Page 7 of First Chance

“This barn is completely off limits. It’s an original, been on the property for as long as my family has owned it, but it’s a death trap. Don’t even stand near it if the wind is blowing.”

I chuckle until he glares at me seriously. Oh, not a joke.

“There she is, Second Chance Sanctuary’s newest employee,” a man says, rounding the corner of the bunkhouse to cut us off.

“Frank, I told you to stay scarce.” Lochlan levels him with a sinister look, but the guy doesn’t budge.

“We were just curious, is all. The guys wanted to say hi.” He smiles innocently but with too many teeth. A wolf in sheep’s clothing.

“They’re all right inside, aren’t they?”

“Yep.”

Lochlan lets out a sharp whistle and then stands silently, and reluctantly, while six more guys stumble out through the doorway. “Alright, get it out of your system. Go ahead.”

A chorus of hellos and introductions come my way all at once, indistinguishable from one another. A few cheeky smiles and one or two bored expressions.

“Nice to meet all of you, I look forward to working here,” I respond sincerely.

“These are the Second Chance parolees. They will leave you alone at all times. They’ve been informed of the consequences if they choose to disobey.” He looks pointedly at them before turning back to me. “All communication goes through me. Do not engage with them. Are we clear?”

“Yes.” The longer he looks at me, the more my heart thunders in my chest. He’s so intense all the time, but standing here in front of all these guys is the first time I feel the weight of what I’m doing. I’m the only woman among eight grown men.

“Curtis, go grab Hayes and Seiver. Might as well get all the introductions out of the way. The rest of you, get back to work.”

Correction: 10 grown men.

“Come back up to the house, they’ll find us.” He ushers me forward, making sure he stays between me and the rest of the men at all times. “Those the shoes you’re going to wear every day?” He asks suddenly.

“No, that would be ridiculous. They only match certain outfits.”

He huffs but doesn’t say anything else. It takes the entire walk back to the front porch for me to realize that he probably wasn’t referring to the specific shoes I was wearing, but rather the heels themselves.

I don’t bring it up again, though. I don’t feel like explaining my love of shoes to him, or how my mother always insistedthat leaving the house in anything but a perfect outfit was doing our family a disservice.

All of our outfits were to be hand-picked by her or a trusted stylist, tailored to precision, and never replicated. I’ve ignored that last rule as an adult, mixing and matching pieces to eliminate the wastefulness of it all. My mother turns her nose up at me anytime she notices.

She’s been doing that since I was a child, making it abundantly obvious anytime she disapproved. There was no such thing as kids’ clothing to her, no characters or sequins, I looked like a politician’s daughter since birth.

Her disappointment was palpable the moment I hit puberty and went from adolescence straight into womanhood. My hips widened and my chest grew too quickly for her liking, and she made sure to point out every imperfection on my skin.

Every dress fitting included a healthy dose of ridicule and degrading remarks. She was 5’2 and 100 pounds on her wedding day, and she’s never let me forget it. My father and brother both tower over her, each of them a few inches over 6 feet. She could never wrap her head around having a daughter who was nearly as tall as the boys and not as light as a feather.

My shoes are the one size that has never faltered. No matter how old I am, or how bloated I get, or the amount of sweets I eat will not change my shoe size.

However, the one item of clothing that doesn’t give me anxiety to try on makes me a mockery for other reasons.

A man like Lochlan would never understand something like that. I could wear a pair of my tallest stilettos and still not rival his height. He would never worry about peoplemaking fun of him for being too tall, not like I have.

“Having second thoughts?” His deep voice startles me, as I’m staring unfocused across the property. When I turn towards him, he’s closer than I realize. I have to crane my neck upward to look him in the face.

“No, I appreciate the opportunity to work here, Lochlan. Thank you again.”

He doesn’t respond, he’s looking at me like he’s trying to figure me out. Most people don’t ever accomplish that, nor have they tried.

The older man from my failed interview comes around the house and climbs the porch steps slowly. “Miss Jo, I’m glad to meet you properly this time. I’m sorry about all that trouble from before.”

“Oh, it’s no problem at all. Seiver, right?” He smiles at my correct guess of his name, and I swear there is a faint flush on his weathered skin.

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