As if that was incentive. I barely had time to shave my legs, where she thought I’d find time to date, I’d never know.
Anyway, everyone loved chocolate caramel layer squares, mainly because there were five ingredients: chocolate cake mix, butter, chocolate chips, condensed milk and caramel. With those ingredients, it could only be good; it wasn’t like I was a master chef or anything.
I went to the party and got there late. I had my face all done up, ‘cause Smithie liked his girls heavy on the makeup which meant I had smoky eyes, lashes out to there, dewy cheeks and serious red lipstick.
Once inside Indy and Lee’s duplex, I stared at the crowd and the only thing I could think of was where I was going to change into my Smithie’s uniform. I didn’t like to go back with the dancers, I had enough confidence problems as it was without being confronted with a dozen perfectly toned, tanning-bed tanned, surgically enhanced bodies.
And I couldn’t wear the uniform to the party, no way, no how.
Smithie made all his cocktail waitresses wear red, micro-mini skirts, black, skin-tight, shelf-bra camisoles with “Smithie’s” written in fancy schmancy script across the boobs, and the shoes could be red or black, he didn’t care, just as long as the heel was thin and high.
I only had time to put the chocolate caramel layer squares on the table when I had to find Indy and Lee and say hi and good-bye.
It was a crush, people everywhere. It looked like a good party, folks were laughing and talking, the music was loud and I could see cashews in bowls here and there.
Cashews were definitely the hallmark of a good party.
I found I was stuck against the dining room table, people having closed in all around me.
Then, Eddie pushed in right next to me, his back to me and he was hand in hand with a fantastic-looking blonde.
He didn’t notice me and I thought I’d get away when, on the other side of the table, Indy and Hank, Lee’s older brother (who was also hot, by the way, and he’s a cop and super-nice) came up. Indy saw me, clapped her hands and laughed, getting everyone’s attention.
“Jet! I didn’t think you’d come!”
Tex lumbered up to the table just as Eddie turned from having his back to me to looking at me. Eddie’s expression was kind of benign when he turned (though he also looked kinda curious, or at least it seemed that way to me) but the minute he clapped eyes on me, he froze and stared.
“Jee-zus, woman, look at you!” Tex boomed, “Fuckin’ A if you don’t clean up good. You look like that behind the counter at Fortnum’s, we’d have a line out the fuckin’ door!”
I wanted to run. I didn’t want everyone looking at me.
I looked at Indy to give her my apologies when Indy said, “Did you make those chocolate caramel things you said you were gonna make?”
“Yeah, right here.” I pointed to them and then said, “Listen, I’m so sorry. I gotta go. I’ve got something else on that I can’t miss.”
“Hot date?” Tex asked, reaching for a chocolate caramel layer square.
I chanced a look at Eddie out of the corner of my eye and he was still staring at me, no longer a frozen stare, there was activity behind his eyes, lots of it. Just nothing I could understand. I stopped trying to look at Eddie without looking like I was looking at Eddie and answered Tex, “Not exactly.”
“Shame.” Tex bit into the square, chewed twice and his eyes got huge, “Fuck!” he exploded, chocolate and caramel flying out of his mouth. My heart seized. He looked like he was going to have a chocolate-caramel-layer-square-induced heart attack.
“Tex!” Indy yelled, “You’re spewing all over the food!”
Tex ignored Indy and was staring at me.
“These are unbe-fucking-lievable. I think I’ve finally fallen in love, with a fuckin’ brownie!” It was a nice thing to say, especially from Tex. I smiled at him, full-on, forgetting for a second that Eddie was there.
Only a second, because Eddie muttered something under his breath and I looked at him, still smiling a bit. Then, I realized where I was, about four inches away from Eddie Chavez, and the smile died on my face. He was still staring at me, but now he was staring at my mouth.
I felt my knees get a bit weak.
There was one thing on my mind… escape, escape, escape!
I turned back to Indy, “Thanks for asking me. Please ask me again.”
Indy was looking at Eddie when I talked to her and I noticed that so was Hank. Then both Indy and Hank’s eyes moved back to me and they both were sort of grinning.
“You’re always invited, girl,” Indy said.
It felt tremendously cool that she said that to me and I smiled at her. Then, there was a break in the crush behind me, I started to go but Eddie grabbed my wrist.
“Hang on, Jet,” he said.
I looked down at my wrist, then up at him. I felt his touch everywhere. It was like his fingers hit a switch and I was a light bulb and he turned me on, a total-body, electric shock.
Panic went through me and I pulled my wrist away. If I hadn’t, I’d have thrown myself at him, right in front of his date. That would have been far more humiliating than the cup incident, I’m pretty sure.
His hands came up, palms out and his face closed down.
“What?” I asked, because I couldn’t string two words together. Even if someone told me they could cure my Mom, make her walk steady and give her back her arm, I still couldn’t have said more than “what”.
“Forget it,” he said and turned away.
That’s when I fled.
* * * * *
That was strike two. Strike three was even worse.
* * * * *
For the next couple of months, I totally avoided Eddie.
This was kind of hard to do, considering he was most definitely not avoiding me.
Before Indy’s party, Eddie came in every once in awhile, got a cup of coffee, had a chat and left. After Indy’s party, Eddie came in all the time, got a cup of coffee, had a chat and hung around to torture me.
Let me explain about Eddie Torture.
Once, Jane and I were going through a box of used books that Jane bought. We were going to put some on the shelves, but most of them were going in the dollar bin.
I was crouched down and I had on a pair of those low-rider jeans and a fitted, square-necked, long-sleeved, plum-colored t-shirt. In the crouch, the jeans came down; the hem of the tee went up, completely exposing the small of my back. The bell over the front door jangled and I turned to see Eddie walk in, cool, mirrored sunglasses covering his eyes. He took them off, looked down at me, and his eyes moved to my behind.
Immediately I said to Jane, “Let’s take these to the counter.” And I stood, picking up the box.
Unfortunately, the box weighed a ton and I staggered back, right into Eddie, who’d somehow managed to make it the six feet from the door to me in that short expanse of time.
Instead of just putting out a hand to steady me, both of his hands came to my hips, low on my hips, fingers splayed wide so his fingertips rested on my pelvic bones.
“Steady,” he said, his lips this close to my ear and a shiver went through my body and I swear, I nearly dropped the box.
Then his hands were gone and so was he. He came around, reached under the box, his fingers just barely (but still, it happened, I know it did) grazing my midriff. He took it from me and walked it to the book counter.
Ally was behind the counter and she was staring at me, open-mouthed. I ignored her look, ignored Eddie completely (didn’t even say thanks) and walked (quickly) to the back of the store and hid amongst the shelves until I was certain he was gone.
Other times, he would be standing in tight spaces, spaces I had to get through to move around, so I’d have to suck in my breath and squeeze by him so as not to touch him with some protruding part of my body. This did not normally work and some protruding part of my body touched him which resulted in one of those aforementioned electric shocks.
It didn
’t help matters that Indy and Ally were constantly asking me out for drinks or to go to the movies, then turning to Eddie and saying, “You want to come?”
I couldn’t go anyway and I was glad I always had an excuse (although, since they didn’t know I had a second job and was taking care of Mom, the excuses were beginning to sound lame).
The Eddie Torture seemed to escalate over time.
For example, a few days ago I was sitting behind the book counter, my legs crossed, my head bent, going through receipts and drinking a cappuccino.
Eddie was talking to Duke, Indy’s second-in-command; a Harley guy with thick, long, gray hair, a beard and an ever-present rolled bandana tied around his forehead. Duke had been at Fortnum’s since Indy’s grandmother ran it. At first, he scared me. He was tough as nails and had a low, gravelly voice. Then I realized he was an old softie, mainly because of the way he treated Indy, Ally, Jane (the other Fortnum’s veteran) and sometimes Tex (though, most of the time, Duke and Tex yelled at each other).
Eddie and Duke were standing across from me at the book counter so that meant I was also engaged in ignoring Eddie.
Then, all of a sudden, Eddie’s hand came into my line of vision and, just as sudden, his thumb swiped my upper lip. My head jerked up and I stared at him, my lip tingling.
“Foam,” he said, dipping his head to indicate my cappuccino.
My face started burning, I stared down at my cappuccino and, get this… when I looked back up, Eddie was again listening to Duke, for all the world like I wasn’t even there, but he put his thumb in his mouth to suck off my foam.
What was that?
This kind of stuff went on all the time. Being me, I had to find an explanation for it. So I decided he was just trying to be nice.
He was a nice guy, I could tell, even if it was in a kind of badass way. Tex held a gruff regard for him and Duke liked him flat out. It was clear he thought of Ally like his younger sister and was always messing around with her. I know he thought the world of Indy and he was always flirting with her in a way that was hot but controlled. I told myself he was just putting me in my niche because, no matter how significant these torture sessions seemed, nothing ever came of them. So, I figured my crush, and my daydreams (which were coming a lot more often once the torture sessions began) made me make them something they weren’t.
Then Indy asked me over to Hank’s to watch a football game. It was getting to the point in her frequent invitations where I couldn’t refuse or I’d seem rude. It was going to be her and Lee, Ally and her boyfriend, Carl (who was also good looking and a cop), Hank and some girl I didn’t know… and Eddie.
I didn’t want to go, because it was Sunday. I didn’t have a shift at Smithie’s and Fortnum’s had short hours on Sunday. I wanted to rest, then sleep, in the night hours, like a normal person.
Nevertheless, we weren’t supposed to be there until five and I had plenty of time to get ready after Fortnum’s closed. I needed to accept an invitation, not to mention, Mom was all over me.
I’d made the mistake of telling Mom about Tex’s response to the chocolate caramel layer squares so Mom started to think Tex was a possibility for future bliss for me. In talking her out of that (by explaining that first, Tex was nuts and second, he was old enough to date her) I let it slip about Eddie.
Once Eddie was mentioned (however minutely), I had to come completely clean (because Mom gave me the third degree) and so Mom was all excited about the possibility that I’d catch Eddie’s eye. I tried to tell her that Eddie was hung up on Indy but she wouldn’t hear of it. I tried to tell her Eddie was seriously good looking, sex-in-cowboy-boots and cool-as-hell and thus wouldn’t be interested in me, and that she really wouldn’t hear of.
So, she pushed me into not only going but also making her sausage, olive and mushroom cups and taking them with me. She was obviously thinking that I’d work my way into Eddie’s heart by filling his stomach with sausage, olive and mushroom, doused in cream, garlic and Parmesan sauce in a toasted bread cup.
I walked into Hank’s carrying a platter covered with foil.
It was still hot from the oven and burning through my sweater. I was late (again), I forgot a hot pad and the minute I walked in, everyone smelled the sausage and garlic.
“Fucking hell, what is that?” Carl asked, staring at the foil wrapped platter. He was a big guy, tall with a thick, sexy mess of blond hair. He had a way of looking at you that made your face burn because, I was pretty certain, he was undressing you with his eyes.
I set the dish down on a coffee table with kind of a clatter (because, as I said, it was burning me). I pulled the foil off. The garlic smell wafted out with such strength; it was like a smack in the face. Everyone leaned back at the smell, then leaned forward and fell on the sausage cups like vultures.
I was holding my arm and biting my lip because the burn wouldn’t go away.
Eddie was sitting in a big armchair, holding a beer bottle by the neck with two fingers. He was the only one not sampling the sausage cups. He was watching me, his dark eyes taking my mind off the burning in my arm because he was making the breath in my lungs burn (and he was making other places burn beside).
Suddenly, he got up, walked across the room, grabbed my hand and pulled me into the kitchen. He stopped in the middle, gently twisted my wrist and pushed the sleeve of my sweater up, exposing an angry red welt on the inside of my arm.
“Dios mio, Cariña,” he said, tugging me to the fridge.
“It’s nothing,” I said.
He grabbed a can of Coke and held it against the burn. I had to admit that it felt good and it felt even better because Eddie was doing it.
“I can hold it,” I said, trying to take the can.
“I’ve got it,” he said.
“No really…”
His eyes locked on mine. “I’ve got it,” he said in a way he never spoke to me before, in a way I’d never heard him speak to anyone before; quiet, controlled but a little impatient.
Eddie was a good ole boy, up for a laugh, always grinning, teasing, flirting, and messing around.
There was no messing around in his tone.
At all.
I stood tense and stiff, back to biting my lip while he held my wrist in one hand, the can against the burn with the other. I stared at my arm so I wouldn’t be staring at Eddie.
The burn wasn’t that bad, and felt much better after the coolness of the can took out the sting. Without the pain, all I could think about was Eddie and being alone in the kitchen with Eddie.
Mysteriously alone.
Where was everyone?
“Where is everyone?” I asked.
“Who do you want?” he asked what I thought was a weird question. But then again, my mind wasn’t working properly so maybe it was a perfectly okay question, who was I to judge?
“I don’t know.”
Anyone! I thought.
His fingers wrapped tighter around my wrist and then pulled me forward. He was already close, but he brought me closer. “You got a problem with me?” he asked, when he was so close, I could smell him.
He smelled nice all the time, but it wasn’t overpowering. You had to be close. During the last couple months of Eddie Torture, I’d been close enough to smell him a lot and he smelled good. Real good. I kinda slipped into a daze, what with his proximity and his smell, and my mind shut down and he wasn’t just the only person in the room, he was the only person in the universe.
“Pardon?”
“Do you have a problem with me?” Eddie asked again, his eyes looking into mine and I was in a stark realization that I’d never been this close to him. He had great eyelashes and his irises were so dark, they seemed to go on forever.
I realized he’d asked a question and I’d forgotten it again. “Pardon?” I asked, well, kind of breathed because, at the last second, I realized I didn’t have a lot of breath in my lungs.
That’s when his eyes changed from assessing to something else. I saw the dimple i
n his cheek before his lips formed a smile. He tugged on my wrist gently and brought me even closer; so close my body was nearly touching his and he had to bend his head further to look down at me.
“I asked if you had a problem with me,” he said.
“Well, yeah,” I answered, my mouth disengaged from my mind.
His head bent a little further and, I kid you not, he was so close I could almost kiss him.
“What kind of problem?” he asked. His voice was low, almost a whisper. Something was happening to his eyes, they’d gone liquid and I felt a similar sensation in my bones.
“I have a little trouble with…” How could I put it? “… your kind.”
I meant his kind as in guys who were hot. Guys who were hot made me tongue-tied, clumsy and shy.
I don’t think Eddie took it that way because his liquid eyes turned hard and glittery and his hand at my wrist tightened and not in a good way. Still, I was in a daze so I didn’t really register this at first.
“My… kind?” he asked.
“Yeah.” I answered.
He let me go as if touching my skin was like getting burned with acid. He handed me the Coke and, without a word, walked out of the room.
As I stood there and the daze lifted, it came to me what I said must have sounded like.
“Fuck!” I hissed to myself.
Usually I tried not to say the f-word but some occasions demanded it. This was one of those occasions because I’d never have the courage to tell Eddie what I really meant and now he thought I was a racist.
Indy walked in, looking worried.
“Is everything okay?” she asked, looked over her shoulder, then back at me. “Eddie just took off out the backdoor looking like he was going to commit murder. What happened? Are you all right?”
Luckily, I still had my purse over my shoulder, the television was in the back room (and so was everyone else) and there was a direct shot out the front door.
“Gotta go,” I said, with no explanation.
I went out the door.
The minute it closed behind me, I ran.
Chapter Two
The Truth Comes Out
(Well, part of it anyway)