t get that?”

  “I said I’m better off finding someone easier. Less invasive.”

  “I?” the speaker crackled a little. “I didn’t get your order, ma’am, I’m sorry. Can you repeat?”

  Serena reigned in her temper. Some. “Fries. Small fries. And a chocolate milkshake. Please.”

  She stopped at home just long enough to change into workout gear. She couldn’t run with all that grease in her stomach, but twenty minutes of jogging pounded out the last of her rage. The long walk that followed was way introspective, which she blamed on her failure to bring the thought-obliterating iPod, but by the time she was in the shower she was calm. Very zen, very centered.

  Also, she’d figured out why Dillon had triggered her most volatile switches. She didn’t grow up within so many broken homes without learning a thing or two about emotional fear. Her college Psych 101 class had all been about Mom, Dad, and the phalanx of stepparents. Identifying her switches, though, didn’t really do a damn thing to tell her what she wanted to do about it all. Knowing that she was terrified to really let him into her space—physical and emotional—didn’t stop the panic.

  And it wasn’t all her. Dillon clearly had his own switches. Even if he could accept his part in their discord, would he change anything in the future? She couldn’t move forward with him if he kept launching grenades and taking cover. If she wanted to move forward with him. If she wanted him to love her.

  She spent all night tossing and turning on it, and hadn’t come to a conclusion. Stupid fear. And every person was in every place whenever Serena left her office on Tuesday, and she began to feel like the universe’s biggest idiot walking the halls. She wasn’t trolling for private time with Dillon, not exactly, but it would have been nice to have a couple of minutes. Just to gauge his mood.

  But then Dillon was walking towards her, and the lurch inside her wasn’t just anxiety. It was longing, and attraction; had he purposely worn that bright ocean shirt he knew made her drool? It was trepidation and hope that he was looking for her, that he was lurching towards her, too.

  And he gave her a smile.

  And he kept walking.

  Serena turned as Dillon passed her, only vaguely mollified to see him pulled into Conference B by Anica, who then ushered Philip inside and shut the door. It had not been a smile that said, “I miss you and wish we were alone right now.” If she had to guess, to apply her increasingly vast knowledge of Dillon's smiles, it had said, “Hi, got to go, and no need to keep stalking the corridors, because today will not be the day we finally have sex under your desk.”

  Maybe if he’d let his shoulder brush hers as he passed. Maybe if his hand had reached out to quickly squeeze her arm. Maybe if he hadn’t gone on without a word. Maybe then Serena wouldn’t have felt they were lost on that damn path of his.

  But none of those maybes had been true, so she took the hint and went back to her office, shut the door, and tried to focus on a layout.

  Serena was surprised a couple of hours later by a light knock on the door. She looked up to find Janice and Anica regarding her with mischievous grins.

  “What am I missing?”

  “Lunch,” Anica sing-songed.

  “Are we having lunch?” Serena glanced at the clock on her monitor. Noon. “Give me a couple of minutes.”

  “Have you noticed how warm it is these days, Toots?”

  Serena nodded, distracted by saving the file she’d been working on. “It’s April, Janice. Of course it’s hot.”

  Anica laughed. “Someone’s a little dense today.”

  “Okay, what are you two talking about?” Serena replayed the conversation, but was still not getting it.

  “Toots. What’s today?”

  “Tuesday.”

  “And what time is it?”

  “Twelve, so?”

  “So,” Anica said, grinning wider now, “on Tuesday at lunchtime, a bunch of people play basketball in the back parking lot. And several of them are men. Attractive men. Including, if I may be so bold, your man. And in April, when it’s nice and hot out, they tend to take their shirts off while they play.”

  “And while they play, they engage their sweat-glistened muscles, pursuing an endorphin high, moving fast, chests heaving, and arms and shoulders pumping like a kaleidoscope of lust for the happy viewer,” Janice explained. “So, Toots, are you ready to grab your lunch and sit outside with us to eat it?”

  Ideally, Serena’s smile was up to the task. She didn’t want to give anything away, and as she headed to the break room to grab yesterday’s salad from the fridge, she tried to figure out what it would mean. What it would look like it meant, to him. She didn’t want Dillon to think she was still chasing him around the company. Or that she was happy to sit and stare at his abs—no matter how much those abs whetted her appetite—as if nothing was going on between them. And if he thought she’d dragged the others out on her own initiative, well. He’d better not think that. But there was no way to tell him that she was there just so she could pretend all was well.

  This was exactly why she’d come up with The Plan to start with, frankly. Not that she could point that out to him. Unless she wanted the drama on the court to be of an entirely different, personal nature.

  There was nothing for it but to get on with it. Serena plastered on her ‘happy and calm’ countenance and joined her friends on the rolling plywood table that, when covered with a moderately dust-free shipping blanket, served double time as a bench. At least her group wasn’t the only one out there. Emily, Inés, Pete, and a woman Serena didn’t know were perched on their own makeshift bench. They’d taken the only decent shade, but maybe that would persuade Anica and Janice to throw in the towel early.

  “You didn’t!” Serena quick-turned on Jan
ice after her friend let out a piercing wolf whistle. Janice wasn’t the least abashed. Even the shrewd look from Anica, as she noticed that Miguel had stopped in his tracks to stare are them, didn’t stop Janice’s grin.

  For her part, Serena was beyond glad to see Miguel’s obvious reaction. Partially it was her anticipation about grilling Janice later. But she also saw Dillon notice the vibe between Janice and Miguel. If he picked up on that, he might not think she was dragging her pals out to watch him in all his half-clothed glory.

  “Good lord, Janice, I had no idea,” Anica said, shaking her head as the game got back underway.

  “Aw, I’m just appreciating his ball-handling skills.”

  “Dirty,” Serena coughed into her napkin. Anica laughed.

  “Toots, don’t you start on me. I see you eyeing a certain tall black-haired forward. Who, by the way, has superb shoulders.”

  “As his supervisor, I can’t comment,” put in Anica.

  “As his girlfriend’s girlfriend, I can totally comment. Or whistle, if you prefer. The boys like it when I whistle.”

  “Said the woman who just got done inspiring a sexual harassment training onslaught,” Serena said.

  “Do you suppose that’s why Emily is here? Checking to be sure everyone’s on his or her best behavior?”

  Anica shook her head. “Emily is here because Pete is here. Pete is here because Jorge is there.” She lifted her can of soda towards the hoop, where Jorge was knocking out a rebound attempt. Serena’s gaze moved almost involuntarily past him to land on Dillon's bare back. Why had she not spent more time looking at his bare back? She knew the feel of those traps and lats moving under her hands, but seeing them working in concert together was like gaining a new sense. A revelation. And that just got Serena wondering when she’d touch them again, what it would be like to feel their movement with these new images in her head. Her irritatingly confounded head.

  “Poor Pete. Someone should tell him Jorge is off the market,” Anica said.

  “Are you volunteering? Because it should be someone who’s not Emily, in case he’s a shoot-the-messenger kind of guy.” Serena stared across at the spectators in the shade, glad to have a topic—any topic—other than Dillon and her tentative status as his girlfriend to discuss.

  “Since workplace romances are a disaster—you and Toots excluded, I hope,” Janice said, looking briefly at Serena before her eyes started tracking Miguel again, “it may as well be Emily, so she can start looking for someone not at Lanigan.”

  Serena turned to look at Janice over the top of her sunglasses, wondering if Janice was just picking up on whatever weird vibe Serena was sending out regarding Dillon, or if there was something else going on.

  Janice read her mind and huffed out a breath. “Ignore me, Toots. I must be skipping too many workouts. It makes me all grumpy. You’d better be prepared for some lunchtime cardio tomorrow.”

  “Do you ever join the game?” Anica asked.

  Janice laughed. “You’ve noticed I’m five foot nothing, right? Not much of a jump shot. Besides, I have a feeling they’d fight over me. The office would insist I belonged with the warehouse team, and the crew would claim my daily use of the computer made me part of the office team. And I do so hate to have men fight over me.”

  That did it. “You and I, cross-trainers and smoothies, tomorrow,” Serena told her. She glanced belatedly at Anica. “Are you in?”

  Anica shook her head. “No, but thanks. Not that I’m ever likely to go outdoors at lunchtime—without a good cause,” she added, nodding at the teams, “but I also have an off-site tomorrow at eleven. I’d never make it back. Which reminds me, not that we’re talking work on our lunch hour, but I need to meet with you tomorrow afternoon, be sure we’re on the same page with Blue Capri.”

  Serena smiled her acknowledgement, but inside, she was lurching again. It wasn’t that she hadn’t realized she was only two days away from her Galveston overnight trip with Dillon. It was just that she’d never factored this awkwardness and unresolved hostility into the trip. Of course, if he had just stuck with The Plan, there wouldn’t be any need for hostility, resolved or not.

  Suddenly ogling Dillon's abs, no matter how surreptitiously, was no longer tenable. Serena tidied up the remains of her lunch and made excuses to Janice and Anica. She thought maybe Dillon would look over while she made her obvious pre-departure motions, but he was in the middle of a fast break. Even without the action, he probably wouldn’t have noticed that she was heading inside. Which, she reminded herself, was fine. She’d gone down to keep Anica and, it seemed, more importantly, Janice company on a pretty, late spring day. The sun was shining, the flowers were blooming, not much pollen was in the air. Houston at its best.

  The question was, could Serena say the same about herself?

  Aggrieved, Dillon slammed shut the front door of his townhouse and headed to the kitchen for a beer. It ought to have been a good day. Anica had pulled him in to sort out one of Philip’s screw-ups, so score one to him, and Philip had even been a little gracious about it. His team had only lost by a half-dozen points to Miguel’s—he probably owed Janice a beer for that—except when he’d turned to exchange a knowing look with Serena, she’d been looking away. Then she’d walked out just before he’d dunked the ball, missing his best shot of the game. Why had she shown up to watch, if not to talk to him afterward? Or at least admire his manly form, hinting at a more private admiration session in his future?

  That had been the real start of his downhill trajectory. The second shower stall in the warehouse changing room was broken, so they’d all had to wait on an annoyingly fastidious Jorge, making just about everyone late back from lunch. Serena had barely turned his way during the afternoon’s team meeting, especially when talking about this supposedly romantic yet still work-related trip they had coming up. Compounding everything, Johnnie had spilled half his coffee down Dillon's shirt as they were leaving the conference room. And sure, it was an iced coffee, but the embarrassing thing was, he knew Serena really liked that shirt, and he didn’t know how to get the coffee stain out. He’d had to call Shannon and ask. And here he was, after a lengthy search for the drain plug, soaking the thing in detergent water and wondering if he even had such a thing as rubbing alcohol in the house.

  Not to mention that Shannon had used her sister-sense to pick up on his mood.

  On cue, the doorbell rang, and he wasn’t the least surprised to see his nephew goggling at him through the peephole. Well, that was cute enough to get him to crack a smile, and when Shannon pulled a bottle of rubbing alcohol out of the diaper bag, he laughed.

  “Justin made me show up unannounced,” she told him as she leaned in for a kiss.

  “Like an ambush?”

  “Exactly like an ambush. Here, take Toby,” she added unnecessarily, since Dillon was in the process of snatching him away. “You didn’t call back Saturday or answer his email Sunday. And judging by your tone today, it had nothing to do with you and Serena running off to the Bahamas together. So I protested that Serena might be here, or you might be there, but he just pointed out that Tobias—the doctor promised he’s at the peak of his colic phase—what was I saying?”

  Dillon hugged her. “He’s not letting you rest much, huh? I think you were telling me that Justin voted it was your turn to drive in circles to keep him from going into full blown afternoon hysterics, so you may as well drive here as anything else.”

  With a weary sigh, Shannon nodded. “Yes. That. Poor Justin went back to work yesterday, and everyone’s been on fire about some client, so I figured he could use the nap. Was it only a week ago I was bragging on what a perfect baby he was? Oh, hell, it could have been yesterday. I don’t know what day it is anymore.”

  “He’s still perfect. Aren’t you, champ?” Dillon hugged the drowsy infant close and steered Shannon to the sofa. “Are you wiped out? Want to take a nap while I watch him? Or, I don’t know, run errands? Shower?”

  She shook her head. “What
are you hinting at?”

  “Nothing. I just always hear that cliché, new mom, no time even to shower. I have new shampoo, it smells like a rainforest or something.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Serena likes the organic stuff, you know. Cruelty free or whatever.”

  “And yet, she’s not here using it. Or is she? Did I interrupt shower time? Is that why you’re shirtless?”

  “Ha ha. You know that’s from the coffee. Damn Johnnie. I wouldn’t mind so much if he was any good at drawing fouls.”

  “Why, is anyone on your team good at the free throw line?”

  Dillon slumped back, hitching Toby closer. “No.”

  “Well then.”

  “Well then.”

  They were silent a few moments, contemplating the baby, who, miraculously for the time of day, was also quiet. After leaning over and planting her head on Dillon's shoulder, Shannon asked, “So?”

  “So?”

  “Do I need to call Justin over here or are you going to fess up on your own?”

  “What makes you think Justin is conscious enough to answer the phone? You know he fell asleep before you pulled out of the driveway.”

  “I programed his cell to ring with a Toby shriek when it’s me calling. He’d hear me. He wakes up like he’s been cattle-prodded every time the little guy cries.”

  “Well, that’s nice.”

  “It’d be nicer if he didn’t start so violently that it feels like an earthquake hit our bed. It’s impossible to sleep through.”

  “As if you’re sleeping through the crying anyway.”

  “Whatever. Point is, I could have him over here in a flash, if you need interrogating. I’m trying to go easy on you, give you a chance to talk on your own. But if you won’t, I’ve got the phone right here.”

  Dillon sighed. She’d do it, too, and then he’d be forced to give up more information than he wanted. Justin was uncanny enough with casual acquaintances, but with him and Shannon, he could figure them out from the most micro of micro expressions. Poor Tobias was never going to be able to hide a thing. That was going to be fun to watch as he grew up.