Chapter Seventeen #2
“I was with Hayes last night,” I admitted, glancing up the stairs. Michael was probably going to come over soon to start the restraining order process.
“Yes, I know. He stopped by yesterday afternoon.”
“Listen, Rossy…I know this is a hard ask and I know the town is going crazy without my coffee, but I need another day.”
“What about that is a hard ask?” When I didn’t give him an answer, he gave me one. “Of course, darling. Take all the time you need.”
My bottom lip trembled, my next words fumbling from my lips. “There’s something I have to tell you, boss man, but I’m not ready to.”
“Then don’t. I’ll be here to listen when you’re ready,” he replied.
I didn’t have the guts to even try to conjure up how his face would twist in a mix of anger and regret when he saw my bruise for the first time.
That’s why I needed time to prepare to watch the guilt weigh heavy on his shoulders.
He’d left me on my couch with a cup of tea and my favorite movie playing.
He thought I was safe. This would eat at him, and I knew him well enough to know there was no way for me to stop it.
Selfishly, I wasn’t ready for that. Rossy had done so much for me.
He was the father I never had. Yeah, I got on his nerves and he got on mine, but we loved each other.
“You have to promise me that you’ll be nice to yourself,” I said, my voice unsteady and quiet.
On the other end of the line, he was quiet.
He remained quiet until Hayes came back down the stairs. “I don’t like the way you said that, Margo.”
My heart lurched. “You don’t like the way I say a lot of things,” I countered, an attempt at humor, badly timed and horribly executed.
We had gotten out of the rain about an hour ago, but over the roof of the Buoy on the other side of the mountain that kept Astoria tucked against the shoreline, the storm brewed.
Lightning cracked across the dark canvas, veins of life stretching for miles, and just before they faded away, thunder boomed, shaking the earth, a warning of what was yet to come.
“Darling, I know you want your space, but perhaps it would be…well, it would be best if I came over,” Rossy said, nearly tripping over his words, his anxiety almost shattering his sentence structure.
Hayes was in front of me then, eyes on the phone. “Please don’t tell me that’s your brother,” he practically growled.
I shook my head rapidly, covering the receiver with my hand. “It’s Rossy.”
His green eyes flashed with understanding, and he gave me a jerk of his chin. “Let’s get inside before the rain hits,” he said, moving to the truck to grab his bag.
“Brother?” Rossy parroted. “You have a brother?”
Shit.
Shit.
Damn.
Fuck.
Panic slithered at the back of the neck, the hairs rising, goose bumps trailing down my arms. “I gotta go, boss man. Thanks for giving me another day off. I promise to make it up to everyone.”
“Margo, darling—”
I ended the call, a sour taste in my mouth, and got out of the Jeep.
I closed the door with my hip, falling against it, shoulders sagging.
The rain soaked into the back of my jean skirt, but I didn’t care.
“I’m a horrible human being,” I whispered to myself.
I’d been living a lie. For the last seven years, I’d been living a horrid lie, foolishly thinking I could escape.
I thought I’d broken the chains, but somewhere along the way, the chains caught back up with me.
“No.”
My head snapped up.
Hayes was right there, leaning into my space. “You’re not a horrible person. You’re a good person who’s been through horrible shit. There’s a fucking difference and I need you to learn it before I redden your ass.”
I opened my mouth to say…I didn’t know what, but movement to my left had my eyes drifting in that direction.
I could feel myself pale as my eyes landed on my second boss, Joey, standing with his arms folded atop his beer gut, a scowl on his face and stains on his white apron.
Hayes’ eyes followed mine, his body becoming alert.
In a swift but calculated move, he shifted me behind him just as Joey called, “All right, fucker, when you came to me this morning with your threats and shit, I respected the hell out of you. Now, after seeing that bruise on my girl’s face, I’m going to give you ten seconds to get the hell off my property before I put three bullets in ya! ”
“Jesus, Joey!” I hissed, coming to Hayes’ front.
I moved to take a few steps closer to Joey, but Hayes hooked his fingers into the back of my skirt.
“You cannot go around threatening to shoot people! You could get your damn business license taken away.” I threw my arms out.
“I need this bartending gig to pay for my school, you know this!”
“Margo, you got a fucking shiner,” he quipped, reaching for something in the little storage shed by the back door. He pulled out his two-barrel shot gun and loaded it. “Now move so I can shoot him.”
Hayes spoke then. “Not a smart move.”
“Be quiet, Top Gun,” I snapped over my shoulder before pointing at the gun. “Where did you get that?”
Joey was just ten years older than me. His father had opened and run the bar until his death about six years ago.
Heart attack, I think. According to Sarah and Michael, before his father passed, Joey was the life of the party, Astoria’s hottest bachelor.
Everyone either wanted to be with him or be him.
He had the world in the palm of his hand, thanks to his grandmother’s inheritance.
Michael told me after I was hired that Joey blew all of the money within a month of his father’s funeral after not touching it since his eighteenth birthday.
Partying, gambling, and drinking. He had plans for that money.
Plans to travel, to start a new life outside of Astoria.
His father’s death wasn’t in his plans, and it flipped his entire world upside down.
Now, he spent his days running the bar, chasing after his father’s ghost, but he was a decent man.
He’d just had a bad stroke of luck, is all.
“I bought it.”
“Does Sheriff Humbly know you have a gun?” I questioned, raising a brow.
Joey looked to the ceiling. “Why do I have to hire the most difficult women in the world?”
“Stop talking to the fucking ceiling and put down the gun,” I ordered, reaching around to grab Hayes’ wrist, freeing myself.
Hayes, being fucking Superman, didn’t like that. The hand I pulled out of my skirt snapped around my waist and hauled me back into him. His lips were at my ear. “Don’t approach an emotional person with a loaded gun, Temper. Ever.”
“He’s gonna shoot you,” I quipped, turning to look up at him.
“I’m not too worried about it.”
I blinked.
“Margo, don’t tell me you forgave this sorry fuck of a man,” Joey groaned, running his free hand through his thinning hair.
“Hayes isn’t the one who hit me,” I snapped at him. “Put the damn gun down before I call Michael.”
Joey tipped the gun to Hayes. “He didn’t hit you?” he pressed.
“No!”
“Okay, then who did? Because I need to have a conversation with them.”
Joey and his big heart.
“It’s being handled,” Hayes assured, putting his hand at my lower back and guiding me toward the stairs.
“By who?” Joey demanded.
We stopped at the base of the stairs, and I watched Hayes look at Joey. Joey stared back for some time before he nodded. “Right.” He looked at me, putting the gun back into the shed. “You still planning on working tonight, or do I need to find someone to cover your shift?”
“I can work.” Hayes cleared his throat but said nothing, looking out to the water.
“Not saying this to offend you, babe, but is there a way you can cover that up? If not, I’m afraid some of the boat crews will go off the rails.”
That was true. Astoria fishermen didn’t play about women and children being hurt.
“I have cover-up,” I assured, giving him a smile.
“See you at seven. Don’t be late,” he called as I climbed the stairs, Hayes following closely behind.
Once inside, Hayes set his bag on the bench that sat underneath the living room window and turned to me. “I need your work schedules,” he declared as I shrugged off my purse, hanging it on the hook.
“I have my next two weeks mapped out in my planner.”
He raised a brow. “You have a planner?”
“Yes, I have two. One for life and one for school.”
He continued to stare.
“My brain gets jumbled sometimes,” I admitted, picking at the polish on my thumbnail. “Writing everything out helps quiet the noise.”
“I get that,” he muttered, and his phone rang. “That’ll be Ash.” He jerked his chin toward the kitchen. “The soup is warming up on the stove.”
As I walked into the kitchen, I heard Hayes talking about the security system in a low tone. I got out two bowls and served us each a healthy portion of soup, the herbs and spices filling my nose. My stomach growled.
“Yeah, she has four exit points,” Hayes said from the living room. “No, I can have it installed within the next two hours. Just have Jake call me then. Dominic get anything?”
Clearing my throat, I reached up, grabbing two plates, putting a bowl on each.
Out of habit, I began to hum, moving across the space to my silverware drawer to grab what I needed.
I closed it with my hip, turned around and jumped.
Hayes was leaning against the wall, phone gone, arms crossed, eyes on me. “You feeling okay?” he asked.
I handed his soup to him. “Do you want the truth, or will a lie make you feel better?” I asked.
“From you? I’ll always want the truth, even if it kills me.”
Pressing my lips together, I gave him a sharp nod. “Right.”
He set his food on the table, pulling out a chair and taking a seat. “You don’t have to sit at the table, Superman.”
“I want to.” He pushed out the chair across from him with his boot. “Come eat your lunch. You’ll need the energy for work.”
He finished his soup and bread before I was halfway done, leaned back in the chair, and watched me in silence. I set the spoon down and straightened my spine. “I hate when you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Stare at me like I’m some science experiment.”
“Is that what you think I do?”
“I don’t know, but you make me feel like that. You have this intense look…honestly, Mr. Perfect. It scares the shit out of me sometimes.”
He blinked, his brow pinching. “The last thing I ever want to do is scare you. I apologize for making you feel that way. It wasn’t my intention.” He paused for a moment, looking at the scratches on my table. “You’re just so goddamn beautiful that sometimes I wonder if you’re even real.”
Before I could get the words off my tongue, he rose from his seat, washed off his dishes at the sink, and told me he needed to get my security system installed.