Mai Tai'd Up (11 page)

“I believe you,” he replied, watching me pour the eggs into the onion mixture.

“I’d ask you to pour the orange juice, but I’m afraid I’d have to hear about the chocolate milk,” I said, looking at him over the burners.

“Can I have some of it?”

“My chocolate milk?”

“Yeah.”

“Sure.”

“Then you won’t hear a word about it,” he answered promptly, heading back to the fridge. He got out both, and I nodded him toward the cupboard where the glasses were kept. A few minutes later we were sitting at the table with full plates and glasses in front of us. We grinned at each other across the tops of our glasses and dug in.

“This is really good,” he told me as demolished half the omelet in two forkfuls.

“Thanks.”

I sat contentedly for a moment, listing to the scrape and clink of his fork as he polished off the other half. In just a few short weeks I’d gotten used to the quiet, but the silence of one is very different than the silence of two. It was nice to have another scrape and clink in the kitchen.

“So what’s with the house?” he asked suddenly and, surprised, I choked on my orange juice. “You okay?” He thumped me on the back.

“Sorry, wrong pipe. What did you mean?”

“This crazy pad, man—these ring-a-ding-ding digs. I feel like I should be saying things like chickie baby.”

“Ah, yes. Well, it’s not my taste, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Are you kidding? This place is great!” he said with such
enthusiasm that I found myself smiling again. I sure did smile a lot around this guy.

“Thanks, it’s my dad’s. It’s been in the family for years, but we hardly ever use it. Hence, the very out-of-date decor.”

“And now it’s the home of a pit bull rescue. Very cool.”

“Yeah. Not at all what I was expecting when I came up here; I just needed some space. And how lucky for me that I’ve got the land to do this here.”

“Is this what you did in San Diego? Like, for a living?” he asked.

I took the opportunity to examine my plate. “Not exactly.”

“What kind of work did you do?”

“I’ve never had a paying job before. I was good at one thing, and that was winning crowns. Then I volunteered. Then I was engaged. And I wasn’t going to work once I was married. So this is kind of a big step for me,” I snapped, throwing my fork down. Where had that come from, and why was my chin wobbling?

Ah, fudge.

“Sorry, it’s a bit of a touchy subject for me, I guess.” I sniffed, dabbing at the corners of my eyes with a napkin.

“It just happened; I think it’s normal to be a little touchy. You should have seen me after Julie and I broke up. When I first got to Guatemala, I was . . . not myself,” he admitted, pushing his plate away.

“Oh, yeah? Did you cry over omelets like a big baby?” I asked, my voice going all warbly now. Warbly voice and wobbly chin, what a combo.

“Over omelets? No. But I drank more than I usually do, and made a few late-night phone calls that I’m not proud of.” He leaned closer and motioned for me to do the same. “Okay, there
was one night when there might have been a tear or two. But that was over some weird goat stew—not an omelet in sight.”

I laughed into my napkin, an ugly, weepy laugh. “What a mess I am.”

“Yeah, you barefoot and in your nightgown,” he said quietly, reaching out to swipe my cheek with his thumb. “What a mess.”

He stood to clear the table, reaching for my plate first. “Okay, we wash dishes, and then we paint. How’s that sound, weepy girl?”

“Good,” I whispered. I whispered because I didn’t trust my voice in that moment. Because there were suddenly other things I wanted to do instead of washing dishes and painting . . .

I
’d done most the work the day before, but there were some high spots that were hard for me to reach that I’d saved for last. Being so tall, Lucas was the perfect guy. To hit the high spots, of course.

We talked as we worked. And laughed as we worked. And over the course of the morning, I decided that Lucas Campbell was not just great looking and funny, he was also . . . a nice guy. With Prince Harry hair.

Kryp-to-nite.
So
much trouble.

I learned that he was an only child but had a lot of extended family, mostly in Northern California. He’d been on the water since he was a kid, originally surfing and now kayaking and paddleboarding—a real beach rat. I learned that he’d never wanted to be anything other than a veterinarian, and to go into the family business that his grandfather started back in the sixties. And I learned more about his ex, Julie.

She hadn’t been on the pageant circuit as long or as extensively as I’d been, and had held mainly local titles, which could
be why I’d never met her. She was always more interested in acting, which is what she decided to do when she left Lucas to run off to Los Angeles. Who would ever leave this guy?

Someone is saying the exact same thing about you every time they look at Charles.

Touché.

“So who ended it?”

“Hmm?” I asked from the corner of one of the stalls. I was almost finished, sitting down to paint the baseboards. The old floors had been power washed, then sealed to keep down the dust that was always floating around in old structures like this. With the whitewashing, the entire place looked bright and inviting, the old beams sailing overhead. Things this old were built to last, by God, and the roof only needed minimal patching to keep the dogs dry in even the nastiest of storms.

It was cozy.

And speaking of cozy, Lucas was standing on a stepladder in the stall next to mine, looking down on me from above as he tackled his own last corner. Lucky corner, I mused.

But wait, he asked me something? Oh, yeah. “Ended what?”

“You and your guy. How close did you get to the big day?”

I almost dropped my brush into the pail. “Oh, please, like I’m going to tell you that,” I scoffed, staring up at him. As he reached for the highest rafter his T-shirt slipped up, revealing an inch or so of tanned skin. I licked my lips without thinking, then grimaced at the taste of paint. Gross.

“Come on, I thought we agreed last night that we could talk to each other about this stuff. Swapping our sad stories?”

“Oh, story this, you nosy veterinarian,” I replied, slapping the last bit of paint on and throwing my brush into the pan. “Done!” I laid down on the floor, feeling the muscles in my back stretching out gratefully.

“Great! You can entertain with me while I finish this last part. Talk, woman.” he instructed, and I shamelessly watched him work.

Could I tell him? Could I talk around the part where I ran out on my wedding hours before it happened? I could give it a shot.

“So you want to know why my fiancé and I broke up?”

“Yup.”

“It’s complicated.”

“I assumed.”

“Hmm, okay. Well, I guess for me, it all boiled down to a feeling I—er, we had. I’d been feeling like something was off for a month or so before the wedding; I think we both felt it. But it didn’t all bubble up and become clear until that last . . . week or so.” So far, so good.
We. Stress the
we. “And we just knew it wasn’t the right thing to do.” Whew.

But like an idiot, I pressed on. “The funny thing is, I think he’d still have gone through with it. I mean, if we didn’t talk about it ahead of time. He wasn’t in love with me, and I wasn’t in love with him, but somehow I don’t think he felt that was necessary for a good marriage.”

“And you?”

“I want it all. I want all-encompassing, knock-your-socks-off, can’t-live-without-you, can’t-be-in-a-room-without-wanting-you-naked love,” I said, closing my eyes and smiling as I said the words. When I opened them, there he was. “I can’t believe I just told you that,” I said, wanting to disappear. But he wouldn’t let me. He stared me down, his eyes searching and strong. I could barely breathe. His body now full of tension, his knuckles whitening on the brush he was holding, he licked his lips.

“Well, that’s what everyone wants, right?” he asked, finally returning to his whitewashing.

I returned to my regularly scheduled breathing. “Is that what you had with Julie?” I asked, my voice unsteady.

He stopped for a second, then continued painting. “We did at one point. And if you’d asked me that question the day before we were supposed to get married, I’d probably have said we still did. But in reality?” He finished up his corner with a resounding smack, then tossed his brush into the bucket. “We didn’t have that. Not anymore.”

He came down the ladder, disappearing from sight while he was on the other side of the stall, but then coming over to sit next to me. We both looked at our handiwork in silence. Then he asked, “What was his name?”

“Charles. Charles Preston Sappington.”

“Yuck.”

“Yuck? You don’t even know anything about him!” I protested, sitting up in a huff.

“Rich guy, right?” he asked, a knowing look on his face.

“Yes.”

“Country club? Well connected? Shirt never untucked?”

“Yes. Yes,” I said, then thought for a moment. “Yes,” I admitted to the last with a sheepish grin.

“I stand by my yuck. Yuck to Chuck.”

“Who was
never
untucked,” I added and he nodded seriously, as though that explained it all. We sat there another moment or so, looking at the work we’d done. “Thanks for helping me finish this up, by the way. Especially on a Sunday.”

“It’s in my contract, right?” he replied. “Nights and weekends.”

“Oh, yeah. Nights and weekends.”

A patch of sunlight had been working its way across the barn floor through a window high up in the rafters. It had finally reached us, and the day immediately felt lazy and unhurried. Like a sunflower, my head turned to follow the warmth, and I
felt content for the first time in a long while. Warm, safe, and altogether gooey. When I turned to share this little bit of nonsense with Lucas, it felt perfectly natural to instead lean in and press my lips to his.

And I very nearly did. I looked at his mouth, those soft lips smiling back at me curiously. I tilted my head just enough to the left, and actually began the leaning in . . . but then stopped myself. He raised an eyebrow—he knew what I’d been thinking. Horrified, I leaned back, shaking my head.

“Did you just—”

“No!” I replied, hiding my face.

“Pretty sure you just tried to—”

“No!” I yelled at my knees.

“I think you almost—”

“No!” I repeated once more, thoroughly embarrassed. And then he was tugging at my arms and unfolding me and pulling me across the floor toward him. “Oh, God, I could just die.”

“Oh, would you quit.” He chuckled, and suddenly I was tucked against his side, his arm around me. “I’ve been thinking about this nights and weekends thing.”

“Uh-huh,” I said, holding my hands over my face so he couldn’t see my flaming cheeks.

“My friends are all married, and most already have kids, so they’re usually pretty busy.”

“That’s great,” I said, monotone.

“So, since I’ve been back from Guatemala, I’ve spent most of my nights and weekends alone. I take extra shifts when I can, but mostly I’ve been . . . well . . .”

“Been what?” I asked, peeking through my fingers at him. He was chewing his lip. His thumb was also absently stroking my hip where he held me close. I let him stroke. It was soothing.

“Moping, I guess. Julie and I were together so long, almost
everything I did was as part of a couple. And alone, it’s just . . . I don’t know.”

“I know what you mean,” I offered. “I miss certain things—not just with Charles, but just . . .”

“Having someone else there?”

“Yeah.” I sighed, leaning against him. He smelled so very good. Equal parts pine and salt air and a hint of sunscreen. Beach rat.

“So I was thinking, let’s just hang out a bit. Run around town, drive up the coast, go do some stuff. How much time have you spent exploring Monterey?”

“Zero,” I admitted. “I’ve been so busy, which is a good thing.”

“It is a good thing, but this is a fantastic town and you should see it.”

“Nights and weekends, huh?”

“Nights and weekends. I’ve been bored out of my mind, and it’ll be nice to hang out with someone again.”

“Just hanging out, right? That’s it?” I asked.

His eyes darkened slightly. “That’s it.”

But there was an undercurrent now, something intangible in the air. He knew it, I knew it, but we were both going to ignore it. Because . . .

“Because it’s just . . . it’s too soon . . . you know?” I said, and he nodded.

“I get it,” he replied, and planted a kiss on my forehead. “I actually do.”

And so we sat, in the sunshine on the floor of the barn, until it moved on. Just me and my kryptonite. Who’d be filling my nights and weekends.

Mm-hmm.

Turns out that nights and weekends had to wait a bit, as I had work to do out of town. I spent a few days at Our Gang in Long Beach, working with Lou and his team on the day-to-day operations of running an organization like this. The amount of fund-raising required was astonishing; just the phone calls to sympathetic ears was staggering. As a satellite operation we received funding mostly through the mother ship, but I’d be responsible for doing some of my own outreach in Monterey. I was already thinking of ways I could not only generate donations, but get the community involved with the placement of the animals by partnering with the local scout troops.

And I got to spend time with the dogs at Our Gang Long Beach. I learned how to socialize the newer dogs, how to work one-on-one with those that came out of more aggressive households, and how to approach a dog that wasn’t used to humans who were actually
kind
. So many of these animals had been mistreated, tied up, left alone on chains in empty lots and backyards,
they’d never known that anyone cared about them.

But when they realized that someone did care, and someone
would let them just be dogs again, to run and jump and play, they could have the same personality that anyone would want in a family pet. Friendly, eager to please, and loving, they’d run with you all day and sleep by your side all night. And that was the image I was taking back with me to Monterey; that was the image I was determined to show anyone who questioned why we were running a rescue for these amazing creatures.