Page 9 of A Matter of Time
Dex grinned at me as he took a swig of his beer. “Well, Lord knows the universe has a few reasons to hate you, but in this case, I think it’s just a sign that this feud between you and Cam has gone on long enough. Time to let bygones be bygones.”
“That’s what I’ve been doing,” I pointed out. “I’ve let him live his life and I’m living mine. I don’t wish him any kind of misfortune, I just don’t want to have to see him every day. Is that too much to ask?”
“There’s a difference between forgetting and forgiving,” my stubborn brother countered. “You may be able to put him out of your mind when you’re not together, but as soon as you see him, you’re that hurt and defensive 18-year-old girl all over again. I really think you guys just need to sit down and have an honest talk about the whole thing. Something’s gotta give, Tonia, before you go storming off any more dance floors.”
That was the first time Dex brought up what happened at his wedding, and it managed to make me blush, no small feat in itself. “Fine, you might have a point. But I really can’t help it, I see him and I just want to slap him. It’s out of my control.”
I gave the most innocent shrug I could, but Dex shook his head at me. “Sounds to me like what you really wanna do is make him hurt like he hurt you. Maybe if you’d’ve ever told him that, it wouldn’t hurt so bad anymore.”
I really hated when he made sense. Having grown up with three sisters, my brother had a unique insight into the female psyche, and sometimes, it really annoyed me. “You know, Dex, sometimes a woman just wants to complain, she’s not actually looking for solutions.”
“Then you’ve come to the wrong guy,” he said with a laugh. “I’ve got an answer for everything.”
That might not be true, but he did always have my back, which I appreciated even when he teased me.
“Now, what’s the deal with this Jason Barnly fella?” he asked next, recognizing that I was ready to move the conversation on from talking about Cam. “Was this lunch of yours all business?”
I’d already told him briefly about Jason taking me to lunch, and I couldn’t add much more than that. “We chatted a bit about our backgrounds, but it all stayed pretty professional.”
“And do you want to keep things professional?” he pressed.
I had a tougher time answering that question. On the surface, Jason should be exactly the kind of guy I would be interested in: smart, ambitious and attractive. He had just enough Texan charm without being over-the-top about it. No one I’d spoken to before taking the job had a bad word to say about him.
So, what held me back? I didn’t love the idea of mixing business and pleasure, for one. I didn’t want there to be any rumours about me being anything less than strictly professional when it came to the workplace.
But more than that, if I were to be totally honest with myself, Cam himself made me hesitate. I already knew that Jason and Cam were colleagues, and for all I knew, they were friends as well. I didn’t need to mix my life up with his anymore than it already had been.
“I’m not sure Jason’s looking for anything else,” I told my brother. “There’s no point in obsessing about it unless he makes a move. You know I don’t waste time on indecisive people.”
“Oh, I know. But I think you might want to put some thought into it anyway, so you know what you want before you’re put on the spot.”
Dex didn’t usually stick his nose into my love life; the opposite was far more likely to be true. The fact that he felt he should say something let me know that he genuinely wanted to look out for me, and I did my best to reassure him. “Trust me, Dex. I can handle Jason Barnly, or Cam Bailey, or any of the other men at Barnly Oil. You don’t need to worry about me.”
I truly believed that too, so I had no worries about heading out of town with the head of engineering on Friday morning. He had a visit planned to their processing plant south of Corpus Christi and had invited me along, so I had already planned out exactly how we could use the travelling time to get his schedule whipped into shape. It would be the perfect end to a good first week at Barnly Oil, and the following week, I could take on dealing with Cam.
I had everything completely under control.
~Cam~
The office seemed to be Tonia-free on Friday morning, thankfully, and I could relax as I sat down behind my desk. I had done a pretty good job of avoiding her since the meeting on Monday, but I could often hear her voice carrying out from another room while she talked to someone else. She had a way of standing out in a crowd, she always had, and it made it difficult to concentrate when my mind kept drifting back to the past every time I heard her laugh.
Back to the days when I would have done just about anything to make her laugh.
That morning, however, it looked like she wouldn’t be coming in, and in her absence, I had a very productive morning. So productive, in fact, that I agreed to a coffee break with two of the other guys on the management team when they came to ask if I wanted to take a walk to the nearest coffee shop for a bit of fresh air.
“I’ve gotten so much done this week, I can hardly believe it,” Isaac told us as we walked down the sunny sidewalk, our shirtsleeves rolled up in the warm late morning sun. “When Jason first suggested bringing in this time management consultant, I thought the whole thing sounded like bullshit, pardon my French, but I’ve got to admit, she really knows what she’s talking about. I’ve never been so organized.”
Pride shot through me before I could stop it, before I remembered that Tonia’s accomplishments had absolutely nothing to do with me. Annoyance quickly replaced it as I realized that even without her around, we were still talking about her. The weekend couldn’t come fast enough, when there should be no chance of anyone mentioning her at all.
“She’s going to have her work cut out with me,” Hal replied with a laugh. “We’ll see then just how much of a miracle worker she is. Have you had any sessions with her yet, Cam?”
They both turned to look at me and I shook my head. “Not yet. I think I’ve got something scheduled for next week, I don’t remember exactly when.” I lied, of course; I knew exactly when my appointments were. Those calendar invites were burned into my brain. “She had the day off today, I guess?”
I didn’t even mean to ask the question. Why did I care where she was? I really didn’t.
“No, she’s off with Bradyn today,” Hal told me before giving Isaac a nudge. “We’ll see if his plan works.”
I’d missed something, apparently. “What plan?”
