“Did you wire feed this?” Mickey asked, running his fingertips over the torn metal.
“What else?” the guy asked sourly.
“Just wire, right? Not flux core?”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Not enough heat,” Mickey said. “Shoulda burned it in with stick, or run the MIG hot as hell with flux core.”
“Shit,” he guy said, disgusted.
“You got a grinder?” Mickey asked.
“Yeah.”
“Okay. Give me a pencil.” Mickey made heavy lines along either side of the weld. “Grind that out to clean metal. I’ve got to go pull the props off Mr. Oliver’s boat. Clean this up while I’m doing it, I’ll drag out the Miller and we’ll stick it together again. Be done before lunch.”
“How much?”
Mickey grinned. “How much you losing sitting on your thumb?”
“A fucking bunch,” the guy said. “Still, I gotta know what...”
“Fifty an hour, including set up and tear down,” Mickey said. “Maybe a hundred, hundred and a half. You doing the grinding will save you another hundred.”
“Christ.”
“Cash,” Mickey said. “Cost you more if you call somebody in.”
“You better be worth it.”
“Don’t worry, I know my shit,” Mickey said. “Be back in thirty, forty-five minutes.”
Pulling props was no problem. He used the correct pullers and a wrench. Mickey didn’t like beating on things unless they needed beating on. He tied them both off to the dock and climbed out of the water only bleeding in a couple of places from the barnacles. Then he stripped the dive gear off and hauled the props up so Pete Oliver could see them.
“I’m supposed to take some people out this coming Wednesday,” Oliver said, looking unhappily at the damaged starboard prop.
“Darrel is a good man,” Mickey said. “He’ll have these babies like new by Sunday, and I’ll be here bright and early Monday to rehang them.” He motioned to the boat. “Needs her bottom scrubbed, Mr. Oliver. And you ought to replace those zincs pretty soon.”
“How’s the bottom paint?”
“Might get the summer out of it if you take care.”
“How much to scrub her down?”
“Three dollars a foot, ten for each zinc, plus costs. She’s what...sixty feet? Hundred and eighty, then eight flat zincs on the rudders and water plate, and a pair of clamp-ons for the shafts at twenty per. Be three hundred, time I finish.”
“And she’ll be ready by...?”
“Monday lunch,” Mickey said. “I’ll be here at seven.”
Oliver nodded toward the barge. “What about that weld job?” he asked.
“That’s between me and your guys. Told him fifty an hour.”
“You get all this shit done, I’ll see there’s a bonus in it,” Oliver said. “You don’t, I’ll be pissed.”
“I’m a man of my word, Mr. Oliver.”
Mickey didn’t get home until after dark, but he had another three hundred in his pocket by then, plus a fifty dollar tip from Oliver. And that was aside from Davidson’s money. Half for the props from Jones and that much again from the seawall guys. Plus another three for Oliver’s boat cleaning on Monday, and a buck fifty on top of that from Jones when Mickey finished reinstalling on the other two boats in the afternoon.
With the run to Miami, which was a cake job in spite of his bitching, he’d have seven hundred dollars cash before the week-end. And the good news was that the seawall guys were going to have him do some repair and reinforcing on their battered jib crane, which would take two or three days, although at slightly reduced rates from the emergency repair at Oliver’s house. Maybe seven or eight hundred more by the time he got done late in the week. First no money at all, and suddenly he was up a grand and a half. Things were definitely looking up especially after the long dry spell after Ponz laid him off.
The baby was already asleep when he got done unloading the truck, but Sandy was up. She’d brought the roses home from work and arranged them in a green vase on the kitchen table. “I made spaghetti,” she said.
“Let me get cleaned up,” he said. “I smell like a horse.”
“You want a glass of wine? We’ve got some of that Chianti you like.”
“Perfect,” he said.
Sandy sat with him while he ate, sipping a little wine. She was barefoot, and had on her glasses and the thin cotton granny gown with tiny blue flowers on it. Her hair was still damp from her shower, which she would have taken after Cindy was safely in bed. Mickey liked girls in glasses. He thought about the girl at Oliver’s. The thin one. Pretty as hell, and an engineer, they said. She wore glasses, too.
“The rent was due yesterday,” Sandy said eventually, like she hated to remind him or something. “We only have six hundred dollars in the bank, Mick. We’re low on groceries, and I’m not sure I can face the landlord again. It’s so embarrassing.”
“How much we need?” he asked.
She sighed. “I hate this,” she said sadly, wiping at her eyes. “We don’t have enough to get by, Mick. We never...”
“How much?”
Sandy sat back in the chair looking at her hands folded in her lap. “It’s endless, honey. We need three hundred more just for the rent, and a hundred for groceries, and the light bill is a week overdue, and...”
“I got enough,” he said, thinking about the money in his jeans and the three hundred and some from Davidson. “I’ll leave it on the dresser, okay?”
“What do you mean, enough?”
“Enough,” he said.
“Where did it come from?”
“Grows on trees down around here,” he said, finishing the spaghetti. “Didn’t you know that, Sandy? Money’s just lying on the ground.”
“I mean it,” she said. “You didn’t sell your bike or something, did you? I don’t want you to...”
“Didn’t have to,” he said. “I will, if that’s what it takes, but I’ve got some things cooking right now. Maybe I can keep that going for awhile.”
Tears spilled onto Sandy’s cheeks. “I don’t know what to say,” she said.
“Tell you what,” Mick said. “Write me a four hundred dollar check. I’ll take that and the cash and pay the rent. Hold off on the electric until I get the hundred from Ponz tomorrow afternoon. It’ll be cash, as well, so I can pay FPL on Saturday. That’ll leave you enough in the bank for groceries. Put gas in the Volkswagen and let Cindy order us a pizza in for tomorrow night. She loves doing that.”
Sandy was surprised. She was the one who always seemed to be taking care of the bills. She wiped her face again and looked at him in consternation. “I can pay the rent,” she said in a low voice. “And my paycheck tomorrow will...”
“I’ll do it. Mr. Schwartz is an asshole. You don’t need to be dealing with assholes, baby. Me, I’m used to it.” Schwartz was their landlord.
“I don’t mind.”
“You don’t mind his hand on your butt, or him gaping down your shirt?”
She sighed. “He doesn’t mean anything by it, Mickey.”
“The fuck you talking about? Man puts his hands on my wife and you tell me he doesn’t mean anything by it?”
“I didn’t mean...”
“I said I’d do it,” he cut in. “I mean it, Sandy. You stay away from that prick. He lays another hand on you; I’m going to kick his ass.”
“There’s too much of that going around,” she said. “I guess you heard about Mr. Davidson, didn’t you?”
“Who?”
“The man who does our impression moulds. You know, the retired FBI guy. He was mugged and robbed.” The tears came again. “I just saw him at the restaurant that night, and then he...”
“All that FBI training he brags about, and he gets mugged?” He remembered the shock in his forearms as the baseball bat did its work on Davidson’s sorry ass.
“Somebody hurt him bad.”
“Fuck him,” Mickey said, feigning indifference. “He’s another asshole, Sandy.”
“Oh, honey, don’t say that. It’s just mean and...” Sandy let her voice trail off and took his empty plate to the sink. Mickey figured it was to keep from saying something else, maybe too much.
“I’m going to brush my teeth,” he said abruptly, getting up. “Maybe you’d rub my shoulders a little bit? I’m bushed, and I’ve got to be at Ponz’s at seven. A back rub with the magic hands will put me out like a light.”
“Alright,” she said quietly with her back to him.
“And take that damned granny gown off. I don’t ever want to see it again.”
Chapter Seven
Sandy was standing naked in front of an open dresser drawer when Mickey came back from the bathroom. She had the cotton nightgown in one hand and was digging around in the drawer for something else to wear. She didn’t do that very often, stand around naked where he could see her. Mickey thought she looked great.
“I really don’t have anything else,” she said. “I guess I could wear that black thing again, if you like.”
“Your skin will be just fine,” he said. “In fact, it
is
fine.”
“Nothing you haven’t seen before,” she said, closing the drawer.
“Yeah, but I don’t see it often enough,” he said, and peeled off his tee shirt. He was sunburned and his muscles ached with that pleasant feel of work well done. It made him feel strong and healthy, which he was. “Come on to bed,” he said, slipping naked under the sheets. “You’re not getting out of that back rub, girl.”
She gave him a quick grin. “I’m not trying to get out of it,” she said. “Just let me check on Cindy and get the oil.”
“I checked on her already. She’s fine. And I don’t want any oil. I want your hands on me.”
“You’re a naughty boy,” she said, letting a little silk into her voice.
Mickey didn’t say anything to that, watching her go to switch off the lights. He loved watching her move, the way her hips rocked, the slight movement of her taut breasts, the way her arms moved. She slid in beside him and kissed him and he put his arm around her bare shoulders to draw her in.
“Next week,” he said, “we’ll get you a tattoo.”
“I’m scared to get a tattoo.”
“Something small and pretty to start with,” he said.
“It would have to be...you know, out of sight somewhere.”
“I’m thinking on your stomach, way down low.”
“Will it hurt?”
He laughed. “Does it hurt when I spank your butt?”
“That’s different,” she said with a little grin.
“I’ll tell you when.”
Sandy licked him thoughtfully and looked up into his eyes. “We have to be careful, honey. The budget...”
“Let me worry about it,” he said. “And don’t talk with your mouth full.”
“My...?”
He reached down to grip himself and grinned at her.
“Oh,” she said.
The first time they ever went down on each other was in the front seat of his father’s car. They’d been in high school. Neither of them had any experience, and Sandy just couldn’t believe that he would want to kiss her
there
. He did. Mickey thought her pussy was the most beautiful and exotic thing on earth, and Sandy loved the power that cock sucking gave her. She wasn’t too sure about the cum-in-the-mouth thing, and had let him pop her cherry rather than try it.
They ran away to get married at eighteen. Being high school sweethearts gave them the confidence, college gave them the freedom, and their youth meant they didn’t have enough brains or discipline to control the hormones. They had a ratty little garage efficiency at school and made love just about anytime they could, sometimes two or three times a day. Their parents found out eventually, but by then it was obvious they hadn’t married because Sandy was pregnant, because she wasn’t. Besides, it was too late by then for anybody to do anything about it.
Six years later, they had become quite adept at pleasing each other. Mickey knew how to flip her switches pretty much at will with his lips and tongue, at least when she was in the mood, and Sandy...well, she could suck the chrome off a truck bumper when she set her mind to it.
She curled on her side beside him in bed and kissed his flat belly, stroking his erection with one hand and supporting her upper body with one elbow pressed into the mattress by his ribs. It meant he could see her in profile until she got to his dick, and then all he saw was the back of her head. He stroked her back for a minute as she sucked him, and then shifted his feet.
“Lie down between my legs,” he said. “I want to see you.”
Sandy did what he asked, getting up onto all fours to pull the sheet down all the way and to move toward the foot of the bed. She lay down with her arms hooked over his thighs and nuzzled his ball sack with her nose.
“It’s kind of embarrassing, you watching me,” she said with a low, self-conscious kind of laugh.
“I love seeing you with a mouthful of cock,” he said, crossing his arms behind his head and settling in to watch.
“Oh, you,” she said, abashed and pleased by his language.
She toyed with him, licking his balls and his thighs, and then took him in her mouth again. Mickey watched her lips form around him and saw the indentation of her cheeks as she sucked.
“Don’t forget the tongue,” he said, sounding a little hoarse even to himself.
Sandy rolled her eyes at him, but her tongue slithered around the thick urethral vein on the underside of his penis and there came just the faintest electric shocks of her teeth scraping over him. It made him catch his breath with the pleasure of it. She sucked the head, biting a little, and then took him deep again. He groaned, deciding that he would cum in her mouth, even if he had to hold her down to do it.
Mickey knew that what she was doing would not be quite strong enough to get him off. It was wonderful, the way she focused on him, but she had no way of knowing just how forceful he liked things to be. Eventually, he rolled her onto her back with her head hanging over the side of the bed, and half squatted for her to suck him again. She reached up to grip him with both hands, and Mickey put his own hands flat down on her breasts and leaned forward.
“You hold still now,” he said in a strained voice, bucking his hips. “I’ll get you some dessert in about ten more seconds.”
Sandy made a noise but before she could voice any kind of protest he was spurting. She coughed and swallowed. He could see the muscles in her throat moving. He took one hand off her chest and reached down to close the grip over her hands. He worked it hard, squeezing her fingers tightly around the shaft for maximum effect, and spurted, and spurted, and then spurted again. She choked a little through her nose, but he held her still until he was done.