Chapter 5
RINSING
My eyes blink open, and as I stare at the closet doors, heavy footsteps creak across the floor of the apartment.
But my limbs are leaden, and I can’t raise the energy to prop myself up.
One minute Rig’s fucking me, the next minute he’s gone, then he turns up and he’s fucking me again.
What am I doing? That sex last night—or should I say this morning—was something else.
God, it’s too early. I suck in a deep breath and close my eyes.
Then I hear “What the fuck?” and I blink up to find Dave standing by the bed, checked coat stretched over his broad shoulders. I turn my head sharply to an empty mattress.
“What the fuck what?” I say. Maybe I can brazen this out, though the whole thing is making me look like a slut.
“Some guy’s duffel bag is in your kitchen.”
The toilet flushes in the bathroom. A bathroom I think Dave cleaned last weekend. Ouch. Spectacular timing.
Rig appears, buck naked, welts and bruises all over his body, but he’s so impressive that I can only gawk at him. The red marks have receded a little, darkening into a yellow and purply black, like a mottled cat. Holy shit, how damaged is he?
“Oh my God!” It flies out before I can stop it.
“You’re that guy. From the fight,” Dave rumbles, looking from me to Rig and back again, and a flush starts to build on his neck. He swings toward where I’m propped up on an elbow in bed.
“You fucking slut,” he says, low and dark.
Almost before the words are out of his mouth, Rig is across the room and has picked him up and is wrestling him through into the living room. Dave is shouting through the apartment, words bouncing off the walls:
“I knew I should never have gotten back into it with you, you fucking slut! You and Marni fuck anything that moves!”
“Shut the hell up!” Rig growls.
“You’re a fucking drunk bitch …”
There’s a thud, a yell, and the creak of the door. An even louder shout ricochets through from what I assume is the kitchen, followed by a sound that is remarkably like someone falling down an iron staircase.
Holy shit.
Rig comes back into the room and studies my face. Dave starts shouting something from lower down behind the building, but it sounds like a dog barking in the distance.
“Dave Chapman was the boyfriend you mentioned last night?”
“Yes. Did you throw him down the stairs?”
“Yeah.” He shakes his head. “He’s a world-class asshole. I have no idea what you’re doing with him. He was two years ahead of me in school and he treated women like shit.”
“Maybe I’m a world-class asshole.”
“Babe.”
“He doesn’t treat me like shit.”
He walks around to the other side of the bed and sits down. “Yeah, well … that’s not a surprise.”
“What! Why?”
“Babe, you’re way above his league. He was reeling you in.”
Seriously? “I’m not above his league.”
Rig chuckles quietly and settles back on the pillow, one huge arm tucked behind his head. “Babe.”
He turns on his side, stretches out a hand, and pulls me toward him. “I was looking forward to some morning snuggling. Haven’t had that in a long-ass time.”
“Did you just say the word ‘snuggling’?”
He laughs. “Quit messing around and come here.”
I shuffle over and into him because when you’ve been on your own for as long as I have and someone offers you that, you take it.
I like him. And I don’t care how much time I’ve got him for, or even if it’s just toe-curling sex, I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts.
At least he’s being clear with me that this isn’t anything.
I’ve heard the story about how I’m The One too many times to count, only to be thrown over when some more attractive offer comes along.
He moves me around so I’m tucked into his front, and his heat seeps into me, furry chest rough against the skin of my back. My muscles relax one by one.
He nuzzles into my hair and sniffs.
“Notwithstanding that jackass, this is fuckin’ bliss,” he mumbles.
The building’s quiet now. The kids aren’t screaming downstairs, and it’s too early for the smells from Ketley’s to have drifted up this far.
“You don’t mind I … umm …”
“Spit it out.”
“… was seeing Dave?“
“Never expected you’d be celibate, babe. No choirboy myself.” He grunts. “I owe you an apology, though.”
“What?”
“Was an asshole to you when I left town. Bailed on you.”
I stare at the wood paneling that makes up one wall of the bedroom. He rolls onto his back, and I turn over to look at him.
“There’s no real excuse for it. I got a call when I got back to the trailer: They needed me on the rig.
An accident. They were several men down.
So I had to go back. I didn’t want to go, and I was pissed at having to do it.
It’s a hard four-week slog out there, and I’d been looking forward to a break.
So, being an asshole, I thought it was best to chalk whatever this was up to one good night.
I got to the rig and it played on my mind. So, I wanna apologize for that.”
My eyes are all tight and scratchy. When has a guy ever apologized to me? “That’s okay.”
“No, it ain’t. And it weren’t right the night I said it, neither: I could see it in your face. But, babe, I also need to say to you, good though this is, I wanna be crystal clear I ain’t looking for something more.”
Yeah, he’s laid that out. But God, with sex this great, good for now is fine, isn’t it? More than fine. And I like how straight he is with me.
“I understand, and I’m good with that. I appreciate you being upfront.”
His eyes roam over my face and drift down, and my lips curl up as he groans and rubs his face.
“I’m too bruised for sex,” he says, and I laugh, pushing myself up and climbing over him. His eyes heat as he studies me.
“You managed fine last night.”
“I was pumped full of drugs.”
“Well, you’re going to have to lie nice and quiet like and not move and let me do all the work.”
A large hand comes up and cups my breast, thumb rubbing over my nipple which hardens instantly, and he closes his eyes. “Don’t know if I can do that.”
“Do you have a choice?”
“Not really, getting that asshole out of here nearly finished me off.”
“Did you ice all this?” I drift my hand over his bruises.
“Does a freezing-cold shower count?”
“Not really.”
“Angelo told me you were doing the medical shit there, at the fight.”
That makes me laugh. “The doc all but forced me to take over from him when he had to take that guy from the first fight to the hospital. I have no idea what happened to him.”
“He’s badly beat up, but I’ve heard he’s okay.”
“Yeah, and what about you? You were out for the count and …”
“They took me to the hospital, too. I came to in the truck.”
“Do you fight a lot?”
“Given it up, babe, but Angelo offered me three large for last night. Even more, if I lost.”
“Three thousand bucks! And what do you mean, more if you lost?”
“Throwing a fight. But I never throw fights, and Angelo knows that, too. He doesn’t argue, but they like things where they can predict the outcome. People like to see me fight because they understand it’s real and I don’t lose unless I’m beaten fair and square.”
“But you lost last night?”
“Yeah,” he laughs. “Angelo thinks I threw it, so he’s given me a wedge of extra cash.
They made a fuckin’ fortune off all the betting on me, and there are people in town who ain’t very happy because I lost them a lot of money.
Everyone’s clamoring for a rematch, not that I’m interested in fighting that bastard again. I could take him, though.”
“That’s an amazing amount of cash, Rig.”
“Yeah, it is. Gonna use it for a down payment on a house when I get enough together.”
“Here?”
He laughs. “Here? No. I’m here because my ma’s here.
I can’t live with her because she’s a pain in my ass and we drive each other up the wall, but the trailer costs me next to nothing and I can keep an eye on things.
She lives on fucking useless farmland, and my dad died when I was young, so she needs the help, financial and otherwise.
Gonna buy a place somewhere warm with a beach. Been my dream for fucking ages.”
I can see that for him, and who wouldn’t want to escape this godawful town in the backend of nowhere?
His big warm hand rubs up and down my back. “What’s your dream?”
I laugh. “I learned a long time ago not to have dreams. They never turn out quite like you hope they will. Life is never that sweet.”
He studies my face for a minute. “I get that.” He picks up a strand of my brown hair and twists it around his finger. “What keeps you going, though, when life gets shit?”
“I dunno. Escape.” I grin. “Booze.”
“Well, we’ll have to find you something better than that.”
I stare at him. How can he say he’s no good long-term when he talks like this? Dammit, I wish he didn’t make me curious.
A muffled beeping noise cuts through the quiet, and I frown at him, then my eyes widen.
“Crap, that’s my alarm.” I lean over and grab my phone off the nightstand. 8:15 a.m. “Jesus Christ.”
I shoot off him and out of bed, scrabbling around on the carpet. I can remember my hand shooting out the second time we had sex and catching everything, tipping it all onto the floor.
He grins at my panic and puts his hands behind his head.
“What you work at?”
“I’m a caregiver. Got a few old ladies I take care of.”
“You like it?”
I shrug. “It’s a job.”
“Same with me with rigging.”
“You like fighting?” I say as I dash to the bathroom.
“Like it while I’m riled up and doing it, not so much afterward when I can’t fucking walk.” His voice drifts through as I close the door.
I turn on the shower and stare at myself in the mirror. Long curly brown hair, tired gray eyes, but hey, they’re not bloodshot. Not looking so bad this morning. Not hungover for the first time in forever.
I dart into the stream of tepid water, gasping.
“When you’ve got more time, I’m joining you in there,” he shouts through the door, and I laugh.
“Anytime.”
He says something that sounds like “Don’t tempt me.” Then he yells, “Whaddya want for breakfast?”
My alarm leaves me only fifteen minutes to get up and out. “No time!”
“I’ll make you something to go. Tell me what or it’ll be random!”
“Coffee, just coffee.”
I soap up fast and rinse and then I’m out, scrabbling for clean underwear in my drawer and pulling my uniform out of the dryer.
I dart back into the bathroom and dab on some concealer and brush mascara over my lashes.
That’ll have to do. I’m twisting my hair up into a scrunchie as I head into the kitchen, and I grab my coat and bag from the hook by the door as he taps my arm.
He’s got a Saran-wrapped sandwich and a thermos of coffee sitting in his big paw. That was fast.
“It’s instant. Best I could do in ten minutes.”
I blink at him in awe. Nobody’s done that for me since … well … since my dad died. “Thank you, I …”
“Got an ulterior motive, babe.”
I like how direct he is. Some women would take offense at the things he says to me, but I know who and what I am, and I’ve been around the block too many times with too many guys who want one thing and say another. This is oh so different.
“Yeah? What’s that?”
“I need to keep my head down for a bit: a coupla nights here, maybe more. A lot of people are mad about what happened last night, and they’re looking for me. Don’t want to be in the trailer when a bunch of men with baseball bats turn up. I can hold my own, but not against a mob.”
“When you went out to the rigs, I asked Mike where you’d gone. He might guess you’re here.”
He wraps a hand around my neck. “Mike’ll keep quiet if I tell him to. I’m sorry I bailed on you.” He kisses my forehead. “Now get out there and see to your old ladies.”
Stop being nice. Just dump me like everyone fucking else.
But he’s being nice for a reason. My thoughts flit back through this morning as I take a sip of coffee and head down the stairs to my car.
Kicking Dave out, snuggling, and encouraging me to have a dream, something anyway, to get through.
Making me breakfast to go. For some reason, I don’t mind him taking advantage, I don’t mind it at all.