Stranger (21 page)

“Watch out!” He pointed to the ancient, straining washer, which was rocking on its base.

I’d have laughed if I could, but nothing came out but a gasp. A moment later he’d proven me right not to laugh, because sparks started shooting out of the back of the washer along with the torrents of water pouring from the wildly flailing black rubber hose that had come disconnected.

I didn’t have to be a genius to figure out that water plus electricity equals bad news, so, taking Jared’s arm, I turned and ran. Every step through shin-deep water left me cringing, expecting the snap, crackle and pop of electrocution. The fluorescent lights above us flickered and fizzled. If they went out entirely, we’d be up the creek without a paddle, as my dad was fond of saying.

“Shit,” panted Jared as we slid in the wet and managed to fling open the doors to the ramp.

“Wouldn’t the stairs be easier?”

We both looked across to the stairs, three doors down the hallway. Then at the water, which didn’t, thank God, seem to be rising but still gurgled menacingly. And the flickering lights above. A scorched smell had begun wafting down the hall toward us.

“Are you going to put your feet back in that water?” I asked.

“Hell, no.”

“Ramp it is, then.”

Our wet shoes made the ramp slippery, and I thanked my dad’s foresight in laying down the rubberized tread he’d intended to help keep the gurneys from sliding. In moments we were upstairs and bursting through the door.

“Call the fire department!” I shouted this to a startled-looking Shelly who’d come out from behind her desk at the commotion we made hurtling ourselves through the door to the ramp.

Shelly didn’t hesitate, just picked up the phone and dialed as, panting, Jared and I flew down the hall. Jared slid on the tile floor of the entryway between where we were and Shelly’s desk and wiped out.

“Jared!” Shelly shrieked, and dropped the phone. She ran to him and knelt, even as he groaned, tried to sit. “Are you all right?”

His hand, wet, came up to clutch the pristine white sleeve of her demure button-down blouse. It left a print. “Yeah. I just about busted my ass, but—”

Leaving Shelly to tend her wounded soldier, I grabbed up the handset she’d dropped and dialed 9-1-1, explaining quickly what we needed before hanging up again. In seconds the ringing of the phone distracted me from the intimate picture before me, and I was glad to have someplace else to look.

“Frawley and Sons, can you hold—”

“Grace?”

“Yes?” I answered automatically, reaching for the pen and message pad to write down the number, for surely I’d need to call him back after I dealt with the fire department. I could still smell smoke, and visions of my house on fire made my fingers clumsy enough to drop the pen.

“Are you all right?”

It was the same thing Shelly had just asked Jared, and I stopped my restless fumbling and went still. “Who’s this?”

“It’s Sam.”

The fire station was no more than a block away, and yet the crew still used the sirens.

They were loud enough to make conversation difficult, should I have been able to think of something to say, which I could not.

“Grace? Are those sirens?”

“Sorry,” I blurted as I watched through the windows for the truck pulling into the parking lot. “I can’t really talk right now.”

“Grace, wait! Don’t hang up—”

“Sam, my washing machine exploded and I think there’s a fire!” I cried. “I can’t talk now!”

The fire truck slid into place along the curb and Dave Lentini hopped out along with Bill Stoner and Jeff Cranford. I’d gone to school with Dave and Bill, and Jeff had been a year ahead of us. In their firefighters’ outfits they looked exotic and sexier than usual, even though I knew they weren’t going to start bumping and grinding and stripping out of them. I yanked open the back door for them and waved them inside.

“The basement,” I said. “Be careful, a wire pulled loose and there’s water—”

“Got it.” Jeff pointed to his heavy rubber-soled boots. He hefted a handheld chemical-fire extinguisher and I felt immediately foolish for not using the almost identical one we kept in the prep room.

“Is he okay?” Bill, not just the local firefighter but also an EMT, jerked a thumb at Jared, who was now sitting up with Shelly’s help.

“He slipped.”

“I’ll take a look.”

Dave and Jeff headed toward the basement stairs while Bill gently shooed Shelly away from Jared, whose face had gone pale. In the seconds it took my heart to slow its adrenaline-induced pounding, I realized I still held the phone against my ear. Sam’s breathing tickled my ear.

“Sounds like you’re having quite the day,” he said.

“We’ve had an accident. I really have to go.”

“Grace, wait. Is everything all right? Are the firefighters there?”

“Yes.” In fact, Jeff had already reappeared and given me a thumbs-up, situation under control, A-OK. “They’re here. I think it’s going to be all right.”

I waited. My heart started its frantic thumping again.

“I want to take you to dinner.”

“I’m busy tonight.” It wasn’t quite a lie. The mess downstairs would practically guarantee I’d be busy tonight and for a lot of nights in the future.

“Tomorrow night.”

“Sam—”

“Why not?” His question sounded reasonable enough to deserve a reasonable answer, or at least a legitimate excuse, but I had none.

“I just can’t, okay? I’m sorry, Sam, but I can’t do this right now. I’ve got to go.”

Jared was still not on his feet. Worry etched Shelly’s pretty face. She’d taken his hand in hers, their fingers linked as Bill felt around Jared’s ankle. I listened hard for sounds from downstairs, but Jeff had disappeared again and I heard nothing.

“I can’t stop thinking about you.”

My thumb, which had been creeping toward the disconnect button, stopped. I pressed the phone momentarily closer against my head, and the back of my earring bit into the softness behind my ear. My lips parted, and a sigh escaped me.

“Just have dinner with me.”

I closed my eyes and the world settled into darkness around me, just long enough for me to pull in a breath. Then another. I thought of blue eyes and dark hair, and the taste of him. The way he’d felt inside me.

I didn’t believe in white tunnels of light; and I didn’t believe in fate.

“I’m sorry. I really have to go.”

Before he could say anything more to change my mind, I ended the call and turned my attention to the disaster in front of me.

“What a mess.” My dad clucked his tongue and surveyed the laundry room.

“No kidding.” I rubbed my forehead. The fire had fortunately been put out before it had time to do more than singe the rafters, but the heavy, electrical smell of the smoke still hung in the damp air. The water from the burst connection had all swirled down the drain in the floor, but a thin film of sludge still clung to everything the water had touched. It was going to take hours of labor to clean.

I hadn’t really wanted my dad to come, but once he heard about the fire, there was no keeping him away. He was already pissed off I’d waited until the next morning to call him. My excuse had been that I’d assumed he’d have already heard about it. Annville didn’t keep secrets very long, and more than one of my parents’ neighbors kept their police scanners on all the time.

“The cleaning service will be here in the morning to take care of it. And Jared’s got to stay off his ankle for a day or so.” I pressed my middle finger between my eyes to stave off the headache.

My dad shot me a look. “Cleaning service? How much is that going to cost?”

Irritated, I gave him a look right back. “A lot. Of course.”

The frown he pulled told me he didn’t much care for my attitude, but then I didn’t much care for his. “If you got started now—”

“Dad!” For once, he stopped, so I didn’t have to talk over him. “I’m not doing this myself.

I need the cleaning service to take care of this because it has to be done right, and it’s too much for me to do myself. It would take me days and even then, I don’t have the equipment. So lay off, okay?”

My dad huffed. “I’m just thinking of the cost, Grace.”

“Dad. I’ve got it covered. Stuff like this happens. We’ll be fine.”

Sure. If I planned to survive on ramen noodles and bargain-priced mac-n-cheese for a few months. It wouldn’t be the first time, but it still sucked. I could deal with the reduced grocery budget, but this also meant my social life was going to be seriously curtailed. That sucked even worse.

My dad sighed and put his hands on his hips. “I can come in. Get a start.”

“Dad, no!” I mirrored his stance. “I don’t need you to do that.”

He looked around again at the mess, then back at me. “With Jared out, you’ll need some help around here, won’t you?”

“I’ll be fine. I won’t be going anywhere, anyway.” Not without the money to pay for my dates. Sam’s phone call rose to the top of my mind like a raisin in champagne, refusing to stay down no matter how I tried to squash it.

“How much is it going to cost?”

I tossed up my hands and left the room, leaving him to contemplate the damage I’d

“allowed” to happen to his precious business. Upstairs I found Shelly at the coffeemaker, her hands wrapped around a mug from which she kept taking rapid, nervous sips. Not only wasn’t she a champ at brewing it, Shelly didn’t drink coffee. She didn’t even drink soda or tea.

“Is that decaf?” I pointed to the carafe. She shook her head and gulped another mouthful from her mug. I poured myself a cup and added sweetener and milk from the small fridge.

“Shelly?”

She gave me a timid smile. “It’s not so bad once you get past the taste.”

I nodded solemnly as I sipped. “Uh-huh.”

The clock on the wall ticked loudly in our mutual silence.

“How’s Jared?” I asked her.

“Oh, he’ll be okay. It’s just a sprain.” Her timid smile faltered. She poured more coffee into her mug, though it wasn’t yet empty. “He has to stay off it, that’s all.”

I pretended to study a pile of brochures in the printer tray as I sipped my own coffee.

“Yeah, I know.”

Shelly gave a garbled squeak and gulped down more coffee. A sideways glance showed me pink cheeks and bright eyes. She looked tired and hopped up at the same time. Too much caffeine. I recognized the feeling.

“My dad’s hanging around,” I told her to save her from answering my question. “Just ignore him, okay?”

Shelly put her mug down on the counter. “Your dad?”

I smiled. “Don’t let him get to you, Shelly.”

Her smile got less timid, and she lifted her chin. “I won’t. You’re my boss. Not him.”

“That’s right, and don’t you forget it.” I gave her a trigger-finger salute and lifted my coffee mug. “Good coffee, by the way.”

She beamed. “Thanks.”

The phone rang, and she went to answer it while I took my mug and went to my own office to pore over the diminishing balance in my checking account and wonder what I was going to do.

The answer to that was simple enough. Spend less money. I sighed, drinking coffee.

The situation wasn’t dire just yet. I lived frugally enough—aside from my dates with Jack.

So I’d put off getting a new couch for a while. Not eat lunch out so often for a few months.

It was a matter of priorities, that was all.

Jack met me in the same room we’d used the last time. I knew it not by the verdigris-colored number on the door but by the patch in the wallpaper above the bed and the stain on the bathroom sink where someone had left a cigarette to burn too long.

We didn’t say hello. He didn’t smile. The door closed behind us and he pushed me up against it with his hands already pulling up my skirt and his mouth already fastening on my throat. He pressed his teeth to my flesh. I reached for his belt. He grunted and wound his fingers in my hair when my hand dived inside his jeans.

Jack pushed me onto the worn carpet that offered no padding for my knees. I might care later, when they sported dark purple bruises the shape of a quarter, but right then the sting of him pulling my hair mattered more.

He freed himself from his jeans with a practiced hand and got himself fully erect in three strokes, up and down. I could have pulled away, freed myself from his grip, but that wasn’t the game we were playing. I let him push my mouth onto his cock, and I took him down as far as I could while my hand crept between my thighs to stroke myself through the thin cotton of my panties.

I hadn’t told him on the phone this was what I wanted. I’d only told him what I didn’t want. No talking. No coyness. I wanted fast fucking.
Ruthless
was the word I’d used, not sure he’d understand what I meant, but Jack was a champ. He’d gotten better at this, and at that moment it didn’t matter if he’d learned it from my tutelage or someone else’s with more money to spend. All that mattered was the way he pushed his hips forward to thrust inside my eager mouth.

This was about me. For me, as it always was, but giving pleasure can be better than receiving, if you’re in the right frame of mind. I’d knelt this way in front of other men and fucked them with lips and teeth and tongue. Made them come while they muttered and groaned and pulled my hair. Today I was doing it for Jack, who was doing it for me, and somewhere along the way it stopped mattering just who this was supposed to be for.

He shuddered, groaning. The sweet/salt musk of semen flavored the inside of my mouth, but he hadn’t yet come. I sucked him softly one moment longer and slid my hand along his wet length to take the place of my tongue.

I’d have finished him with myself just a few seconds behind, but Jack pulled me to my feet and grabbed both my wrists. Breathing hard, he let go of one of my hands to reach for the straight-backed chair beside us and yanked it closer. He moved fast but sure, pulling a condom from his jeans pocket and sitting on the chair without letting go of my wrist.

“Put it on me,” he demanded, and pressed the foil package into my palm.

He lifted his ass to shove down his jeans and briefs to his ankles while I ripped open the foil. I slid the latex down his length as he reached beneath my skirt to yank down my panties.