“Sir, you’ll have to–”
That was all he got out before Carly reached back and caught my arm, pulling me up beside her.
“Hi!” she said, beaming in that way she had. I’d never seen a woman smile as much as she did. But then again, maybe she had a reason to smile. Me, I could barely find a reason to scratch my ass.
As she tugged me closer, the man who’d been coming to rid his fine establishment of my presence froze. I could see the look he shot his cohort, confusion that quickly faded, replaced by an expression that was blank and smooth as glass. He wouldn’t react now until he knew what his rich customers were thinking.
Carly’s smile was almost impossible to resist, and Mr. Slick in his suit wasn’t immune. His lips curved and he held out a hand. “Would you be Ms. Prince?” he asked, his voice warming.
“I am. Jake spoke with somebody a little while ago. Did he explain the circumstances?”
I hadn’t heard the call, but I had a pretty good feeling that I was the circumstance. I clenched my jaw and felt my face heat up. I didn’t want to deal with this.
“He did.” The man shifted his gaze to me and took a step forward, drawing a pair of glasses from the pocket of his shirt as he did so.
As he came closer than I liked, I backed up. “Watch it, pal.”
He smiled. It wasn’t the same sort of smile the others got, but it wasn’t totally fake. “I’m sorry. I just need to get a good look at you. An idea of your sense of...style, if you would.”
“My sense of style?” I bared my teeth at him as I laughed. “It’s simple. If it’s clean and covers me, I’ll take it.”
To my surprise, the man laughed. “Well, that will do very well for you...for the life you have now, but if you will be assisting a woman like Ms. Prince, perhaps you could understand that you’ll need a bit more...versatility.”
Carly caught my arm by hooking hers through my elbow. You could’ve put me in a room with a hundred people, and if any of those hundred people touched me – by chance or on purpose – I’d have been on red alert. You do time, you get weird about people invading your personal space.
But Carly...well, I was figuring out fast that having her close to me wasn’t a bad thing at all. In fact, I kind of liked it. More than I should have, I knew, because I wanted more of her in my personal space, and I wanted it to be in a very personal manner, so to speak.
Although the man now approaching me with a tape measure had a smile on his face, I could see the few other customers in the shop giving me sideways looks. I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if one of them asked when the trash would be taken out.
Fortunately, I was at least spared that.
Determined to stick it out, I found myself in front of a three way mirror, arms out while the dude – his name was Harrison – buzzed around me, needles in his mouth like an extra row of crazy little teeth. He somehow managed to talk with them in there, too. I could just see myself trying to do that. I’d choke on them. Get them stuck in my throat and bleed to death on the carpet, right there in the middle of a couple of rich old bastards.
“You’ve got a great form, Mr. Cantrell.”
“Bobby,” I corrected, trying to pretend my arms hadn’t turned into lead weights, oh, five minutes ago. I was in good shape, but no one was made to hold this position for long.
“Of course, Mr. Cantrell.” He straightened and then took a step back. “Lower your arms.” He gave me a once-over and then nodded. “Yes. That will do for the time being.” He checked his watch, and then turned to Carly. “I can have this one done in two hours. I have a few other pieces I can have complete within twenty-four hours, if you need the rush.”
“We need the rush,” Carly said, her voice absent, a frown on her face. She was staring at her phone and tapping away furiously.
“Absolutely, Ms. Prince.”
Jake moved forward and gestured to the counter. “Why don’t we get all that sorted out?”
I closed a hand into a fist as I looked down at the pinned and tucked up clothes I wore. The material was softer and finer than anything I’d ever known. I didn’t even want to think about how much it cost. So much for swinging by a Target or something. Or stashing all of that five thousand while I looked for another job. “I can’t afford this.”
Carly waved a hand. “It comes with the position. I pick up all my employees’ on the job expenses.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but she turned away, shoving her phone toward Ryan. Her tone was agitated, and the sound made my stomach clench. I didn’t like whoever was making her feel like that.
“Look at this shit!” she said to Ryan. “She’s at it again. I’m calling my damn lawyer. I can’t keep doing this. The lawyer can handle it this time.”
Ryan took the phone and skimmed it. He held it out towards her, but Carly didn’t even notice. She was striding across the floor, long strides that did crazy things with her stretchy mini skirt, over the knee boots and those long, long legs. “Why do I have to put up with the crazy, Ry? What did I do to deserve this?”
“You know what my advice is going to be, Carly.”
She stopped and raked her fingers through her tousled hair. I wondered what it would feel like to bury my hands in her hair, to see it messed up after a night together. My hands curled into fists. Dammit. This was going to be torture.
“I can’t...” She stared up at the ceiling, and then her head rolled toward me and she caught sight of me. As if she’d forgotten I was there, she gave an odd little start, a half-jump, half-shiver. Then she smiled. “Sorry. Family freak-out. Ignore me.”
Like that would ever happen.
But I shrugged. “No problem.” Then because I couldn’t not ask, I said, “Is everything okay?”
“Oh, yeah.” She shrugged. “Just typical family crap. You know how it goes.”
Right. “Yeah. Sure.”
I turned at the sound of footsteps.
I didn’t think her idea and my idea of family crap were even close to the same. With my dad, back when he’d still been breathing, an average day had gone something along the lines of this: food wasn’t done, or maybe it was done and it was cold, he’d dump his shit, wash up, and then slap my mother. If his mood had been really foul, she’d gotten a belt across the back or a fist in the face. If I’d been too loud or not fast enough, or if he’d been just feeling mean, I’d gotten a kick in the ass or fist in the face.
That had been my family until my mother and I left Tennessee. Then, it had been just the two of us…until she died and I’d had no family. It’d just been me. Then, before I’d gone to jail, that had been changing. I’d been looking forward to it, even. But I didn’t have that anymore either.
“Hey.”
The sound of Carly’s voice drew me out of the ugliness of the past, and the even uglier mess of my own mistakes. I looked up to see her studying me. “Where did you go?” she asked, her voice soft.
“Nowhere that matters.” I shrugged it off, or pretended to. There were people who acted like guys didn’t get emotional or some shit like that, but that was all bullshit. Some of us just didn’t show it.
In my opinion, what was the point of getting worked up over something I couldn’t change or fix. Except I still thought about it, the past. Sometimes I thought about it so much it drove me crazy, made me want to take drastic measures just to make it stop.
“If it doesn’t matter, then why did you slip off there?”
I jerked my head up and met Carly’s soft blue eyes. For a princess, she sure as hell saw pretty deep into people.
I didn’t like it. And because I didn’t like it, I leaned in close and murmured, “I’m in the middle of a good hard brood, princess. But if you insist on distracting me, why don’t we slip off to one of those dressing rooms they got back there, huh?”
I didn’t back away, crowding into her space. I waited for her to blush, pull back, or maybe even call for Ryan or Jake. Or both of them. They both had a rough idea of how I moved now, and if they planned it out, they might be able to take me down. Especially since I was in a mood to hurt. Not to hurt somebody, but get hurt myself.