King Stud Read online

  Enough already. She planted her knuckles on her hips and tried to scowl him down. His smirk made it plain he enjoyed needling her, which turned her cheeks from pink to blush to girl-is-on-fire.

  “And where’s a good place to buy flooring?” she asked, shading her tone with enough annoyance to keep them both on-task. Even without the plywood patch in front of the sink, the existing floor needed a replacement, since the scuffed and faded olive geometry vinyl came straight out of 1970.

  Ryan leaned against the chipped Formica counter. “There are a couple places we can check out.” He braced himself with his palms, making his shoulders look around six miles wide. “Might be kind of fun.”

  Humor tempered her annoyance. “Home Depot on a Saturday. Yee-haw.”

  “We could get lunch later, you know, grab a beer somewhere.”

  “Like on a date?”

  His gaze dropped back to the gap between her tee shirt and jeans, heating her core, melting her resistance.

  “If you want.”

  “Ryan!” Despite solid, rational, reasons for staying away, her body resented the short distance from his side of the kitchen to hers. “Dude, you’re, like, nine years younger than me.” The age difference was her most obvious and least inflammatory excuse.

  “So?”

  “I feel like I should wear leopard print and growl like a jungle cat when I’m with you.” See? This is why we shouldn’t mix sex and sheet rock.

  He chuckled, but his eyes weren’t happy.

  Before he could speak, she went on, doing what was necessary for her own peace of mind. “Listen, I’m thrilled with the work you’re doing, but let’s just focus on the remodel for now, okay?”

  “This is about Maeve, isn’t it?”

  “No, it’s about me, and going back to L.A. in two months, and being a lot older than you, and…” Please don’t leave me alone with all of this.

  A short, angry laugh interrupted her comment. “Sure, Dani. We can focus on the remodel.” He made a half-assed attempt at finger-coming his unruly curls. “I’ll get the appliances out today, then we can talk about the cabinets.”

  “Right.” She rubbed her palms on her thighs so she’d have something to do.

  “And when the kitchen’s done, I’ll finish trimming out the dining room, then move upstairs.” Anger deadened his voice.

  Danielle countered with sweetness, a plastic smile, and a softer tone. “The built-ins around the fireplace could use some work.”

  “I’ll do that, too.”

  “And the bathrooms?”

  He rubbed his mouth with the palm of his hand and nodded. “Yeah.”

  “The tub downstairs here looks pretty trashed. Do you know someone who can re-do the enamel?”

  “Geez, I hate…” He looked off to the side and snorted. “I should take a sledgehammer to it and get rid of the thing. The cracks in the tile and grout make me think we’ll find some kind of weird science experiment underneath it, but…”

  “I’d have to buy a new tub, then.” With the focus strictly on the remodel, she felt more secure – and tremendously relieved.

  “That’d be best. You could get one that’s deeper, the kind with some jets.”

  She didn’t like the look in his eyes, a mix of anger, frustration, and pain. She really didn’t like knowing she put it there. “Sure.”

  “You’ll need a new roof at some point, too, and windows. Then I’ll paint, and you can get someone in here to refinish the floors.”

  A new roof would cost over ten thousand dollars, and would wipe out her savings. She couldn’t even think about the windows. Just more stress for her to swallow down. “I’ll have to talk to Uncle Jonathan.”

  “Sure.”

  “And you’re keeping track of your hours, right?” Because reminding him he’s an employee is the perfect wedge. “I’m going to pay you for this.”

  He started to say something, then stopped. “Yeah.”

  “Good, I mean, just give me an invoice or something.” She drove the wedge in farther, then clamped her teeth together to keep anything else from leaking out.

  “Yeah.”

  They stared at each other, Danielle trying to apologize with her eyes. She didn’t know what she was apologizing for, exactly.

  Except she did.

  Danielle flipped the strips of bacon, each one sending up a fresh wave of crackles. She’d left her grandmother’s house early Monday to get back to Maeve’s apartment in time to cook dinner, and possibly also to avoid Ryan. She hadn’t seen him since their little talk on Saturday. Just as well, given the garbled mess she’d made of their non-relationship.

  “Food,” Maeve said as soon as she came through the door. She dropped her oversized purse on the dining room table and kicked off her pumps.

  “Cob salad.” Danielle couldn’t disguise her happiness at having someone uncomplicated to talk to. As long as she didn’t mention Ryan, she and Maeve should get along just fine. “Christopher called the other day.”

  “Yeah, Jason told me.” Maeve’s short skirt was wrinkled after sitting at her desk all day but gel still held her cropped hair in a precise part with stylized spikes along the edge of her face. “We’ll all go see the Dogs play on Saturday night.”

  Pressing her palms into the countertop, Maeve arched her back, rotating her ankles and groaning into the crackle and pop. For just a second the façade shifted, giving Danielle a glimpse of the tired woman behind the aggressive veneer.

  “There’s some white wine in the fridge,” Danielle said.

  “Cool.” Maeve didn’t immediately grab a glass. She surveyed the array of bowls on the tiny countertop, each holding a different chopped vegetable. A mound of sliced ham sat on the cutting board next to a pile of crumbled goat cheese, and fresh greens almost overflowed the salad spinner in the sink. “Cherry and I talked about grabbing dinner somewhere, but this is better.”

  “There’s enough for her, too.” Danielle lifted the greens out of the sink and upended them into a large pottery bowl.

  Maeve tilted her head with a get-real grin. “Won’t that be a little weird?”

  Danielle willed her face into cool neutrality. “I like Cherry.”

  “You like Ryan, too.”

  Grease from the bacon spattered up and Danielle grabbed the pan, moving it off the heat. “I don’t want this to burn.” She used a fork to lift the strips onto a plate covered with a paper towel.

  “I know I’m not the most observant person,” — Maeve paused to snag a crumble of goat cheese from the bowl and pop it in her mouth — “but I’m not stupid. You two tried so hard to ignore each other on Thanksgiving it was almost embarrassing.”

  Danielle’s first impulse was to play with her hair, to cover her face, to dodge the inevitable. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  Maeve’s bleat of surprise turned into a laugh, not nasty but not happy either. “Right.” Her laughter dwindled to an exasperated chuckle. “I’d get grossed out if you dated Niall, because my brother? Eeuw.” The ick-factor resonated through her voice. “But, at least he’s older than us. My God, Danielle. Ryan’s a kid!”

  Something sizzled in Danielle’s gut, and it wasn’t the bacon. Anger, frustration, and a bellyful of repressed desire piled on top of each other like a full-on emotional rugby scrum. “If he’s such a kid, why do you keep talking about him getting married?”

  “Because Cherry’s a kid, too. They’re perfect together.” Maeve pranced to the fridge and dug out the bottle of wine.

  There was no good answer to that. Danielle gaped at her best friend’s back, jaw slung wide enough to catch flies. She didn’t intend to date Ryan, so arguing about whether he should marry Cherry was an exercise in pointlessness. Instead, she dumped the greens from the spinner into a bowl and tossed the plastic colander into the sink, a little – no, a lot – harder than necessary. Immediately she felt like an idiot for showing her internal disarray.

  The silence between them stretched to the point of discomfor
t, but Danielle kept her mouth shut. If she couldn’t explain Ryan to herself, she sure as hell couldn’t explain him to anyone else. Finally Maeve passed her a glass of wine and Danielle took a deep swallow.

  Truce declared.

  “At any rate,” Maeve said, sounding satisfied that she’d made her point. “We’ll have fun on Saturday night.”

  Sure. “What about Where’s Waldo? Won’t he mind if you go out with someone else?”

  Maeve snickered. “He’ll hate it. Jason could have the personality of toenail clippings and he’d rate over Waldo Beamer.”

  “Someday I totally have to meet him.”

  “Waldo? Nah. It’s probably not safe. You might be his type.”

  Danielle had no clue if that was a compliment or not.

  “You don’t want to mess around with him, anyway,” Maeve said and drained about half her glass of wine. “Christopher’s so damned handsome.”

  Danielle dumped piles of chopped vegetables on the salad greens, creating wedge-shaped sections of tomato, avocado, and mushrooms. Which was a lot harder than it should have been, because she really wanted to throw those bowls of food at the wall, like some kind of modern art exhibit. Hey, kids. This is what crazy looks like.

  Maeve poured them both more wine and took a deep sniff of her glass. “This is pretty good,” she said.

  Danielle set the salad bowl on the table and sat down, taking a sip from her own glass. The blend of fruit and mineral notes worked okay with the fresh veggies in the salad. In the end, talking about wine–or just about anything else–was easier than talking about men. Though when Maeve smiled just right, dimples framing her feminine version of Ryan’s grin, a shot of pain hit Danielle somewhere under her sternum.

  Right next to her heart.

  What a mess.

  The Friday Happy Hour crowd at the Pig N’ Whistle had started to move out, opening up seats for the more serious drinkers. Ryan and Chubb were camped at their favorite table in the front corner near the window. They had a view of the room and the street outside, which prevented random ex-girlfriends from launching sneak attacks.

  Chubb had his bangs pulled back in a ponytail. It made his nose and chin look longer than normal, as if a sculptor had stretched them both while the clay was still soft. He wore a beat-up UMass sweatshirt, though he’d never been to Massachusetts, and Ryan figured he probably pulled it out of the lost and found box at the gym. A couple of girls sat at a table nearby, taking turns eyeing Chubb like he was a pair of spike heels on the sale rack. Something about his ratty hair and scruffy goatee drove women crazy, and Ryan was used to being the benchwarmer on their team.

  “You still doing double shifts?” Chubb asked after taking a measured sip of his beer.

  Ryan really didn’t want to talk about Dani, but if he didn’t answer, Chubb would work it to death. “Not this week. She’s, um … I’ve been pulling long hours at the day job, you know?”

  “Ah … the day job.” Chubb punctuated his comment with a snort that amplified his disbelief.

  “Shut up.”

  Chubb tipped his pint glass and swirled the beer with a grin on his face. Ryan went back to watching the girls watch Chubb and trying not to think about Dani. Every time he made any progress with her, something happened to slow things down. It pissed him off.

  He’d been with Cherry for long enough that he’d lost the habit of looking at other women, though the redhead on the left looked pretty. Then she tucked a strand of her long straight hair behind one ear, something he’d seen Dani do. Shit. He gulped the rest of his beer in one swallow.

  “You’re a mess, dude.” Chubb toasted him with a half-full glass, as if getting twisted up by a woman was some kind of accomplishment. “I’ve never seen you this bad before.”

  “Didn’t I say shut up a minute ago?” Ryan asked, keeping one hand on his beer and the other on his temper. “I think I said shut up, so maybe you should.”

  “Dude, you’re killing me. If you want her that bad, go out with her.”

  Right.

  The familiar neon beer signs reflected off the big mirror on the wall behind the bar. Ryan caught the waitress’s eye and raised his glass. Getting hammered on a Friday night was an old-school way of dealing with his problems. Guess this was the night to tear it up.

  “She’s not into me.”

  “What?” Chubb rose halfway to his feet, his weight on his knuckles, laughing at Ryan. “Man, I know she took off right after I got there the other day, but I saw her give you a look like you were a plate of fried chicken and she was a Weight Watchers refugee.” He dropped back down, still laughing. “My ass she’s not into you.”

  “I’m never going to look at chicken the same way again,” Ryan said into his empty mug. He’d spent almost a week telling himself all the reasons he and Dani would never work out. He knew they were bullshit, but it helped his pride. Hearing the opposite message from Chubb just about killed him. The waitress came by to drop a fresh one, and he managed to trade glasses and thank her without taking his eyes off the table.

  Chubb interrupted his pity party. “When I was hanging out here the other night, Maeve was up at the bar going on and on about Dani’s ex.”

  Ryan nailed him with a glare. “What?” Dani hadn’t ever said much about her past, and he needed every bit of information he could gather.

  “Geez, touchy much?”

  “Tell me.”

  Chubb grinned a little more sympathetically. “Actually – and I’m not just saying this because you’re my friend – he sounds like a douche.” He hunched forward, like he had a bunch of dirt to share. “He’s like, a partner in an architectural firm down in L.A.”

  “I hate architects.”

  “He drives a four-year-old Saab, owns a condo with a view of the Mulholland canyon, and I guess,” — Chubb took a swallow of beer and scuffed the foam off his mouth with the back of this hand — “his personal grooming expenses are, like, large. Way large.”

  Ryan could almost see the guy — blond hair, expensive loafers but no socks, perfectly manicured five o’clock shadow. David Beckham without the tatts. “So unlikely she’d be interested in me, then?”

  “Lemme remind you of my fried chicken analogy.” Chubb raised his beer like he was proud of himself. “Maybe she’s tired of douches.”

  Or maybe Ryan had gotten ahead of himself on this one. He went back to staring at the tabletop. Danielle was used to more than a guy with a pick-up truck and power tools.

  Chubb’s whisper dragged him back from the ledge. “Don’t look out the window, man, but Cherry’s coming up the sidewalk.”

  Ryan glanced up at his friend, who grinned like they were sharing the best joke ever.

  “Is she alone?”

  “Yep.”

  “Walking straight?”

  Chubb paused. “She just tripped over a pebble.”

  “Awesome.”

  “She’s seen us.” Chubb’s grin faded some and he turned more directly toward the window with a cool wave.

  Ryan didn’t have any choice. He nodded in the direction of his ex-girlfriend, who was standing outside, smiling broadly. She blew him a kiss and skipped toward the door as quickly as a drunk girl in three inch heels could manage.

  There was no bouncer yet, and no one delayed her as she made her way to their table. “Hey! Have you guys seen Maeve? Some friends dropped me off here, and she’s my ride home.”

  Ryan had some trouble finding his words, and after an awkward pause, Chubb filled in. “Nah, not yet.”

  She smiled down at them expectantly, and Ryan tried to find at least one good reason to talk to her. No luck.

  “Um,” Chubb said, giving Ryan a significant look. “Do you want to grab a chair and wait for her here?”

  Her smile got wider still. There was the usual shuffle as they asked around to borrow another chair, then the waitress came over to take their orders.

  Ryan switched to soda water.

  The conversation lurched along, with C
hubb doing the heavy lifting and Cherry finding every excuse to put her hands on Ryan. He tried to take a mental step back and look at her objectively. She’d spent a long time getting her hair to look casually messy, her silk and lace blouse cost more than he’d spend on a suit, and if he kissed her he’d taste her favorite lipstick and the chemical flavor of alcohol.

  The more she relaxed, dragging both of them into the rhythm of their faded relationship, the higher his frustration rose, until finally it crossed the line into anger. When she wrapped her arm through his, laughing at a funny work story Chubb told, he lost it, wrenching his arm away and halfway rising from the table.

  “What’s wrong?” She gave him the same tolerant, semi-apologetic look that always used to bring him back in line.

  “You’re hanging all over me, Cherry, and…” And it’s fucking annoying. Until pretty recently, his two options for dealing with anger were to leave the situation or to hit something. He still needed to work on a third option.

  “C’mon, Ry-Ry.” She leaned closer to him.

  He pushed farther away, trying to get a handle on his anger. The guy at Al-Anon had told him to call her on her behavior. “Listen, you’re drunk, and Maeve’s not here.”

  “It’s okay, I’ll just hang out and wait for her.” Her eyes got wide and kind of hurt.

  Chubb slid his chair back a bit, meeting Ryan’s glance. “I think we were just leaving,” he said.

  Ryan raked a hand through his hair, which was safer than punching a hole through the table. “Yeah, it’s time to go.”

  She stood up quickly, stumbling into the table when she landed awkwardly on one heel. “I’ll sit at the bar ’til Maeve gets here, then.”

  “You don’t have your car, right?”

  “No.” She blinked once, slowly. “Maeve’s my ride.”

  Let her stay, then. He was supposed to let her live with the consequences of her decisions, even the bad ones. Except Ryan couldn’t do it. Taking care of Cherry was second nature. “Come on. I’ll get you a cab.”

  Leaving Chubb to handle the tab, Ryan marched Cherry out of the bar. Luck was on his side, and a Yellow Cab cruised up Greenwood before they’d stood there for more than a minute. Ryan opened the door and aimed Cherry in, pausing only briefly when she lurched toward him. She planted both hands on his chest, her face close enough for a kiss. “Get in the cab,” he said, forcing the words out through clenched teeth. He was done with happy hour, done with women, and seriously done with Cherry.