Willow (3 page)

“
You got a reason to be hanging around a closed construction site? ‘Cause if not, then I suggest you get the fuck outta here.”

Jared turned around slowly. He didn’t know the man behind him and didn’t know what the man might have pointed at him, like another bat or a gun. Jared was surprised to see two people standing there. One was the man from the bar; Conley, if he remembered correctly. The other was Willow.

His first thought was that she looked exhausted, then he noticed her face. Christ, she was bruised. He caught himself before he went to her. Then he really took a better look.

She was taller than he remembered at about five-foot, ten inches. She was also very beautiful. Even with her bruised eye and lip, she still looked like every man’s dream, both sexy and innocent at the same time. Her eyes were clear, a shade of blue so light that he knew they were as unique as the woman was. A small patrician nose and high cheekbones gave the impression of a model, but for some reason, Jared knew she’d scoff at the notion. Willow’s hair was pulled back again; its rich, dark color looked blue-black under the harshness of the bulbs hanging from unfinished fixtures.

Today she had on just a t-shirt and jeans; the flannel, he realized now, had hidden a great deal of the woman. Full breasts strained the shirt and her muscled arms looked like she was a working foreman rather than an office one. Her jeans hung low on her full hips and curved over her thighs like a second skin. Tears at the knees and one at the thigh were not from some manufacturer’s idea of what worn jeans looked like, but from actual work. Jared found himself wanting to ask her to turn around so that he could see if her ass looked as good as he remembered. Conley clearing his throat had Jared look back at him. He knew in that moment that the other man knew just where Jared’s thought had been.

“
I start working here tomorrow. I’m Jared Robert.” He reached for his wallet, suddenly glad he’d had new identities made with his partial name on them. “Miss Kensal set it up. I was just seeing where I’d be working.”

Conley took his driver’s license and with a quick glance, handed it to Willow. She looked, but made no comment as she handed it back to Jared.

“
I’m Will James, the foreman here. This is my second in command, Thomas Conley.” She cocked her head at him. “You were at the bar last weekend…Monday, in the back room when…” She looked up at Conley.

“
Yeah. I’d just come home from another job. I’m here to fill in work until the job is complete. You should have been notified sometime last week that I was coming.” At least he hoped so.

“
Yeah, got it Friday. Work begins here at eight on Monday, Robert, not Sunday afternoon. You’re lucky no one shot you. Conley, show Robert the lay of the land then both of you get the hell off my job site. I got shit to do and I don’t need a babysitter.” Willow looked pointedly at Conley and he smiled back at her.

“
Okay, boss. But you’ll call if you…you know.” She nodded at Conley and left them standing there.

Jared and Conley stood watching each other until they heard the board move back over the opening again. It was quiet for a full minute before Conley spoke.

“
She ain’t gonna like that you lied to her. She’s real big on honesty.” Jared didn’t say anything, but was shocked. “You and I met about five years ago at a company function. You here to fire her or to congratulate her?”

A man that got to the heart of things. Jared liked him instantly. “Neither, for now. I’m here to work, like I said, and to see what’s going on. We’ve gotten a few…quite a few complaints about her.” Jared studied the man standing before him. “Are you going to tell her?”

Conley looked down the stairs before answering. “Nope. Not my place. But I won’t help you either. Don’t come to me about information on her. I won’t help you either way. But know this, if she asks me, I will tell her.” Conley looked down the stairs again. “If you want my opinion, I think sending in a spy for your old man is about as low as it comes. I’m sure you know your way around your own site, Robert.” And with that, he left.

The same dirty truck was in the lot the next morning. There were any number of others there, a car and two motorcycles as well. Jared wasn’t sure which vehicle was Willow’s or Conley’s, but he parked next to a truck that made him wonder if the driver lived it in. There were enough fast food wrappers and cola cans that he was sure they could fill a large land fill. With a shake of his head, he went to the trailer where several men and Willow were standing. It was just past seven-thirty.

“…
Sherman on floor two. I want those walls primed for Wednesday A.M. when the painters get here. Viktor and Jacobs, you’re to get the ceilings done on the top floor. There are…” Willow looked down at the clip board in her hand before she continued. “Seven on the second and the entire entrance this week. If you have time, I want you to begin the second floor as well. There are some more lights that go in there that the owner had decided to add. This is Robert, Jared Robert, and he’ll be with Thomason and Ruby on the set of the stone in the main entrance and office of the president. The rest of you get the drywall hung. Anything else?”

“
You didn’t assign me nothing, boss.” The voice was heavy with scorn and he had sneered her title like it was a dirty word. Jared turned to see the man behind him.

He knew who he was, Talbor. The man had both his eyes still blackened, but probably not as bad as it had been. Jared wanted to laugh at the squat man, but didn’t want to get off on the wrong foot this early in the job.

“
Have you finished the clean up?” Willow didn’t look at her list for him. “I told you on Tuesday and then Wednesday that was your job until it was complete. I was told I had to work you. Doesn’t mean I have to find you something constructive you can fuck up. Now you—”

“
I ain’t no fucking maid service. You put me to work inside, out of the sun, or I’ll tell my daddy that you ain’t complying to the arrangement.” Jared, as did everyone else, turned back to the man. “You ain’t fucking gonna get away with this soon as Stone finds out what I have to tell him.”

Willow laughed at the man’s threat. “You ever get tired of that same litany every time you don’t get your way, Talbor? Your daddy bailing your ass out all the time? Clean up or I’ll cite you for failure to do your job.”

She walked away even as he kept the insults up. The men didn’t say anything either, but simply went to their assigned jobs. Jared wasn’t sure if she had told them not to speak or they just didn’t care. At this point, he wasn’t sure what to think either. He followed the two men who went into the building to the main hall.

Laying stone was usually left for a mason on a building site. Jared had been taught how to lay the stone when he’d still been in high school and knew that it was on his application that Willow had received from Sarah. He was really good at it too. He knew from the file on the men working here that both the men he was working with were masons and they wasted no time getting set up and to work.

The sub flooring had already been sectioned off into four even squares with a snap chalk line. It started at the middle of each of the four walls and met in the center of the room to form a large X. It would be the starting point for them to work with.

Ruby set Jared to work spreading the mortar after he asked Jared if he’d ever done it before. Jared had the thin-set mortar spread over about a four foot square area. The mortar needed to be in a combed pattern so they could follow the lines in the floor to keep the lines straight. As the men began laying the design of colored stone tile, putting spacers between each one to keep an even grout line, they began to talk.

“
You gonna be replacing one of us or you just here to fill in? Got my hopes on the first part so long as it ain’t me, you understand.”

Ruby sounded like he hailed from the Deep South. There was a soft cadence about his voice that was soothing and funny at the same time. Jared knew he was from Atlanta and that Thomason, the other man, was from California.

“
Nah. Just helping out. I’ve been out of town for a while and this gig came up so I jumped on it.” his cover story was as close to the truth as he could give without giving away who he was. “I was missing home so I thought what the hell.”

The men worked in silence for the most part after that. Twice he heard Willow’s voice and once he’d caught a glimpse of her as she strode by the room, but she never stopped to speak to them. He was impressed that she didn’t micromanage her people, but for a reason he didn’t want to think about, was aggravated that she didn’t. They were breaking for lunch when he saw her again.

She was directing a delivery truck to one of the many site storage units. It was a tractor trailer loaded with drywall and buckets of what he assumed was plaster. He watched her as she walked over to a forklift and strapped in when the truck was parked. As she began to unload the heavy pallets, Jared felt someone come up behind him and wasn’t surprised that it was Shawn Talbor.

“
She’s a fucking bitch, you know. Thinks her shit don’t stink. I fucking hate her.” his voice was low but full of hatred.

Without turning around, Jared asked him, “Then why do you work here? Seems to me there are plenty of other construction companies around you could sign on with. Most or all of them would welcome someone from Stone Construction.”

Which wasn’t true. Word was that Stone was difficult to get hired on to, but if you left on your own, you were either stupid or retiring. Jared knew that they paid top dollar and treated their employees with respect.

The answering laugh sent a chill down Jared’s spine. “’Cause it would make her day. I’ll stick around. ‘Sides, Daddy said if I play my cards right, I’ll have her job before much longer. But she’s been fucking that old man Stone for years and got herself buried in like a tick. Only reason she got this far is ‘cause she gives good head.”

Jared didn’t turn now because had he done so, he would have killed the man. His parents were the most faithful people he knew and his father had never had an affair. He knew this because his mother told him that as long as he was alive, then she knew this for a fact. She claimed, and Jared didn’t doubt her, that no one would ever find his body if he even thought about having one.

“
Course you can ask any man here about that too. ‘Specially Conley. Them two been going at it for months. Heard tell she prefers married men to the single ones. Why I don’t stand a chance with her, not that I’d touch some man’s seconds.” With that and his maniacal laughter, he left Jared to go to the lunch wagon.

Jared ate with the other men. Willow emptied the flatbed while they did. Most watched her; a couple of them wandered over then came back. Jared wondered if they set up duties or offered to help. He wasn’t sure why what Talbor said bothered him so much. It wasn’t as if he was dating her or anything. After lunch, he went to the upper floors before going back to work on the tile.

The second floor had been less than a quarter finished with hanging the drywall last night. Today all but one wall was hung and it was being done now. Willow was setting a screw to the last one as he stood watching her.

~o0o~

Willow had a set of headphones on and was listening to a book. She didn’t particularly care for music, but needed something to drown out the constant hammering and other things going on. It really was too bad the book wasn’t working.

When she got the last sheet into place and the last screw set, she turned to get her pail and trowel. She was startled to see the new guy there. She pulled off the headphones.

“
Something I can help you with, Robert?” She looked around and found they, for the most part, were coming along. “You just looking around again?”

He’d been leaning against the doorjamb, but straightened now. There was something about the man that made her nervous. It wasn’t his height, though that was impressive at about six-foot-six. It was something…manly, she thought, that made her feel weird. He looked like one of those guys on the cover of one of the books, Shasta, her mother’s cook, read. She called them bodice rippers and the men looked like they could take on the world.

“
No,” he said as he moved closer. “I was just wondering what you’re doing. Didn’t see you at lunch and thought maybe you had a picnic or something up here.”

Willow wanted desperately to back away, but stood her ground. “No, just me. I don’t usually stop for…shouldn’t you be on the tile job?” Anywhere but here, she thought.

He reached up and plucked at her hair and showed her the plaster he’d removed. “We’re waiting on the stone to be delivered. Supposed to be on the way.”

Willow nodded as she watched his fingers roll the plaster between them. His fingers were incredibly long and so slender. She couldn’t help but think about them touching her. And her skin heated. This man worked for her. She looked up at his face when his fingers stopped moving.

It was a beautiful face, strong jaw line, straight, narrow nose. The stubble on his face was dark and begged to be touched to see if it was soft or hard. His eyes were a dark brown, like hot cocoa made with melted dark chocolate rather than with cocoa. His hair was a warm brown and curly at the ends. He wore it long and he had it pulled to the nape of his neck in a pony tail that was probably six inches long. His voice, when he spoke to her now, was dark, low, and made her body tingle.

“
How’s your mouth, Willow?” He ran his thumb over her lower lip and asked her again.

“
Fine. Sore. I’ve had worse.” She took a step back then another when he stepped toward her. “You should go back to work.” Her own voice was like nothing she’d ever heard before.