Chapter 9
A week and some later, I was ready to implement phase one of my big assignment for Trista. I’d called in a favor with a former client, and he’d set up the perfect comeuppance for a less-than-generous person who hated manual labor.
I was prepared for multiple scenarios. One way or another, I would capture photo and video evidence of Blake Malone hopefully having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
Out in the parking lot, a van door slid open. I checked my phone to make sure the app for the doorbell cam was capturing the apartment across the way and, more importantly, recording.
Showtime.
Two men in work clothes crowded my view of Malone’s door. The shorter one hesitated before using the door knocker.
When no one answered, they looked at each other. I bit my lip, while drumming my fingers on the upholstered arm beside me. The only outcome I hadn’t planned for was that he would refuse to open his door.
The taller man checked his phone. His short buddy gave the door knocker a more vigorous workout. We all waited. The men shifted their weight from side to side or front to back. My fingers drummed even faster.
C’mon, Malone. Open up.
The two men looked at each other, shrugged, and took a couple of steps toward the parking lot. I bit back a groan and scooted to the edge of my seat with a sigh of frustration and a fervent wish that I’d brewed more coffee.
But then Malone tried to open his door, only the chain was still attached, so it banged when it hit its limit. Malone cursed, closed the door, and then reopened it with a yawn. “Can I help you?”
At least that’s what I thought he’d said.
The door muffled his voice, and I had the sound on the recording muted so my eavesdropping wouldn’t be given away.
Blessedly, the workers had moved to the side, so I had a clear view of Malone leaning against the door, shirtless and wearing only boxers.
He yawned while absently scratching the back of his head.
Was that a hint of a tattoo? A thin line of writing on the inside of his right bicep, maybe?
Definitely broad shoulders. Toned, but not to the point where he looked susceptible to roid rage or prone to giving a lecture on the evils of sugar.
My mouth went Death Valley dry.
Trista had said her husband worked out. I had even seen him working out, but . . .
Stella, you can’t drool over your client’s soon-to-be ex-husband. Highly unprofessional. Also, there’s a reason why you’re doing what she hired you to do. As Nana likes to say, pretty is as pretty does.
With that thought, I waited for him to wake up enough to cuss these guys out and slam the door in their faces. Then he wouldn’t be so gorgeous.
If only I could get my eyeballs to believe that.
Sabbatical, Stella. Sabbatical.
I shook some sense back into myself in time to make out what Malone was saying: “Huh. I don’t remember signing up for that, but if you’ll give me a minute, I’ll be right back.”
He didn’t cuss them out or slam the door in their faces.
Okay then. On to plan D, which I really didn’t think we’d get to.
I grabbed my camera bag as well as a backpack that contained snacks and water. I’d pick up coffee on the way.
Implementing plan D didn’t bother me; having misread the psychology of my target did.
Based on Trista’s description of the one time she’d tried to talk him into delivering gifts to Christmas Angels, I thought for sure I’d come up with a perfect combination to incite his anger: manual labor, helping others, waking him up just as he would’ve been hitting his REM sleep.
The little hairs on the back of my neck stood up, a sure sign that something was off.
Malone emerged in sweatpants and an impossibly tight T-shirt and followed the Habitat volunteers. A laugh echoed over the parking lot before a van door slammed shut.
Maybe coffee and some careful observation would give me the answers I sought.
Coffee helped, but surveillance was tricky. The Habitat for Humanity build site sat among a row of small homes a few streets over from the Marietta cemetery. Finding a place to park where I could see the workers but not be seen was a challenge but nothing I couldn’t handle.
I kept Malone in the sights of my high-powered lens.
I soon felt like a Peeping Thomasina once again. I was not taking revenge photos. Nay, nay. These were thirst-trap snapshots.
So far I’d observed Malone lift heavy objects, joke with his fellow workers, and listen intently to the construction site leader, who happened to be a woman. With his neatly trimmed beard and lopsided smile, he was my aesthetic.
Salcedo’s words haunted me: The universe is going to plop the perfect person right in front of you and dare you to break the promise you made to yourself.
Honestly, it wouldn’t be the first promise to myself I’d broken.
Besides, I wasn’t looking for forever. He could be Mr. Perfect-for-Right-Now.
No.
He is a cheater. You are on the rebound. Absolutely not.
I revisited my new mantra.
Slow inhale: I may not be able to touch . . .
Slow exhale: but I can most certainly look.
Sadly, my mantra didn’t help much.
He had to have an angle, because he was acting nothing like the man Trista had described, and she was legit. I’d always prided myself on my bullshit detector, and she’d passed muster.
But my bullshit detector had missed Ken, now hadn’t it?
With a strangled growl of frustration, I put away my camera. I needed to observe this man up close. Time to implement plan E, which I was already dressed to do—all that remained was pulling my hair into a ponytail and putting on a cap and sunblock.
As I approached the worksite, Malone paused in his work to study me. I couldn’t see his eyes behind those mirrored glasses, but a twitch of his lopsided smile suggested he was happy to see me. “Don’t I know you from somewhere?”
“From across the breezeway.”
His smile bloomed into a grin. “That’s it. You were looking for a ‘Man in Finance,’ if I recall.”
“And, if memory serves, you really know how to wear a suit.”
“But I would prefer to be dressed like this. Too bad the guy you were looking for didn’t arrive.”
I shrugged. “A man like that would be entirely too high maintenance.”
“So you prefer someone a little more . . . down to earth?”
I drank him in: His shirt had a new rip, dirt streaked his sweatpants, and a smudge sat beside his nose. Not at all as Trista had described him. Did Blake Malone have a not-so-evil twin?
“Uh-huh.”
So articulate, Stella.
He lifted the hem of his shirt to wipe away sweat, and I sucked in a breath at the flash of abs.
“Yo, lovebirds. Get to work,” came a cry from the site manager. “Wait! Who are you?”
She pulled me aside to question me, politely blessed me out for being late, and then put me to work next to Malone, which was both a reward and a punishment.
I hit my thumb with my own hammer at least three times because he was that distracting.
Maybe it was just my imagination, but it felt as though each time I took a peek at him, he looked away suddenly, as if he had been studying me, too.
“Wanna grab a pizza together?” Malone asked when we reached the apartment complex. I’d offered to give him a ride home, and he’d accepted that, as well as my story about how the volunteers must’ve knocked on the wrong door.
“Yes, but no,” I said.
We got out of the car, and he looked at me as if I had three heads. “You don’t like pizza?”
“No, I like pizza.”
“You don’t like me?”
“No, I like you,” I said, my words surprising me with their truth. “Maybe I like you a little too much.”
An eyebrow arched over his aviators. “And that’s a problem?”
By now we stood in the breezeway, each poised in front of our respective doors. I weighed whether honesty was the best policy.
“I just got out of a long relationship.”
“Ah.”
“And I promised myself that I would wait before I got into another one.”
He leaned against his doorframe, and I was reminded of why women love to watch actors lean and to read about men leaning. Malone leaned especially well, with his arms crossed and his biceps straining at the cuffs of his T-shirt.
“I was just offering pizza,” he said, his voice as innocent as his expression was not.
“Offering to get ‘just pizza’ with someone whose name you don’t know,” I said. “Right.”
“Yes, because it’s the neighborly thing to do,” he said. “Besides, I do know your name. You’re Stella Stark. I bet you’re the one who doesn’t know my name.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “You’re Blake Malone.”
Was it my imagination, or did he flinch ever so slightly? I guessed hitting on a woman while technically still married would do that to a guy. Flinch or no, he definitely frowned for a split second before recovering his composure. “Yeah, but I prefer to go by Malone.”
Maybe he felt guilty?
Not that he was wearing a wedding band.
Nor did he have that telltale lighter indentation on his ring finger that showed he’d been wearing one up until recently.
“This last-name business seems to be going around,” I said. “I have a friend who only calls me Stark.”
“I like that,” he said. “Suits you.”
“Well, Malone, thanks for the offer, but I’ll have to decline. The only date I have is with my shower.” I turned to unlock my apartment door.
“Let me know if you change your mind about pizza,” he said. “Or, say, pizza with benefits.”
My head whipped around, but he was already unlocking his door. He didn’t even have the good grace to turn around and see my shocked expression.