“For fuck’s sake, Rafe. Don’t touch anything. You leave a handprint on a doorframe, and we’re both fired,” he hisses at me.
“I’m not touching a damn thing,” I hiss back.
“Anybody here?” Bubba calls out. “We’re here to help move furniture.”
A woman’s voice replies. “In here.”
Bubba follows the voice, and I follow him in.
We find them in the living area, the piano already set up and pieces of furniture pushed to the side.
The boss’s daughter is trapped against the wall as the men maneuver the heavy piece into place.
“Miss Sawyer, where do you want this stuff?” Bubba asks, and I stand silently over his shoulder.
Tori squeezes out from behind the piano, and her gaze swings to us. She freezes when she sees me standing behind Bubba. Only the momentary flash of fire in her blue eyes indicates she remembers exactly who I am.
I’ve thought about her more times than I care to own up to since our last meeting, especially that damn red bikini. I’ve even gotten off to the image burned in my brain. I wonder if her cheeks would blush if she knew.
She points at a piece of furniture. “This one goes against the far wall. This one goes in the study across the hall, and this one goes down to the basement.”
“How do we get to the basement?” Bubba asks.
“There’s a door in the kitchen.”
Bubba moves to the tall grandfather’s clock first.
“Be careful with that one,” the girl warns.
“C’mon, Rafe. Grab that end.” Bubba takes the top, and I grab the bottom, and we tilt it on its back and walk it across to the study.
Tori trails after us and points to a wall. “There, between the windows.”
We set it up and stand back. The hanging chimes are swaying all wonky, and I wonder if we broke it.
“You need to reset it?” I ask.
She steps over and opens the glass, stopping their swaying, then starting them again. “There. That should do it.”
I follow Bubba to the other room, and we move a low chest of drawers to the dining room.
The last piece is the one I’ve been dreading. It’s a marble topped coffee table.
“This thing come apart?” Bubba asks.
Tori shrugs. “I have no idea.”
“Guess we’re about to find out,” he mutters and points me to the other side. We both lift, and thankfully the marble is not attached to the wooden base, which will make it a damn sight easier to get it down a flight of stairs.
I’m on the end near the archway, so I get stuck walking backward into the hall and through to the kitchen.
Tori runs ahead of us and opens the door, turning on the light.
“Hang on, Bubba.” I adjust my grip, struggling under the weight, and take the first step. The stairs are old and wooden, and they flex under my boot.
At this angle, almost all the weight is on me, and my muscles strain, my arms shaking, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to drop the thing in front of this girl.
We make it to the bottom and half the weight shifts back to Bubba.
“Where do you want it?” I call up the stairs.
Tori comes down with an old quilt and points to a far wall. “There, but let me drape this over it before you lean it against the concrete.”
Once it's wrapped and settled against the wall, we head up for the wooden base.
Grabbing an end, I realize the solid wood base is just as heavy as the damn marble. “What the hell’s this made of?”
“Solid oak,” the old aunt snaps from the doorway, then shakes her finger. “And I don’t want to hear another cuss word out of your mouth, young man.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Bubba and I both murmur, and we can’t get the thing down the hall fast enough. This time Bubba is the one going backward down the steps, and after he stops to get a better grip. His boot slips off a step, and he almost goes down.
Thankfully, I’m able to hook a forearm through a shelf and keep the whole damn thing from crushing him. “You got it?” I shout, straining to hold it up.
“Yeah.” He hefts it and takes another step.
We manhandle the unwieldy piece down the stairs and set it against the wall.
Tori waits with an old sheet to drape over the piece and protect it from dust.
Bubba trudges up the stairs, and I take a second to glance around the basement. A dozen framed paintings—at least I think they’re paintings from the edge of the gilt frames—lean in a stack.
I gesture to them. “Somebody must like art.”
Tori follows my eyes. “My grandfather collected a lot of paintings.”
“Why are they down here?”
She shrugs. “I think they’ve been down here since I was a little girl.”
“Can I take a look?”
“If you want.” She pulls the sheet back, revealing them, then crouches down and flips through the frames—all oil paintings of landscapes. She stops on one. “Oh, my God.”
“What is it?” I tilt my head, studying the painting.
She leans closer. “Help me pull this one out.”
I lift it out while she keeps the rest of the stack from flipping over, then pushes them back. I heft the painting, tilting it right side up.
It’s a nice painting of some Native Americans dancing around a fire on the great plains at dusk.
Tori leans to the signature in the bottom corner. “It’s him. Oh my God. Do you know what this is?”
“Nope.”
“This is a Jules Arneaux. He was a famous painter in the late eighteen hundreds.”
I shrug. “You say so.”
She rolls her eyes. “Figures you’d have no appreciation for art.”
“What are you talking about? I’m the one who asked to see the damn things. If I hadn’t, you wouldn’t even have given them a second glance. You’d be upstairs playing your fancy new piano.”
“Why are you here if you hate us so much?”
“I was sent up here by my boss, darlin’. You think I sit around, wishing I could come move furniture for the likes of you?”
“The likes of me?” Her brow hits her hairline, and she flings a finger toward the stairway. “Get out.”
“With pleasure.”
“You’re a jerk.” Her words follow me, and I pause on the third step to look back at her.
“And you’re a bitch,” I say, then grin at her. “But sweetheart, you sure looked good in that little red bikini.”
She gasps, and I pound up the rest of the steps and slam out the screen door off the kitchen.
I meet Bubba at the pickup. He’s bent over the side of the truck bed, his forearms on the edge, and his head dropped between his shoulders.
“You okay, Bubba?” I ask.
He groans and tries to straighten. “Pulled a muscle in my damn back. Can you drive us to the shop?”
“Sure. You need help getting in the passenger seat?” I grin as he shuffles his feet toward the door. “You want, I could lay you out flat in the truck bed, old man?” I tease.
“Fuck you. Just start the damn truck.” He slides into the cab and settles against the seat. “Damn, I wish this thing had heated seats.”
I fire it up and head down the hill.
He looks over at me. “What the fuck took you so long?”
“Me and that bitch got into it.”
“You and that old witch, Ruth?”
“No, Tori.”
“Oh, it's Tori now, is it? You don’t listen too well, do you? I told you to steer clear of her.”
“I couldn’t help it, could I? She followed us to the basement.”
“You piss her off or something?”
“Sort of.”
“How?”
“Hell, just by breathing the same air as her.” I’m not about to tell him about the whole bikini encounter. I haven’t breathed a word of that to any of the assholes down at the mill. I’m not sure why, but I don’t want them making crude comments about her.
“You got any pills?”
I look at Bubba. “Might be some Tylenol in the glove box.”
“No, I’m talking about the good stuff. Hell, you’re a biker, ain’t you? You must have access to all kinds of good shit.”
“I’m not getting you drugs, Bubba.”
“Why the hell not? I’m in real pain here.”
“Go to the Doc in the Box then. There’s a 24-hour clinic about three miles from here.”
“Come on. Hook me up, brother.”
I hit the brakes, and he winces in pain, then I turn and glare at him. “First off, I’m not screwing up my probation for your goddamned pulled back. Second, I’m not your fucking brother. You call me that again, you and me are gonna come to blows. Understand?”
“Jesus, Rafe. What the hell are you so pissed about?”
I park and slam the door, stalking off, leaving him moaning in pain.
By now, it's quitting time, and the parking lot is mostly empty except for Bubba’s truck and my bike. I climb on and roar onto the highway, giving the throttle all she’s got, visions filling my head of a pretty blue-eyed girl in a sexy as hell red bikini.