Chapter 13 #2
He glares at me, that brow telling me ‘I told you so’ loud and clear. I know he’s right, and this is risky. But it’s worth it if Unc’s house is well-kept. The flower bed edging is the first of two jobs and the least serious thing I’m hoping Bobby can help with.
He makes quick work of it, the new concrete in place in minutes. “Hmm. It looks too new,” I decide and get down on my knees in the yard. Scooping up some dirt from around the bushes, I rub it into the new pieces to blend them in with the old ones.
Leaning up against the bed of his truck, Bobby laughs. “What are you doing now?”
“What’s it look like?”
I glance over my shoulder and catch him looking at my butt, not really seeming to care at all what I’m doing other than kneeling with my ass in the air.
“Making me lose my fucking mind.” It’s a statement, not a question at all.
Somewhere deep inside, the tiniest vixen roars to life, and I wiggle my hips a bit, teasing and seducing him.
He groans and plainly reaches down to adjust himself in his jeans, keeping eye contact with me the whole time. “Now what?”
“Hammer. Nail.”
He chokes on his tongue. “What?”
I’m the one grinning cockily now. “We need to fix the steps. What did you think I was talking about?” I ask innocently.
But he’s way better at this game than I am. “Me hammering away at you, nailing you to the bed, fucking you hard, kissing you soft, and touching every inch of your skin with my tongue.”
“Oh.” The lamest comeback in the history of comebacks, but it’s all I’ve got because my brain is busy painting mental images in vivid, photographic detail.
He presses his lips together, but I can see he’s fighting a smile as he grabs the hammer from the toolbox I asked him to bring and the box of nails we bought at the hardware store when we picked up the concrete edging pieces.
“Right here.” I point at the stair edge, where the nails are working their way loose, making the few steps an unsteady tripping hazard.
He hammers a few nails in, making the stair treads solid and safe. I grab the vinegar I brought from home and dab a bit on the nails.
“What’re you doing?” Bobby’s nose is crinkled at the smell.
“Vinegar makes them rust quickly. That way, they’ll blend in and not look shiny and new and therefore noticeable.”
Bobby seems surprised by how far I’m going to do this without Unc realizing I’ve done a thing, but that’s key to the plan of his not feeling like I’m overstepping.
“The side’s gonna need a few screws. Let me grab those and a screwdriver.” He digs around in the toolbox again and comes up with a long-shanked screwdriver. “This might be a bit much, but it’ll do the trick.”
He’s screwing in the last screw when the door opens and Unc comes out, grumpier than a bear whose hibernation has been disturbed way too early.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he demands. His eyes are bright and sharp today, no hint of glassiness or clouding. Nope, just pure fury there.
“Uh, hey, Unc. I thought you were going fishing with Doc today?” I say calmly, willing him to calm down too because we are so busted.
“Did. Got tired so I came home to take a nap and got woken up by some fool hammerin’ away on my porch. What the fuck are you doing?” he repeats, getting louder.
Bobby steps forward, putting himself between me and Unc’s ire, trying to ease the situation. “No big deal, Hank. No need to yell at Willow. She just asked me to fix up these steps so they don’t walk away from the house.”
He gestures with the screwdriver, and before I know what’s happening, Unc grabs the screwdriver out of Bobby’s hand by the flathead end and chunks it into the yard, where it lands blade down in the dirt, buried to the handle.
“Don’t need no help,” he hollers, pointing at Bobby in accusation. Pointing to his own chest, he barks, “I can do it myself.”
Behind me, I’m sure eyes are peeking out of every window with how loud Unc’s being. I’d expected him to be mad if he found out I was helping like this. That’s why I was trying to be sneaky about it, but I hadn’t expected anything close to . . . this.
I’ve never seen him like this.
I’m shocked and hurt at Unc’s reaction, and Bobby is holding me protectively behind his back like he’s scared Unc is going to charge us. I’m ashamed to admit that I shrink behind Bobby a little, letting him take the brunt of it on his broad shoulders.
“Shit,” Unc hisses, holding his hand up, and blood drips down onto the porch.
“Oh!” I exclaim, my concern for him overriding everything else. I step out from my hiding spot and run up the steps to grab Unc’s hand. He tries to fight me, still mad as a hornet, but I glare at him. “Let me see it.”
With a pissed off sigh, he opens his fist. A gash stretches across his palm from the meat by his thumb toward his ring finger. He immediately closes his hand again, holding it over his head. “Damn screwdriver got me.”
He glares at Bobby as though it’s his fault when none of it is. Bobby is here because I asked him to be, doing work when I told him it would be fine, and Unc is the one who had a tantrum and grabbed the screwdriver.
All business and not allowing for any argument, I push Unc’s shoulders, turning him around. “Inside. Let’s get a towel, then you’re going for stitches.”
He relents on the towel, but when I shove him back toward the door, he refuses and plops himself down in a kitchen chair. “Don’t need no stitches. It’ll scab up in a couple of days.”
“And in the meantime, you’ll be dripping God knows what into the whole town’s beer. Nope. Stitches, bandages, and sterile dressing, or I’ll call Chief Gibson if you even step one cranky foot in the bar. I’ll report you myself for health violations.”
Unc isn’t moving, not swayed by my argument in the slightest. Probably because he counts Chief Gibson as a friend and trusts that he won’t shut him down.
Bad thing is, I fear he’s right, which leaves me stuck on how to get Unc to go for the care he needs.
Bobby steps up to the plate, backing my play.
“You catch anything this morning?” he asks like they’re just shooting the breeze.
Unc grunts and Bobby snorts. “How many and how big?”
Narrow blue eyes meet dark ones in a battle of wills. I’m honestly not sure which of these men will come out on top. Bobby’s got youth on his side, and size for sure. But Unc has old-fashioned iron will.
“Couple each, not more than a pound or two. Catch-n-releasers.”
Bobby nods. “You scrub up before you took a nap, old man? Not just rinse off at the creek, but wash up good and proper like you’re eating dinner at your mama’s table?”
Unc doesn’t say a word, but he glares at Bobby for a long minute. “Fine. Don’t want no creek funk infection. Probably lose a damn hand and it’d be your fault, Tannen.”
I have no idea what happened, but Unc is walking outside and heading for his truck.
“We’ll take you,” I say, hurrying alongside him.
“The hell you will. I can go get somebody to sew up my hand by myself, just like I could’ve fixed those stairs myself.” The accusation stings, but I have my doubts. If he could’ve, he would’ve already. Right?
“I was trying to help,” I argue. I’ve already figured out that apologizing doesn’t work with Unc.
“Hmph.” With that, he gets in his truck and leaves me and Bobby standing in the front yard.
“What just happened?” I ask, not really expecting Bobby to answer as I nervously nibble at my bottom lip, looking down the road where Unc’s blue truck disappeared around the corner. “I was trying to help,” I say again, quieter this time.
Suddenly, I find myself buried against Bobby’s chest, and tears are running hotly down my face, soaking into his shirt. He rubs my back soothingly. “It’s okay, sweetheart. Hank’s got a streak of pride a mile wide, and we rubbed up against it a little too much. That’s all.”
“You think he’s going to be okay?” This time, I do need him to answer, to reassure me that Unc’s hand is going to get stitched up and he’ll be good as new.
“Of course. Hell, if we hadn’t been here, he probably would’ve super glued it shut and kept on with business. He’s tough like that.”
I’d like to believe that. Except Bobby doesn’t know that there’s more to it. No one does.
Pulling myself together, I swipe at my eyes behind my glasses and snort very ungracefully.
“He’ll be okay, and he’ll get over it. At least until he shows up to work and sees what you did to his office,” he deadpans. “It’s all over then.”
There’s a beat of silence and I realize he’s kidding. Sort of.
“Oh, God, he’s going to kill me!” I wail, but through the last bit of tears, I’m laughing in shock, knowing it’s true. He is going to be so pissed. “How in the hell can he be mad that people want to do nice things for him?”
“Some people don’t get it, sweetheart. But he’ll come around.”
Bobby makes one last check on the stairs to be sure they’re solid and stable while I text Doc to let him know we got busted and that stitches were required.
Doc: Tannen? Or you?
I laugh, amused that Doc assumes Unc did something to us.
Me: Unc. Sliced his hand on a screwdriver.
Doc: He went for stitches? Didn’t glue it up?
What is it with these guys? Glue is not an appropriate treatment for gashes and never has been. A second later, another text pops up . . .
Doc: On it. You tried.
I did. I tried so hard to do something nice, and Unc yelled and stomped and cussed his way around like a drunk, wayward sailor who got off at the wrong shore for leave.
But I’m nervous about his being at the hospital alone. Maybe I should go over there too? Sit with Doc and make sure that Unc gets home okay and eats some dinner? He said he came home and took a nap. Was it because they left early to catch the prime fishing hours or because he overdid it today?
My brain whirls and swirls. It’s not until Bobby puts his hands on my shoulders and bends down nose to nose with me that it stops. My brain quiets and I stare into his eyes. Deep, dark onyx unblinkingly stares back at me, steady and supportive.