Page 53 of Roads Behind Us
“Mornin’,” I responded to Clay, stifling a yawn. “I just ran up to the main house for coffee.” Lie. “Let me grab the plans in my cabin. I need to change real quick,” I said, looking down at the leggings and sweatshirt I still wore, “and then I’ll meet you back out here.”
If he had any suspicions about my tawdry nighttime activities, Clay didn’t let on. “Good deal,” he said, and he leaned back against his tailgate as steam rose from the top of his Thermos when he screwed off the lid and took a tentative sip of his own brew. “I’ll be here.”
Once I’d changed and chugged as much of my coffee as I could before I brushed my teeth, I flossed and rushed back outside. It wasn’t like me to arrive after my crew. If I wasn’t fifteen minutes earlier than everybody else, I felt late and rushed for the rest of the day. I wasn’t mad about it today, though, because for the first time in a long time, I woke up feeling… happy.
Sure, orgasms had a little something to do with that, but it was more about the guy who’d given them to me.
It seemed absolutely hilarious to me that I’d come down to Wisper expecting to hate Bax Lee, but I hadn’t felt connected to a man like I did to Bax in forever. I’d felt that way with my ex in the beginning, but the feeling quickly died when I realized I wasn’t much more to him than arm candy, which had never made sense to me because I’d always found my reflection in the mirror a little plain. But Lincoln had never cared about the things I’d loved or my dreams.
Bax seemed to, and he talked to me even when the subject was painful for him. He listened when I talked about my parents and childhood.
That wasn’t nothing.
And the way he touched me? Just the way he looked at my body— It seemed Bax didn’t find me plain at all.
The nagging doubt in the back of my mind kept trying to convince me that it was because he was still mourning his wife. Maybe right now, different was the thing getting him through the day, but he’d probably end up with some other buxom blonde in the future, like Felicity from the grocery store, and I’d go back to my lonely little life, with my plain hair and plain, barely there curves.
Was it so bad to enjoy his attention now, when it was fixed on me and made me feel truly beautiful?
Outside, the chatter of the cabin crew preparing for the day filled the air, but Clay wasn’t where I’d left him. I spotted him by the woods north of cabin three and headed that way as I tugged on my hard hat and gloves.
“What is it?” I asked when I saw the faint look of concern marring his features while he stared between two tall pines into the dark forest. The trees were so dense on this part of the property that I didn’t imagine he could see much. Yellow leaves fell like confetti all day long, but the aspens were still covered in them, and the firs and pines had grown in thick clusters between the aspens.
“Not sure,” he said.
“Did you see a bear?”
He laughed. “You’d know if I had. No, I saw a man standin’ over here. I turned to grab my phone off the bed of the truck, and when I turned back, he was gone. He’s not on any of the crews. He wasn’t familiar.” He shrugged. “Maybe he was lookin’ for work?”
“Yeah, maybe, but then why the hell did he take off into the woods?”
“Got me stumped,” Clay said. “I’ll keep an eye open for him with the house crews and you do the same here. He has brown hair down to his shoulders, kinda medium dark. Looked scraggly. He’s pretty tall, six-three or -four. He had on a canvas Carhartt coat and a dark beanie.”
“Okay. Thanks. I will,” I said, but besides the long hair, he’d just described half my crew and Bax and Rye too. How the hell was I supposed to find that needle in my haystack while simultaneously running four crews and overseeing so many builds that they’d all started blurring into one in my mind?
I hoped if the guy needed a job, he’d come back and ask. I could find a shit-ton of things for him to do. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d paid a guy under the table who’d been a little down on his luck. As long as I didn’t have them performing jobs that they could be injured doing, Brand provided petty cash for things like that. Our deal was that I had to attempt to get the guy to provide his social security number so we could pay him properly. Most people worked a few days and collected the cash when they could, and then they took off, but there were two guys on my home crew who’d started at Lee Construction under the table but were now high above board and providing for their families easily.
My day flew by. Lunch came and went so fast, I forgot to eat. We were supposed to have received a delivery of sinks, tubs and bathroom fixtures, but it never showed up so I spent two hours on the phone trying to locate it. I lost my voice for a while after cussing out the idiot at the warehouse for five minutes. He finally found my load and said it would be delivered the next business day, but it was costing my guys half a day and they were pissed. I was too. We couldn’t afford any more delays.
On the plus side, Devo’s and Abey’s roof and exterior siding had been installed, and the drywall would go up today while the roofers got started on Rye’s house. This stage of the builds always made me happy because it meant the end was in sight. It also meant that once the three houses were done, I could allocate the house crews to the cabins, which would allow for everything to be finished before our deadline.
The chill in the air today had me feeling glad for that. Winter could come crashing down any time, and that would suck a big, fat dick. If we got a lot of snow, we’d be screwed, and the crews would have to leave the job with lighter pockets than they were expecting.
The holidays would be here before we knew it, and I hated the thought of any of my guys struggling through Christmas. I made a note in my phone to get my hands on some free turkey and ham vouchers from the Food Mart or a market in Jackson that I could pass out to everyone when the job was done.
All of that had me worrying that the mysterious lurker from this morning might be going hungry too. Been there, done that, and I tried every day to repay the kindness I’d been shown.
Chapter Eighteen
Bax
“It’s a good show,” Candy said, sitting next to me on the edge of my bed.
Not our bed; I’d burned the mattress in the back yard during a fit of sleep-deprived rage at God after the funeral. Abey had to threaten to arrest me to stop me from dousing my fire with more lighter fluid before I set the whole forest ablaze.
It was weird, but somehow, I felt Candy next to me, even though I knew she was in my head and not really here.
This time, my dream was full of bubbles, like the kind I’d made as a kid with soapy dishwater and plastic rings. They kept popping in front of my face and splashing me.
