The Relationship Clause

Chapter 13

Saturday morning,a knock comes at my door, and my heart jumps into my throat. I run to the mirror on the wall to check my reflection before realizing what I’m doing. I scowl at myself and pull my hair up into a basic, tight, no-nonsense ponytail.

There.

Things are getting a little too comfortable with Mr. Ferguson. I’m getting too comfortable with him. That’s what got us into this mess with his dad to begin with. I can’t believe I sat on his desk like that. Even if his dad hadn’t interrupted us, it was totally unprofessional and wrong of me. And then, my brain had an even bigger malfunction, and I invited him over to my house.

I should have canceled. In fact, I almost did at least a dozen times, but then I looked around at my sad, sorry house. It would be really nice to get some help. So I didn’t cancel.

Instead, I made a deal with myself as a trade off: today I can’t be flirty with him. At all. Zero flirtatiousness from my end. It’s going to be all business.

But then I open the door and realize I may have bitten off more than I can chew.

I’ve only ever seen Mr. Ferguson looking like Mr. Ferguson. Polished and professional in his suits and ties, hair perfectly combed, and not a whisker out of place.

Standing before me is not that man. This is Owen. His hair is a little messy and, oh, it even has a bit of a curl to it. I never noticed that before. He’s wearing a sweater, and I think I may have a heart attack if he ever takes it off and reveals what’s underneath. And, oh…my…gosh. He’s wearing jeans. Jeans are a good look on him.

I get an eyeful of just how good as he steps inside and turns around slowly, looking at my place. I’m officially ogling him now. Him and those jeans slung low on his hips and hugging his very nice, very round—

“...but it could use some paint.”

I blink up at him. He was speaking to me, but I have no idea what he actually said because I was hard-core objectifying him. What’s worse, I’m about ninety-percent sure he was making a joke because he’s looking at me like he’s waiting for a reaction, and now I’m so upset I wasn’t listening because Mr. Ferguson might actually have a sense of humor!

“Uh, I’m sorry, what? I wasn’t listening.”

“Not listening, huh? What exactly were you thinking of?” He looks me up and down like he knows exactly what sorts of dirty thoughts were playing in my head.

“No-thing. Nothing. I meant nothing.” Oh my gosh, I have to get control of myself. “Um, so, you ready to work?”

“Sure thing, but first…” He reveals a bag I didn’t realize he’d been holding—again, the whole ogling thing was solely focused on his bod. He reaches into the simple, white paper bag and pulls out a big, fluffy raspberry croissant.

I gasp and snatch it out of his hand like a raccoon who spotted something shiny. “You went to Pete’s for me?!”

“Well, for myself too.” Then he pulls out a croissant for himself.

“Right. Of course. I wasn’t assuming you went to Pete’s just for me. When I said ‘me’ I meant it like the uh, royal, um, me.”

He lifts an eyebrow, and I swear my ovaries sigh a little. “The royal me?”

“Yep.” Then I stuff about half the croissant in my mouth to keep from saying any more dumb things. It’s a serious problem for me.

Mr. Ferguson takes a bite of his own then walks further into my little house, looking around. Suddenly, I realize having him come over to help tear out cabinets was the worst idea I’ve ever had. I mean, yeah, he kind of owes me for going along with the secretary thing and helping him save face in front of his dad with the whole girlfriend thing, but having him here? In my house? Walking around my things and touching stuff and wearing jeans? I don’t know if I’ll ever recover.

“I like your place,” he says.

“Oh, um, thanks,” I say through another mouthful of croissant. After chewing and swallowing, I add, “I bought it with the intent to fix it up. Sort of an investment thing. But I guess when I bought it, I didn’t realize that fixing it up would require actual money and skills that I don’t possess.”

He chuckles. “Well, I’m here to help. I don’t have a ton of experience, but I did help Shane with a few things in a condo he owned a couple of years ago, so I can help a little.”

Lies.

He can help a lot. And he does. He is a demo machine, and soon, we have all the old, rotten kitchen cabinets and counters demolished. It’s fun smashing things around and even more fun because he gives me the big sledgehammer and lets me take the first swing. It’s like an episode of Property Brothers, only without a camera crew around, and I’ve got my own Property Brother right here.

We don’t talk a whole lot, which is fine with me because I’m trying not to focus so much on how every time he’s within three feet of me, my heart pitter patters. By the way, he’s within three feet of me a lot because my house is not that big. If he were talking to me and close to me at the same time? Recipe for disaster.

We work all day, snacking on the last of the croissants he brought and some random, not-too-dry carrots I found in my fridge. We rip out the cupboards, the cabinets, and the countertops, then get to work on the floor, tearing out the old linoleum and carpet to make way for the engineered hardwood I have waiting in my cart online.

By four o’clock, I’m exhausted, and I realize we’ve accidentally skipped lunch, which means I’m starving.

I shiver. One thing about winter in the South is that it’s never predictable. Last week, we were having highs in the sixties, which is super warm for February, and this week, we’re back to barely forty. It’s been cold all day, but I haven’t really noticed it because I’ve been working up a sweat. Now that I’m not moving as much, I’m definitely feeling it. I adjust the thermostat. My heater must be having a hard time keeping up with this particular cold front. I get back to the flooring.

“Ah, dang it,” Mr. Ferguson says, sounding more than a little annoyed. “Who left this paint can over here?”

I don’t turn around, too engrossed in my current goal: peel up the awful laminate. “Oh, that was me. Sorry. Did it spill? There wasn’t much in it, so it shouldn’t be a big deal.”

“Yeah, but what was inside is now all over my hoodie.”

This catches my attention enough to make me shift and glance behind me. Bad idea. Bad, bad idea. Because right as I turn around, I catch Mr. Ferguson peeling his paint-covered hoodie over his head. This in and of itself wouldn’t be a bad thing. I’ve seen plenty of men in t-shirts. However, in addition to the hoodie coming off, his shirt starts to come off too.

Static cling should be dubbed the hero of the day, because what it reveals is…wow.

Muscles. Side muscles and front muscles and back muscles and—holy crap—I even get a peek at one of his shoulders before he tugs the shirt enough to keep it from coming off completely. Did I mention I have a thing for shoulders?

Suddenly, my brain is trying to locate another can of paint so I can “accidentally” pour it all over his shirt and he has to take that off too.

No! Bad Junie! Bad Junie!

I squeeze my eyes shut and whip back around as Mr. Ferguson deposits his hoodie in a heap with the rest of the trash and adjusts his shirt. I need to forget I ever saw that.

But even as I think this, I know my brain is ever so carefully folding the memory up and storing it away to be revisited over and over and over…

“Dang, it’s cold in here,” he says. Don’t turn around again. Don’t do it! “What do you have your thermostat set at?”

I can practically hear him shivering, but I try not to envision it, with his arms wrapped around himself, arms all tense, biceps and shoulders on full display. Try being the optimal word. I need to get this man another sweater or I’ll never be able to look at him again.

“Um, if you want another hoodie or jacket or something, you can probably find one that fits you in the coat closet over there.” I wave over my shoulder in the vague direction of said closet.

There’s a long pause. “You’d have something that would fit me?”

“Yep.” Probably more than one something…

Oh, shoot. That was a mistake. Why did I tell him to look in my closet? What the heck was I thinking? I wasn’t thinking, obviously. I needed him to cover up his beautiful torso long enough to give my brain the jump-start it needed, but this was the absolute wrong thing to do.

My whole body warms with preconceived embarrassment. Oh, never heard of preconceived embarrassment? It’s when you’re not actually embarrassed yet, but you know you will be, and your body is preparing for it.

I open my mouth to tell him to stop, but he’s already there, opening the closet door, staring inside. It’s too late.

I turn back to my linoleum nightmare, ears burning. There are thirty whole seconds of silence before his disapproving voice sounds again. “Miss Cousins…” Seriously, I think his vocal chords are permanently stuck on grouchy mode sometimes. Or maybe that’s only when he’s dealing with me.

All I can do now is play dumb. Dumb and sarcastic. “Yes, Dark Ruler?”

“What is all this?”

“All what? Be specific when you’re disapproving of my life, please.”

“All this.”

I get up, girding my loins for what I know is coming next.

I find him standing at my coat closet, door ajar, smoldering eyes dead set on the contents.

“What are these?” he demands.

I peer inside, hoping he can’t see how red my face is. Maybe if I play it off, he’ll think it’s no big deal. “Um, a family of mice rooming with my resident dust bunnies?”

“No.” He runs a hand across the clothes draped on hangers. “There are different men’s hoodies and sweatshirts in here of different shapes and sizes with no apparent theme.”

“Oh… It’s nothing, they’re from, um, you know, different boyfriends.”

“Different boyfriends?”

“Ex-boyfriends.”

“Ex-boyfriends? How many have you had? There’ve got to be at least fifteen different hoodies in here.”

“Well, that means there were probably at least fifteen different exes.” Give or take a few. He’s looking like he might grab each sweater and set fire to them one by one.

“Never mind,” he grumbles as he shuts the closet. “I’m not cold enough to use one of those.”

“Oh. Okay…” A strange new thought occurs to me. Maybe I should keep it to myself, but I can’t. “Does it bother you that I have so many exes?”

“No.” He starts ripping into the last remaining cabinet with a vengeance. Like the thing insulted his mother or something. Well, maybe not his mother. Kiera, I guess?

“Does it bother you that I’ve kept all those sweaters?”

“No.”

“What then? Why are you suddenly so upset?”

“I’m not suddenly upset.”

“You’re more upset than usual,” I insist. Well, he is. And I wish he wasn’t. His sudden bad mood is playing funny games with my heart.

When he found the sweaters, I expected some judgy comments and curious questions, that was a given, but this? My boss, Mr. Ferguson, Mr. TDC, Mr. Grumpy Grumpypants, isn’t supposed to care about how many boyfriends I’ve had in the past. I mean, yes, we’ve had some moments, like when I sat on his desk, but I kind of chalked them up to physical attraction. I’m not one of those girls who doesn’t think she’s pretty. I know some men find me attractive.

But this reaction? From Mr. Ferguson?

That implies that maybe he could…

No. I need to forget it. Nothing good can come from this line of thinking. I’m not looking for a new boyfriend. A boyfriend whom I would inevitably break up with after two to four months. I can’t do that to Mr. Ferguson, even if I weren’t trying to keep this job after the contract ends. I won’t do that to him.

We work in silence for a few minutes.

“Why do you date so much?” he suddenly asks.

“What?”

“You seem to date a lot.”

I shrug, suddenly uncomfortable. “No more than the average person.” At least, I think it’s no more than average. Kiera’s had her fair share of boyfriends. Though I don’t think she dates in exactly the same way that I do, and that’s probably the point…

“How long was your longest relationship?” he says.

Great. We’re stuck on this now.

“Um, I don’t know… Maybe four months…” Four months is stretching it, but it makes me feel better.

“Do you keep in touch with any of the guys you used to date?”

“No. Do you keep in touch with any of your exes?”

He sighs. “Fair point. But did you tell all of them you were moving to Tennessee?”

“I didn’t tell Shane I was moving to Tennessee.”

“So, one out of fifteen.”

“Excuse me, am I on trial here?”

That zips his lips for a while, and I use the reprieve from his onslaught of questions to take a few deep breaths. No one’s ever pressed me this much about this particular issue of mine, not even Kiera. I usually avoid thinking about it, because lately when I do, it makes me feel…broken.

And it’s not just the dating. Plenty of people date a lot, and it’s totally fine. But for me, it’s the culmination of the dating, the moving from job to job, the avoiding any type of permanent commitment. I almost had a panic attack when I bought this house because it felt like such a permanent thing, but in the end, I convinced myself I could do it because it wouldn’t be forever. It was an investment. Something to use for a couple of years before moving on.

But this is how I live my life. This is how my dad lives his life. He is fine with it. He makes it work. We’re happier like this, not broken. I bet my dad went through a phase like this too, where he worried whether something was wrong with him.

But he got over it. And I will too.

I scrape my putty knife along the floor. The chill in my house is growing deeper, and I’m starting to feel it seeping into my skin despite my physical exertion and my sweater. Or maybe it’s all in my head because of how majorly uncomfortable I am.

“I’m not good at staying in one spot for long. In all aspects of my life,” I blurt.

There. I said it. I said it out loud. I said it out loud to my boss, but I still get points for being honest, don’t I?

There’s a long pause where the only sound is that of my putty knife and Owen’s manly hands ripping things apart.

“Why do you think that is?” he asks.

I shrug. No way am I going to justify my dad, and therefore myself, to him. “I have…reasons. But I’m not ready to talk about them with you, so can we please drop it?”

He doesn’t answer for a long moment. “That’s fine. But we will talk about this again. Eventually.”

Ha. Not if I have anything to say about it. “So, what about you?”

“What about me?”

“How many girlfriends have you had? I figured you were getting all up in my business so I could get in y—”

“Two,” he says matter-of-factly.

I think for a second I didn’t hear him right or that maybe he is joking, but his face says he most certainly isn’t. “You’ve only had two girlfriends in your entire life? I mean, even through middle school and high school?”

“Yep. Although, if you include elementary, I’m pretty sure a girl named Cindy declared I was her boyfriend during recess one day, and we never officially broke up, so maybe I’m not as single as I think I am.” Our gazes meet, and I can see the teasing in his eyes. Another joke. Huh. “Seriously though, the thing with my parents kind of soured relationships for me,” he says, voice low.

Right. That makes total sense. Kiera’s got some hang ups as well, thanks to the disaster that was her home life, though she’s never totally opened up to me about what exactly they are. I wonder what Mr. Ferguson’s particular issues are?

I don’t get a chance to ask anything more though because he says the most magical, beautiful words I’ve ever heard a man speak. “Are you hungry? I was thinking of ordering takeout.”

A short while later, we’re sitting on my floor with an array of Chinese takeout boxes around us.

“Are you sure you don’t want to borrow one of those jack—”

“No,” Owen barks.

I drop my chopsticks and lift both hands beside my head. “Okay, okay, jeez. If you want to freeze like a popsicle, be my guest.”

Owen glares at me over our spread. One thing’s for sure: he and his sister both have excellent taste in takeout. I’ve never tried this particular restaurant before, but I think it might be my new favorite. I’ll have to introduce Kiera to it later this week.

“Is it always this cold in here?” he grumbles.

“No. I adjusted the heat, but I think it’s gotten colder since then. It’s having trouble keeping up.”

He shakes his head. “It’s more than that.” He stands up and goes to my thermostat which I’ve checked and double checked. After fiddling with it for a while, he raises his hand to a vent in my ceiling. “Nothing’s coming out.” Okay, that is kind of weird… “Where’s your furnace?”

I motion to a door and take another bite of my noodles.

There’s a pause as he opens my utility closet and rummages around. “Uh…Miss Cousins? Your furnace isn’t even working.”

“What?”

“It’s dead.”

“What do you mean it’s dead?”

“I mean, it’s dead. Dead-dead. Not working. No wonder it’s an icebox in here.”

I squeeze beside him to look at the big metal box that is my furnace. I have no idea what I’m looking for, but I gaze at it as if I do. “Um…okay… Let me call someone.”

But I soon find out there’s no one to call. Not unless I want to pay an exorbitant fee to get them out here, that is. Unfortunately, I already used the bulk of the money Mr. Ferguson gave me for the month on the plumber, bills, and other necessities.

“I’ll pay for it,” he says after I get off the phone with the HVAC technician.

I scrape my hand through my hair, starting to pace. “No. No more paying for stuff. You’re already paying me enough. Too much.”

“Well, this is an emergency.”

“Well, I’m saying no.”

Mr. Ferguson sighs in exasperation, looking like he might start pacing alongside me any second. “Fine, then I’ll give you an advance on your pay.”

“No, okay? No! No more money.”

“Why won’t you let me help?”

“Because you’re already helping enough. And I don’t want to feel like I owe you any more than I do.”

“You don’t owe me anything, Juniper.”

I stop in my tracks. He called me Juniper. No one calls me Juniper except my dad…and he doesn’t say it the way Mr. Ferguson did. The way Mr. Ferguson said “Juniper” made an icy-hot firework shoot up my spine. I liked the way it sounded coming from his lips. I liked it too much. Our eyes meet, and he seems to know his mistake already.

“Miss Cousins. I’m sorry, Miss Cousins. You don’t owe me anything.”

But I won’t hear anymore. This night has been too weird, too confusing. I may have a crush on Mr. Ferguson, but I can sense it growing into more, and it can’t grow into more. Only one of two things can happen if I admit my feelings for him: either I risk putting myself out there, admit I like him, he rejects me, fires me, and I’m right back where I started, or he miraculously likes me too, we date, I end up breaking his heart in a few months, then he fires me, and I’m right back where I started.

No. I can’t let that happen.

I march up to Mr. Ferguson and hold my hand out. “Thank you, Mr. Ferguson. Thank you for everything. The food and the help and the offer to pay, but I think you’d better go now.”

“What? Miss Cousins, I—”

“Goodbye!” Then I grab him by the arm—his big, muscular arm—and try to drag him to my door. I will kick him out if I have to.

He digs in his heels. “No. I’m taking you back to my place. Your house isn’t livable.”

My eyes widen, and suddenly it’s plenty warm in this room. “Um, what? Back to your place?”

“Yes. Well, no. Not my place. I have an extra apartment across from mine that I’m not renting out to anyone right now. It’s furnished, so you can stay there until your house is warm and put back together again.”

“Uh, hello? Did you not hear me say I can’t take any more handouts from you?”

“It’s not a handout. I’ll take the rent out of your paycheck.”

Actually, that doesn’t sound like a bad idea… No. Stay strong. I must stay strong.

“Thanks, but I’ll stay here.”

He squeezes his eyes shut and runs a hand over his face, as if controlling his temper is painful. “You can’t stay here, Miss Cousins. It’s supposed to get below freezing tonight.”

“Well, I’ll bundle up.”

“You’ll bundle up,” he deadpans.

“Yep. I’ve got lots of blankets. Plus a ton of sweatshirts from all those ex-boyfriends.” I wink at him, hoping my little joke will break the tension, but it only seems to make him more upset.

“You will not be wearing any of those sweatshirts.”

Okay… Not the reaction I was expecting. “What? Why not?”

“Because.” The word comes out as a snarl. This is one of his buttons. A new, shiny, strange button that, under normal circumstances, I would totally push over and over and over again, but something about the look in his eyes stops me. It’s not the anger or annoyance. It’s something else.

“Okay… I’ll go stay with Kiera.”

“Kiera has a roommate. There’s no space for you there.”

“I’ll crash on the couch.”

“A couch isn’t good enough for you.” He stomps past me, heading straight for my room, and now I’m the one panicking.

“Where are you going? Hey. Hey, I’m talking to you.” But he doesn’t listen. He walks down my short hallway to my bedroom like freaking Aragorn striding into a room to save Gondor. It is H-O-T hot, and all I’m seeing is the view from behind. I’d probably combust if he was walking like that toward me.

He pushes open the door to my room, pauses for half a second, then continues further inside. I run in behind him, face flaming. “What the heck are you doing?” I say as I snatch up a pair of my unmentionables from the floor.

“I’m packing for you,” he says as he yanks open a backpack I’ve had since college.

“Packing? Does this mean you’ve suddenly decided Kiera’s couch is good enough for me?”

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he crosses the room to my closet and throws that disaster open. Things fall down all over the place because he didn’t give me a chance to tell him that I have a system with my closet. A system that involves only opening the door this much in order to keep the disaster at bay. He pays the mess no mind though and starts rifling through my closet, pulling things off of hangers and stuffing them into my backpack.

“Stop! What are you—those aren’t even right for winter! And that one doesn’t fit me.”

“If it doesn’t fit you, why do you still own it?”

“Because it might fit me someday.”

He pivots, nearly running me over. “I assume you keep your socks and underwear in your dresser.”

MY WHAT?!

He moves to my top drawer in slow motion. He’s all business. Like a robot on packing steroids. Robots probably wouldn’t short-circuit at having to rifle through a woman’s unmentionables—black, lacy numbers and faded granny-panties alike. But I would. I will short-circuit at having my superhot boss rifle through my unmentionables. They are all equally horrifying, and I need to end this now.

“Stop!” I screech, running into him like a three-hundred-pound lineman. Only, instead of knocking him off course like a three-hundred-pound lineman would, I kind of bounce off of him as he’s opening my drawer. With all the force I can muster, I squeeze in between him and my dresser, shutting the drawer before he sees too much.

“Stop, okay? Stop. You don’t have to do that.”

“Well, you were being unreasonable.”

Ha, yeah, I’m the one being unreasonable here.

“I’ll pack if you leave my room. You don’t have to do it for me.”

He lifts an eyebrow like he doesn’t believe me. It’s right at this moment that I realize how close we’re standing. How my chest is practically touching his. The way he’s boxing me in, both of his strong, solid arms on either side of me, resting on my dresser.

Owen’s eyes trace my face, and I think maybe he’s realizing how close we are too. Instead of backing off though, he moves in closer. His face is inches from mine, and it’s the closest I’ve come to getting an in-depth look at his bedroom lips. They are positively swoonworthy.

“Do you promise to pack and not lock me out of your room?” he asks, his voice kind of throaty and deep. Shoot. That’s exactly what I planned on doing. “Because you know if you do that, I’ll just climb in through your window.”

“I’ll lock it.”

“The latch is broken. I can see that from here.”

Double shoot. “Fine.”

Once again, I can almost feel his gaze caressing my skin. Finally, he leaves my room and I pack in peace.