Chapter 30
The vibration of my phone in my pocket has me pausing in the middle of checking the brake reservoirs for proper fluid level under the front panel of the Cessna I’m working on today. I finish the task before moving to stand closer to the space heater in the shop. The hangar is huge, and the insulation is subpar, so the heating system does little to keep out the chill of the fall day. Hence the space heaters strategically placed near our workstations. At least it’s toasty when I take a break next to it.
I hold my left hand toward the orange glow and pull my phone out of my pocket with the other.
Arthur:call me when you can
A blunt message like this from someone else—for example, my mom, who is overly fond of emojis—might worry me, but I’ve found Arthur is just as abrupt with typing as he is with speaking.
I’m due for my morning break—fifteen minutes of downtime I rarely take—so I pause the low-level music playing in my earbud and tap Arthur’s name to call him, like he asked. Meanwhile, I head toward the office.
The mailman picks up on the second ring.
“That was fast.” His deep voice is pleasant, even through the phone. I like the brush of it against my eardrum.
There are a lot of things I miss about the military, but I’m glad I got out before I sustained any further loss to my hearing. That I didn’t give in to the I need to be tougher than everyone else mentality I’d been functioning with up until that point.
There are nights when I want to rage over what I lost. But there are also nights I cry in guilt over the fact that I’m still here when others I knew aren’t.
And there are days when I hear a deliciously deep voice that sends shivers down my spine, and I remember my life is pretty great.
“Needed a break to warm up. It’s an icebox in here. What’s up?”
I push through the office door to find Malcolm squinting at his computer screen. Jumpseat lies sprawled across the keyboard, flicking her short tail and purring.
“You’re cold?” Arthur sounds grumpy, and the thought of his frowning face makes me smile.
Break, I mouth to my boss, and he gives me a distracted wave.
Outside, the temperature is colder, but there’s bright sunshine and I start a vigorous walk to get my blood flowing.
“I’m fine. Remember, I grew up in the north”—for the most part anyway—“and I’m used to the cold. Now, what’s on your mind, Bear? Is this a call to tell me I have to cook for myself tonight? ’Cause I’ve got a frozen pizza with my name on it.”
I can almost see his scowl through the phone. Arthur doesn’t complain about the space that my frozen meals claim in his freezer. He only gets in a sour mood when I eat them.
But I’ve never had the patience for cooking. Not for my cooking anyway. I can be perfectly patient if Arthur is the one at the stove, his back muscles flexing under his T-shirt as he cracks eggs in his well-used cast iron to make a frittata.
“No.” He says the word like a reprimand. How dare I consider a store-bought meal for dinner? “We’re having pav bhaji. A vegetable dish with sweet dinner rolls.”
My stomach growls, and I wish it were dinnertime, but it’s only midmorning. Arthur cooks his grandmother’s recipes as often as he prepares Southern comfort food, and I’m officially spoiled with all these homemade meals.
“Now that you’ve made me hungry, are you going to tell me why you wanted me to call?”
There’s a pause, one long enough that I tap my screen to make sure the call hasn’t dropped. It hasn’t.
“Did you answer me?” I ask, reaching up to tug on my earlobe, anxious that I might be losing hearing in this one as well.
But I’m so careful now.
“No. Sorry.”
At the unmuffled rumble of his voice, I breathe a sigh of relief.
“Okay. Then, what’s up?”
“I . . . don’t remember.”
A laugh bursts out of me, and I lengthen my steps as I chuckle. “I distracted you that much? Sorry. I hope it wasn’t important.” I snort, envisioning Arthur’s thick brows scrunching as he attempts to rifle through my chattering to figure out what he messaged me about in the first place. “Walk me through what you were doing before I called. Maybe that’ll trigger the memory. Where are you?”
I hear his grunt loud and clear through my AirPod, which has me smiling as I weave through the aircraft parked on the large expanse of blacktop beside the hangar. There are a few people in Green Valley and Merryville who own planes and keep them here year-round.
“I’m on Westwood Court. Just passed the Baptist church.”
“Wait. Are you driving right now? Should you be talking to me?”
“Hands-free. You’re on speaker.”
“Oh. Okay. I’m hands-free too.” Not that I’m doing anything with them other than shoving them in my coverall pockets to keep them warm. “Let me know if you’re about to drop mail off for someone who’s lingering by their mailbox. I don’t want to shout something inappropriate and scandalize an innocent bystander.”
“What would you shout?”
Is that a smile in his voice?I picture his beard crinkling with the expression.
“I dunno. Something like . . . Arthur has a biteable ass!”
There’s the sound of choking on the other end of the line, and I slow my footsteps.
“Hey, you okay?” Suspicion grows. “Did you set me up? Did I just yell that when you were in the hearing of an eighty-year-old biddy, and now, she’s having a heart attack? Or trying to cop a feel?”
“Robin,” Arthur groans my name, and I ignore how his tone does things to my body.
“Bear,” I grumble back at him, feeling suddenly grumpy myself that Arthur’s not here in front of me for my ogling pleasure. Which is an odd longing for me to have.
I’ve always attempted to keep my romantic life separated from my job. I never asked Daren to pick me up from work. I never wanted him here. Never fantasized about him showing up, telling me everyone else in the shop was gone, and then dragging me in for a heated kiss.
Why am I having flirty thoughts like this about a man I’m fake dating when I never had them for my ex?
I certainly never shouted about his biteable ass.
Now that I realize what I did, I glance around to see if anyone else has ventured outside for their break.
Relief swamps me when I conclude I’m on my own. Not sure how I would have explained my outburst to a coworker. Especially Thomas, who seems like the teasing type.
No more flirting, I chide myself.
“Sorry, sorry,” I mutter to him and the judgmental voice in my head. “Keep going. What’s before Westwood?”
Though he doesn’t answer right away, I hear his sigh through the speaker, so I know it’s a matter of time. I resume my power walk, filling my lungs with the fresh autumn air.
“I made a turn from—oh,” Arthur says. “I remember. I saw the community center.”
“And this prompted you to call me because . . .”
As he gathers his thoughts, I approach the edge of the runway and turn my eyes toward the sky. The blue expanse has me itchy to get in the air.
I should go flying soon.
I wonder if Arthur would want to go up . . .
“The Jam Session,” he says. “This Friday. I’m playing. You could come.”
That was a jerky delivery. I wonder if Arthur is driving down a road with a lot of potholes. “You mean, come and see you perform?”
He grunts. Then, probably unsure if I could hear his affirmative nonword, he adds a belated, “Yes.”
This wouldn’t be my first time seeing Arthur at the Jam Session. Daren and I went to watch his cousin play, and I always loved the vibrant yet still small-town vibes of the gathering. It was one of the things that had me falling in love with Green Valley and wanting to stay. Especially when, after his set, Arthur climbed offstage to hang out with us. I felt like I knew someone famous.
I had an in with the band.
You can buy front-row seats at a concert in Nashville and still not get that close.
Plus, I don’t go to huge concerts anymore to preserve my still-functioning eardrum.
Lost in thought, I must’ve taken longer to answer than Arthur expected.
“It’s not just me. Lots of good bands coming in. And Lance is playing. He’ll be onstage when I am.”
This isn’t the first time Arthur’s brought up his coworker, as if the guy is a selling point. Maybe I shouldn’t have given a whole monologue about how hot the guy is.
Not that I was lying. But just because the ginger is gorgeous doesn’t mean I want him.
“I’m in,” I say, cutting off any more of his sales pitch as I turn back toward the hangar. “And FYI, I think Lance is cool. A top-notch guy. But you don’t have to tell me he’s going to a place for me to sign on. I like hanging out with you.” Probably more than I should.
Relying on Arthur for any longer than this short time would be a bad idea. He’s helping me, and then we’re going to part ways.
Possibly with me on my way out of town for good.
The thought sets off a twinging ache in my chest, different than the pain machine that used to grind and pound under my rib cage. I haven’t felt the latter in a while, but the sad pinching that comes whenever I consider leaving Green Valley—leaving Arthur—remains.
There’s a deep throat clearing from the other end of the line.
“You too,” he says, which I assume means I’m also not completely unpleasant to be around for a stretch.
As I step around a plane, I spy Malcolm outside. When our eyes meet, he raises a hand, indicating he’s looking for me.
“I’ve gotta let you go.”
“See you at home.” Arthur disconnects the call, unaware of the warm shiver his words sent through me.
I pop my earbud out and quicken my pace toward the entrance of the office. When I step through the door, I find Malcolm isn’t alone.
Thomas leans against the wall.
The father wears his perpetual frown. The son offers me a cocky smile.
The problem with Thomas is, he looks like an asshole, and the tone of his voice sounds like an asshole’s should. But he, himself, has never done anything overtly assholish. He doesn’t talk down to me or act like I don’t belong here. If anything, the guy asks too many questions, but they’re all airplane-related, so I have no reason to get pissed off by them.
No, the reason I dislike Thomas is not so much him, but what he represents.
A guy less experienced than me who will get the thing I want and have worked harder for.
“Rob,” Malcolm says, “need you to show Thomas that modification you made to the Piper engine.”
No,I want to say. If he doesn’t know how to do that, then too fucking bad. I’ll show him when I own the shop and he works for me.
But that’s a petty thought, and I know it. Dismissing Malcolm and his golden boy is not the way to prove I deserve to run this place.
“Sure thing.” I try for a cheery voice, but it doesn’t work great when I force the words through gritted teeth.
Thomas grins like he knows just how much his existence pisses me off. But all he says is, “Thanks.”
Asshole.