Page 18 of Come in with the Rain
Abby meets Stella in the living room, and even though I shouldn’t, I strain to hear their conversation as Abby settles Stella onto the couch and takes the spot next to her, their backs to me and Ford. They’re speaking low, like they don’t want us to hear, but I’ve slowed in my work, trying to eliminate some of the banging so that I can listen. Ford’s watchful gaze is glued to me as he slows down, too.
“Wait, I don’t understand,” Abby says, suddenly loud, like she’s forgotten we’re here, or else doesn’t really care.
But Stella hasn’t forgotten. She twists her head just barely, glancing at me out of the side of her eye. I turn away quickly, hearing Stella hiss at Abby to be quiet. Ford and I lift the countertop up, repositioning it to sit comfortably between the two of us so that we can carry it outside. The voices in the living room have dipped low, words ping-ponging between the two women, but then Abby says, practically screeching, “He made you give him a blowjob?”
“Hewhat?” The countertop slips from my hand, jerking Ford forward.
He grunts and says, “Goddammit, Adam,” between clenched teeth.
I help Ford lower the countertop to the floor and turn to the women, who are both looking at me over the back of the couch. I can feel the blood pumping to my temples, a not-so-gentlethrob throb throb. “Did someone touch you?”
Stella just stares, her face unreadable, and then she says, “No. He just told me I had to if I wanted the job.”
The anger has already settled into me, filling all the cracks and crevices of my body. “Where?” I growl. “Tell me where he is.”
Stella’s eyes go wide. “Adam, it’s fine. He didn’t try to force me. I’ll file a complaint with their management.”
It’s not enough. I want to beat into this man, whoever he is, like he’s my favorite punching bag at Berserkr. I want to watch him bleed.
I don’t realize I’m still staring at her, that she’s still staring back, until Ford puts a hand on my arm. “Help me with this,” he says, and we hoist the countertop up and out the front door. Once we’ve got it all the way into the bed of my truck, Ford shifts to face me. “I don’t think that woman needs you to save her.”
I smack my hand flat against the corner of the countertop. I want to smash my fist into it, but I can’t work on the rest of Stella’s condo with a broken hand. “I’m aware of that.”
“Then why do you keep trying to?”
I grit my teeth and storm back inside. Abby and Stella have moved to her bedroom, and that’s probably for the best. I can barely focus on what I’m doing, thinking about some asshole demanding Stella give him a blowjob in exchange for a job.
I put all my rage, all my angry focus, into tearing apart the kitchen. I rip the lower cabinet doors off their hinges even though I don’t strictly need to and beat at the top of the kitchen island with a sledgehammer to get it to disconnect from the cabinet.
I’m not sure when Ford and Abby leave. I’m not sure of much of anything until Stella leans into my line of sight and says, “Adam, it’s late. You should go home and get some sleep.”
I’ve been prying up tile, my hands sore and achy, but I stop when I see the worry in her eyes. I don’t want her to worry about me. I want to worry about her. I set my tools down and lean back on my heels on the ground.
“Are you alright?” I ask her. I’ve worked off most of my anger from earlier, leaving behind only a bone-deep concern.
“I’m fine,” she assures me, taking a seat on the concrete beside me and crossing her legs. “Really. That man propositioned me, I said no, and that was the end of it.”
“Because you know that if he had—” The anger is back, and she stops me with a hand on my chest. Under her palm, my heart pounds hard, and I can see that she’s tracking every pulse.
“He didn’t,” she says, her eyes falling to my mouth. Her lips part, and every part of my body goes hot and hard. I’ve never wanted anything more than I want to taste her lips, and with her hand pressed to me like it is, it’s hard to remember why I shouldn’t. I lean toward her until her nose is close enough for me to brush mine against, our breath mingling.
I told her I would be professional. If I kiss her right now, if I try to take this any further, I’m no better than that piece of shit she dealt with today. I pull back.
I press my hand over hers, feeling the softness of her skin against mine for a second before pulling her hand away from my chest and setting it in her lap. She looks down at it, like I’ve placed a mysterious object in front of her, and then up at me.
For a second, she looks almost confused and then maybe sad, and I have to look away from her so I don’t lay it all in her lap, the way I feel about her and the way I want her. She has enough to deal with right now.
“I should go home,” I tell her, and she just nods, not saying a word as I gather my things and leave.
CHAPTER21
ADAM
It takes me less than a week to redo the kitchen. I get to Stella’s before sun-up and leave when Stella starts to murmur about dinner, and in the hours in between, I try not to think about her hand on my chest, the warmth of it through my t-shirt.
I give her quartz countertops and modern cabinets that I paint blue. She goes to interviews and comes back quiet and deflated. I convince myself that, somehow, fixing up her condo will also fix all of the imperfections of her life.
The day I start laying the tile in the kitchen, the last piece before I move on, I get a call from Danika. Stella is at her kitchen table, which is actually a patio table, just feet from me, trying to repair the clasp on a necklace with a pair of my pliers when I answer.
