It's Not About You Page 9

  I had rounded that sharp right and was taking off my apron and pen when I heard Mary's voice in the room. And she was mad and talking to someone on her phone. I guessed this because I couldn't hear the other side of the conversation, and talking on her phone during work hours was against the rules.

  "…sort of sick! I know! He's like in his twenties and she's old and decrepit. And get this…he actually kissed her this morning….no they all cheered…….there's gotta be a way to get her out of here. I mean…I was here before George hired her and ever since Sam left she's been nothing but mean to me….I don't know…some guy she was dating beat her up. She probably deserved it…oh my God he's here again…and he's on a motorcycle!"

  I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Well, not really cry. She hurt my feelings but honestly over the years I'd had with the Prick, I always considered the source when it came to things like that. Really? Get rid of me because a guy she was crushing on apparently said no?

  What this did was alert me to a possible problem and something I needed to talk to George about. And quick.

  I grabbed my jacket and changed my shoes before I clocked out and moved past a very shocked Mary at the door of the office. Yeah, she'd just realized I was in that room while she was dissing me.

  Dissing…I used the word dissing!

  I spotted Michael's bike through the window, parked just out front. He walked in wearing his leathers, the suit he wore to work wouldn't survive the drive without those sexy leathers. He had the spare helmet in his hand and shades on. He was raking his fingers through his hair when he spotted me and the smile under those shades lit up the whole room.

  "You ready?"

  I nodded and took the offered helmet just before he leaned down and kissed me. Right there. In the front of the shop.

  Cheers again from the staff, except for Mary. I could feel her glare on my back, burning through my jacket.

  "So what are we doing today?" I asked as he mounted the bike and then I jumped on behind him. That first ride last Sunday had been the scariest day of my life, but after moving around for the afternoon like that—it started feeling natural, and my car was what felt confined.

  Me. On a motorcycle. At my age!

  "Grocery store. I want to cook tonight at my place."

  "I'll have to go by my place to get clothes."

  "Sounds good." He pulled his helmet on, checked the two-way in the helmet so we could hear each other, then started the motorcycle.

  The closest grocery was Kroger in the same shopping center as the Trade In Beans. He drove the bike further into the center and pulled it into a parking space up front and shut it off. The man had some serious Park-Fu. Always found good parking.

  "We could have just walked here," I said as I removed the helmet and locked it on the back guard.

  "Yeah." Michael locked his own helmet down and removed his gloves before he took my hand and lead me through the automatic doors. "But I wanted to impress your employees. Saw Mary making death eyes."

  He picked up a basket and steered me to the vegetables. "Mary's still pissed I wouldn't get in the bed with her. She was so upset when learning to use a FrenchPress wasn't innuendo for screwing like bunnies."

  He picked up red potatoes, some green beans and I grabbed almonds. Good choice with the beans. We skipped over to the butcher and he ordered up two large steaks, porterhouse, and I suggested mushrooms. He agreed and told me to meet him at the bakery as I went back to the produce.

  While looking at the boxes of prepackaged fungus someone touched me on the shoulder. Still guarded with the fear Burt was going to show up at some point, I turned fast and surprised Gerald Almondrode.

  Shit!

  "Grace…are you all right? I didn't mean to startle you like that."

  "Oh…yeah. I'm fine. It's nice to see you Gerald. What brings you here?"

  "Oh," he said as he put his hands on his wide hips. "Just picking up some things for dinner. Say…you're looking at mushrooms. Are you planning on cooking one of your incredible meals tonight?"

  Uh…crap! I didn't know what to say. If I didn't get to the bakery, I knew Michael would come looking for me and if Gerald saw us here together, he might make assumptions. Assumptions that would be right but not that we wanted him to make! "Yeah. It's more of an experiment. Had a class on searing last week and wanted to give it a try."

  "And the mushrooms. I do love good mushrooms if they're cooked right."

  I glanced at his stomach. Yeah I bet you do. "Yeah. Mushrooms are good." My phone beeped and I fished it out of my pocket. It was Michael, asking where I was. "Just a sec, Gerald. It's my mom." I quickly texted back that his boss was in the veggie department with me and he texted back a groan.

  "Everything okay?"

  I lowered the phone. "Yeah, I just need to get these things and head home."

  "Dinner for Kyle?"

  "Well, hey there, Mr. Almondrode!"

  I gave Michael a serious WHAT ARE YOU DOING look as he came up. He and Gerald shook hands. "Well, hello Michael. When you said you needed to leave early, I didn't know it was shopping." He looked at me and then at the basket and his expression went blank.

  "Yeah," Michael said before he leaned in close. "I convinced Grace to show me how to cook like she and Kyle do. I figure, if I can make dishes like the one we had that Saturday, I'm pretty sure I could make an impression on a woman."

  To my relief Gerald's face lit up and he clapped his hands together. "Yes you could. And that's a great idea. So you're both heading to Grace and Kyle's house?"

  Again Michael answered. "Yep. Kyle's my test subject. See how I do."

  "Splendid."

  I knew what Michael was doing—shutting Gerald down from inviting himself over. But him seeing us together like this was risky. And bold. If Kyle knew this he'd shit a brick.

  No. Scratch that.

  He'd shit a house!

  "Well, I'll let you to finish shopping. Give my regards to Kyle and tell him I envy him with such fine meals."

  Michael waited for Gerald to disappear behind an isle before he grabbed my hand and half dragged me to the back bakery.

  "Are you out of your mind?"

  "Kinda." He stopped us at the display case and pointed to a small amaretto cake with chocolate ganache icing. "What do you think about that for desert?"

  I just stared at him. "You do realize if Gerald sees us over here—"

  "Then he'll think we're getting desert for dinner. Which is the truth. But this also means we'll need to go back to your place to cook. I better grab Kyle a steak."

  We got the cake and another steak, along with a few other items and checked out. Everything fit pretty easy in the two side saddles on Michael's motorcycle and as I got on the back he half turned to me. "You okay? You seem kinda quiet."

  "I just…that was so risky. I don't want Kyle to lose his job, or you."

  "The guy's a racist and a homophobe bible thumper. I couched the lies in truth. It's easier that way."

  "Is it?" Since when was lying easy at all?

  Not sure I liked this side of Michael and I kept my mouth shut on the drive home.

  Kyle did poop a house, and a condo and an airplane when Michael told him what happened. I thought he was going to have a heart attack. But eventually he drank enough wine and ate everything Michael and I cooked that he fell asleep on the couch and I put a blanket over him.

  Michael stepped out on the back deck to make sure the grill was cooling down. He insisted on grilling the meat over an open fire. "You're a pretty decent cook on your own."

  "Yeah…but what you added…God those mushrooms and that sauce? I'm taking that home with me." He put his arm around me and stared at the dying embers.

  "You're not staying the night?" I asked.

  "No. I don't think that would be a good idea with Kyle's mood."

  "You shouldn't have told him."

  "I couldn't do that. He'd have been blindsided at work and it's better to keep communication open between p
eople. It's in the silence we find the means of our destruction."

  I looked up at him. "That's a seriously sane quote. Yours?"

  "No. It was my dad's."

  "Was?"

  "He died a few years ago. Car accident. It was quick but it wasn't something we were prepared for. Especially my mom and my sister. He'd been a happy drunk most of his life and then managed to stay sober for the last twenty years. That afternoon he lost his job of thirty years and took a header into a local bar. Got behind the wheel smashed and then wrapped the car around a building."

  "Oh my God…I'm so sorry, Michael."

  "They said we were lucky no one else was hurt. I hate it when they say that because it's not true. A lot of people were hurt—the people that loved him. He was a great man."

  Something in Michael's tone touched me so I turned and faced him, the heat of the cooling grill at my back. The evening shadows hid his face from me so I reached up to feel my way to the sides of his face. I pulled him to me and kissed his lips. I tasted salt and realized it was tears.

  I took him into my arms and he wrapped his around me. I felt his shoulders shake and held him like that as long as he needed me. Words weren't necessary. Not for this. I expected he hadn't allowed himself to grieve much over the years and sometimes these little emotional releases were necessary.

  Hell I'd had enough of them myself.

  When he sought out my lips to kiss, I pulled him with me back inside the house. I shut the sliding door and locked it and with my fingers laced with his, guided him down the hall to my room. He might not spend the night, but I knew I could ease his pain and wipe away the tears.

  ***

  Friday was Halloween and I had the staff dress in Halloween costumes. Everyone got into it except for Mary. No surprise there. I dressed up as a sexy pirate. Argh! Michael wanted to walk around Little Five Points that night to see the costumes and Kyle was going to George and Bradford's annual Halloween Bash without me.

  Michael wanted to go to Stone Mountain sometime during the weekend since it was the park's last laser show and he'd never been. I couldn't remember when I last went—might have been when Tanae was little. And that was a while ago. And apparently it'd all changed and tickets were available for snack terraces, not that I knew what that was.

  Flower came in early, dressed as a gypsy with a new deck of Tarot cards and wanted to read people. So everyone but me and Mary offered. I wasn't really into all that and was more interested in getting the shift done before Michael came to pick me up. We were spending the weekend at his house—away from the possibility of bumping into Gerald or anyone else we didn't want to see. The idea of doing that made Kyle a very happy man. That and he got the house to himself so he could bring over a friend if he wanted.

  My backpack was in my locker and the inventory was done.

  Then Flower stepped into the office. "Pleeeease?"

  I looked at her. "You're not going to leave me alone till you read them are you?"

  "Nope. Come on. These are a different kind of deck. It'll be a fast read. I just want to get practice at them before I charge."

  Flower did readings at one of the local new age shops of which I'd never been inside, though I think Tanae had visited a few of them. Her array of Faery figurines on her shelf was testament to that.

  I sighed and moved a stack of forms off the desk. "Go for it."

  She wiped off the table and pulled out this incredibly beautiful box and set it on the table. With a smile at me, she pulled open the side and dumped out a gold-edged deck of cards. The colors were just…stunning and the pictures I saw as she shuffled… "Flower…what kind of cards are those. They don't look like the usual ones."

  "They're not. These are a set of Lenormand cards."

  I gave her a blank stare.

  "The system was used by Mlle Lenormand who was the fortune teller for Napoleon and his wife Josephine. I saw someone use them at the store and I had to try them!" She shuffled them again and laid out three cards.

  I waited cause I had no idea what they meant but the pictures were beautiful.

  When she frowned, so did I. "What?"

  "I forgot to tell you to ask a question so I'm not sure how this reads. But…apparently you've found love but not without conflict from the past."

  "That's vague." But it was also pretty dead on the money.

  "Yeah…I should have asked."

  "Hey Flower!" came the call from the front.

  She packed them back up and patted my head before she left the office. It was true I'd found what I hoped would be love, though I had doubts. A lot of them. About me, about Michael, about whether this would last.

  But in the end, did that really matter?

  The rest of the day had me on the phone with George and the employees, getting work schedules arranged for the next two weeks. Everyone was thinking about Thanksgiving already but me. I just wanted to get through this holiday before I started stressing about cooking a turkey.

  By the time my shift ended George and I had a pretty good idea of who was working when and where. Mary left early—I approved it with no reservations. Michael showed up on time and the others greeted him. One of the girls made him a his favorite drink and had it ready when he stepped inside. She charged it to her account and I went behind her and reimbursed her. She was a good worker and a nice girl, and her being polite to Michael wasn't based on getting into his pants.

  It was sucking up to me.

  We headed to his house through Friday traffic and once there, fell into bed together. I didn't know what was wrong with me but it seemed like every time we were alone, all I wanted to do was make love to him. I guess it was true that a woman's sex drive doesn't kick in till later in life.

  Or I'd found the right person.

  While in the shower Michael decided he wanted pizza—but not just any pizza. He wanted Savage Pizza since we were going to Little Five Points. I laughed as I rain the soapy sponge over his beautiful back and then down over his rounded ass. Wow… I loved his ass.

  "Mmhmm. And they make a great white pizza. I want that, and I want fried cheese and I want…" He looked over his shoulder at me. "I want it all with you."

  "You have me." And he did.

  Eventually we left his house on his motorcycle. Driving down 85 South on a bike was like…the most incredible experience of my life! There was little to no traffic—because it was already after eight o'clock—and downtown lit up with its neon and large screen billboards excited me. It felt like I was really living—for the very first time.

  Half an hour later he turned down Moreland Avenue and then made the right on Euclid. There it was…Savage Pizza. Nothing like it anywhere else in the world. Trick or Treaters of all ages moved back and forth along the street, clothing their bags of candy. The front of the pizzeria had been draped in those fake spider webs with plastic ones set inside the webbing. Halloween cut outs decorated the window and I could see orange and black lanterns hanging up inside.

  Michael parked the motorcycle in an appropriate spot. I liked that about him. He followed the rules, unlike Burt who always believed that rules were an affront to his genius. They were there for him to use and abuse and break when he wanted.

  We took the helmets and walked arm in arm toward the pizzeria. I could see our breath! Fall was in full swing! As we passed the crystal shop I looked int the window and a little nugget looking pendant caught my eye. I stopped and leaned in close to get a better look at it.

  "What is it?"

  When I figured that out, I cracked. "It's a gold coffee bean! Look," I moved to the side and pointed at it. "It's got a ruby in the bean."

  "Well damn…that's kind of cute. Who would think of wearing a bean?"

  I didn't know. But it was cute.

  The pizzeria was what I called almost busy. From the lack of bussed tables, candy wrappers and masks on the floor, I assumed they were just coming off their evening holiday rush.

  Michael ordered and conferred with me on everythi
ng. He didn't take my opinion for granted. Another one of Burt's narcissistic views—that his opinion and tastes were for everyone. Want to try a restaurant you've never been to before but Burt had? Don't go with him because he'll take over the menu and you'll have to eat what he likes.

  Once we had our glasses, silverware, napkins and plates, he consulted me on a few tables. I liked the one near the front facing the area, but it was still dirty. Michael set the tray of things down, held up a finger and went to the counter's side. There he talked softly with someone. All smiles. No yelling. No angry customer.

  "Grace?"

  I jumped at my name. That and I was staring so hard at Michael I hadn't noticed anyone come up behind me. And when I turned, the last person I expected to see was Kevin Taylor. He was in regular clothes, no suit and tie. He wore a brown peacoat and loafers and smelled of Drakkar. I was in a leather jacket I'd bought for riding on the motorcycle, jeans and boots. In my arm was my helmet as well as Michael's. "Hey…Kevin! What're you doing here?"

  "Brought the twins here for pizza to avoid the Trick or Treaters. Josh is out with friends. Margo is at a medical conference in St. Louis."

  I looked past him to the side booth. The boy, Jordan, waved at me. He was the younger of the two by two minutes. The girl, Jennifer, had her face in her phone.

  "And you're here…" he looked at the helmet and then at the tall, leather clad young man as he returned to the table with a plastic tub, paper towels and a spray bottle.

  Michael set the items on a side table and removed his leather gloves. He stuck his hand out to Kevin. "Hey. We met at the Trade In Beans. Detective Kevin Taylor, right?"

  I bit my lower lip as Kevin took Michael's hand and shook it. "Right…you're Michael…Oliver?"

  "Yep." He released Kevin's hand. "If you'll excuse me, I need to clean this table." He moved the dirty dishes into the tub before he removed his leather jacket.

  Kevin touched my arm and nodded to the side. "A word?"

  I put my own hand on Michael's arm. He winked at me. "Go on. I'll get the table ready."

  We walked through the front door and meandered down the sidewalk to stand in front of a crystal store. "Well," he said as he put his hands on his hips. "I see why you haven't been taking my calls."