The Offer (9 page)

I make us both
some sliced avocado on whole-grain bread (the doctor said the way
I’d been feeding her – low in sugar – was excellent and to keep it
up. It’s nice to know that at least I didn’t bring it upon her). We
sit down on the couch and I read a picture book to Ava between
bites. Somewhere in the building I can hear a couple arguing
loudly. The neighbor above me has a shower – the pipes rattle the
walls. To think I could be out of this place, one foot out of the
mess, one foot toward my future.

I just really
hope there’s nothing else that is owed for this. That Bram doesn’t
expect anything from me. I hadn’t really thought I’d be his sex
slave. I just wanted to poke fun at his manwhore ways, but even so
I have a hard time believing that I won’t be in debt to him in the
end. The thought of owing something, anything, to a man like that
is a scary one.

And I hate
that I find it kind of exciting as well.

I stare at my
phone on the coffee table. I could call Steph and get her opinion,
but in the end, it’s not going to change anything. I know already
what has to be done.

I fish out the
card, pick up my phone and dial.

“Hello,
Bram?”

***

“I can’t
believe you’re doing this,” Steph says to me as she walks into my
near empty apartment and hands me a giant cup of coffee she just
picked up from Bluebottle. I slurp it back, even though it burns my
lips and throat as we survey the place.

It’s Saturday
morning and just over a week after I told Bram I accepted his offer
to move into his apartment complex. My landlord was angry at my
short notice but he was angry to begin with, so that didn’t make
much difference. With Steph, Kayla, and sometimes Linden, we were
able to pack up my apartment really fast. Even though it’s a small
place, I was surprised how much junk I’d collected over the years.
I think there’s a sentimental hoarder somewhere inside me but it
was very freeing to give a lot of it away. Clean slate.

Ava is off
with my mom in Livermore for the day, which is wonderful, although
I’m extremely nervous about her giving the insulin shots correctly.
I know I shouldn’t doubt my mom – I showed her how and she has a
neighbor with diabetes just in case she needs help but I think my
worry meter has been pushed to eleven for the rest of my life.

Steph, Kayla,
Linden and Bram are all helping me this moving day. Bram said he
would gladly pay for the cost of a moving company, but I don’t want
any more of his charity, and to be honest, I wanted to see him
sweat a little. We’ve been up since 6am and working like maniacs to
get everything packed up. With a few final boxes we were back in
the apartment, probably – hopefully – for the last time.

I mull over
what Steph just said. “In a good way or a bad way?”

“In a good
way,” she says, drinking her own coffee for a second, her bright
magenta lipstick leaving clean marks on the lid. “I mean, this is
amazing. I just hope Bram stays true to his word.”

“Well, I’m a
charity case, remember?”

“I gotta say
that surprises me too. Because I never knew he was big on charity,
even when tax breaks were involved.” She smiles at me. “But you
know what, charity or tax breaks or whatever, this is awesome for
you.”

“Almost done?”
Kayla asks, appearing at the doorway. Her pale skin is flushed with
sweat, her long black hair pulled back into a ponytail underneath a
pink baseball cap. She’s not wearing any makeup and as usual she
looks fantastic. Her Japanese mother passed onto her perpetually
flawless skin.

“Almost,” I
tell her. “There’s a box for you.” I nod at a huge one in the
corner.

“Oh, great,”
she says sarcastically and goes over, bending down to lift it.
“Don’t tell me all your hardcover books are in here.”

“Pillows and
cushions,” I tell her just as she lifts it up with ease.

She comes over
with it and looks around at the empty walls. It doesn’t even look
like I lived here at all. “Wow. I know you made this place real
cute, Nicola, but I think we all need to have some champagne
tonight to celebrate the fact that I don’t have to come back to
this damn neighborhood and get asked by Hustlin’ Joe outside for
change and a BJ every time I visit.”

“Hustlin’
Joe?” I repeat.

She shrugs.
“His words, not mine. Okay, ladies, are you done taking in the
water-stained ceiling and the peeling linoleum? Because the men
want to get this show on the road. Remember unpacking is just as
bad as packing.”

I take in a
deep breath. I’m ready.

We go outside
and I see my landlord – soon to be ex – Mr. Stanley, standing by
the building with his short arms crossed over his portly stomach,
smoking a cigarette and glaring at the moving van. That was one
thing I let Bram hire for the day.

“Mr. Stanley,”
I say to him, coming over, cradling my box that I’ve labeled
“Kitchen Crap.” In a second, Linden comes and wordlessly takes the
box out of my hands and puts it in the van.

“Don’t expect
to get a good reference from me,” Mr. Stanley says to me, cigarette
puffing out the sides of his fat mouth. He frowns so much he looks
like he has a unibrow.

“Well, that’s
not exactly fair,” I tell him calmly, though what I really want to
do is give him a piece of my mind. “I would have given you a
month’s notice but it just didn’t end up that way. Wouldn’t you
have rather this than me not paying rent and having to evict
me?”

“But I enjoy
evicting people,” he says with smile. “And this way, you don’t get
your security deposit back.”

Shit. Shit.
Shit! I completely forgot about that deposit. $500 is a hell of a
lot of money for me right now.

“Is there a
problem here?”

Suddenly Bram
is at my side and he’s putting one hand on my shoulder. It’s warm
and steady in the cool, grey morning. It feels good. That’s
probably why I want to shrug it off.

But I don’t
dare in front of Mr. Stanley. Besides, Bram is putting up a pretty
intimidating front. For once he’s not in a suit, but dark jeans and
a white t-shirt that fits every contour of his body and shows off
his muscles. I’d been trying not to notice during the move – not
the tan of his skin or the way his arms flex when he lifts
something or the damp spot of sweat on his back. But now I’m
grateful that his bulk is on display because I don’t for a second
want Mr. Stanley to think he can get away with being an
asshole.

“No problem,”
Mr. Stanley says through a sneer. He rips his cigarette out from
his mouth and glares up at Bram who towers over him and pretty much
everyone else. “Just informing the girl here on how to be a good
tenant. You leave like a good tenant. She hasn’t.”

“The girl,”
Bram drawls out in his brogue, “is leaving because she and her
daughter don’t want to live in a rat-infested hell-hole. You don’t
think I haven’t been inside your building and seen how many
building code violations you’re breaking, let alone any of the ones
that would get you fired from being a building manager?”

Mr. Stanley’s
face falters for a moment. I don’t think I’ve ever seen his
eyebrows come apart.

“I’ve also
been moving shit out of her apartment all day,” Bram goes on and
takes out his phone, waving it at him. “I have pictures of the
damaged between-floor barriers designed to prevent the spread of
fire, a broken dry sprinkler system, a fire alarm system control
panel flashing ‘trouble’ and an out-of-date fire safety plan, as
well as rat droppings in the hallways, an elevator that doesn’t
work, forcing all people, even the elderly, to take the stairs, and
carpenter ant damage in the lobby. I’m going to assume its spread
throughout the rest of the building.”

My mouth drops
open. Bram noticed all that?

Mr. Stanley is
pale. The cigarette is shaking in his hand.

“One call to
the fire department and you’ll be fined at least $20,000,” Bram
tells him, head high. “You’ll probably lose your job too. Or you
could give the girl her security deposit back and we’ll be on our
way.”

“Wow,” I hear
Kayla say from behind me. “Bram’s the man.”

Bram looks at
me briefly and winks. “There’s another motto for ya.” Then he fixes
a steady gaze back on Mr. Stanley. “So, what’s it going to be?”

Mr. Stanley
doesn’t have to think twice. He rips out his check book from his
back pocket and writes me a check for $500. He hands it to me,
unable to look me in the eye now then quickly heads back to the
building.

“And no
worries about being her reference,” Bram calls after him. “She’s
got me for that.”

He nudges me
in the side with his elbow. “Come on, let’s get the fuck out of
here.”

We walk to the
van where Steph, Kayla and Linden are watching us. I quickly give
Bram a sidelong glance. “You really want me to like you, don’t
you?”

He smiles,
dimples and everything. “Oh, you like me. You just don’t know it
yet.” He nods at Linden. “Come, brother, let’s go.”

I walk over to
Steph who will drive me and Kayla in her car.

Kayla calls
out at Bram. “Did you really notice all those violations?”

Bram nods.
“I’ve learned something as a building manager. And believe me, next
week, I am putting a call into the fire department.”

The three of
us stand on the curb and watch as he gets in the van and it starts
with a rumble.

“Damn,” Kayla
says as they drive off. “That was some hot shit.” She looks at me.
“You’re lucky you’re moving in next to that guy.” She pauses, lips
pursing. “Are you going to move into his bed too?”

I roll my
eyes. “Hell no. I mean, maybe he’s a bit nicer than I thought at
first,” Kayla raises her brows, “okay, a lot nicer, but he’s still
a jackass.”

“Jackass is a
strong word for you, miss manners,” she teases. “Does this have
anything to do with what happened at the wedding?” she asks.

“No,” I say,
glaring at her before I walk over to Steph’s car. “And you didn’t
see anything, so don’t go thinking something happened between us.
It didn’t. It really didn’t.”

I can feel
Steph and Kayla exchanging a look behind my back.

Later in the
car as we drive down Van Ness, Kayla taps me on the shoulder from
the backseat. “Why do you think he’s a jackass?”

I blow a piece
of hair that came loose from my bun. “Because…he’s a manwhore.”

“That doesn’t
make him a jackass. That makes him fun.”

Which makes me “no fun,”
I think, remembering what he’d said to me at the
wedding.

“I just don’t
trust guys like that,” I tell her after a moment.

“But you’re
not dating him,” she says. “So you don’t have to worry about that,
do you?”

I shake my
head. “You’re right. I don’t.” And really, I shouldn’t. But that
night plays over and over in my head, the sweet feel of his lips,
the sharp sting of rejection. It probably doesn’t help that the
last man I kissed, the last person who turned me on and made me
feeling something, instead of nothing, was Bram.

Once you go Bram, you won’t give a damn.
But I did.

“Why all the
questions Kayla?” Steph asks, her tone cautious as she eyes her in
the rearview mirror.

“I can ask
questions,” Kayla says.

“Mmm hmm. But
you’ve got that look in your eyes.”

“What look?
I’m Asian, you racist.”

“Shut up,”
Steph says. “You know the look. The one you get when you find your
next lay.”

Oh? I turn in
my seat and look at Kayla. Yup, she’s got that look.

“Are you
interested in Bram?” I ask her. Kayla had broken off her engagement
with her ex-boyfriend a couple of years ago and now was always
perpetually single but not for lack of trying. Any hot bod and
she’s all over it. She even had a fling with Linden for a few weeks
back in the day when Steph and him were just good friends. I’m not
sure how Steph dealt with that but she doesn’t hold a grudge like I
do.

Kayla shrugs
casually but I can see right through her. “I don’t know. He’s just
really hot, that’s all. And he’s got money. And he’s got that bad
boy appeal but like the ante is upped because he’s a man, not a
boy. I mean, now that’s a man. Like if you hooked up, he’d probably
ruin your vagina for everyone after.”

I scrunch up
my nose. “Way to be classy.”

“Yeah, Kayla,
that’s my brother-in-law you’re talking about,” Steph admonishes
her.

“So,” she
says. “You’re not blood relatives. You told me you thought his
brother was hot.”

“I did. But
he’s not Linden.”

Kayla rolls
her eyes and flops back into her seat. “Of course he’s not Linden.
How dare anyone be even close to Linden?” she says mockingly. “You
know, Steph, just because you’re married doesn’t make you
blind.”

“Sure, but I
don’t try and think of Bram as hot. Still, you’re right. He is. And
if you don’t mind being played, then go right ahead and have your
fun,” she says. “But don’t come crying to me if it doesn’t work out
and don’t you dare fuck anything up with the nice relationship
everyone has at the moment. You know you’ve done that once before,”
she adds under her breath.

Ah, so Steph
hasn’t forgotten the whole Linden and Kayla hookup.

Kayla grows
quiet. We drive for a bit then she says, “Fine. I guess one
McGregor brother was enough for me.”

I snap my head
back at her and find Kayla grinning wickedly. Steph’s hands are
growing white on the steering wheel. I feel like we’re seconds away
from a catfight and I start wondering what I’ll do to try and break
them apart. I’ve got strong arms from lifting Ava and booster
seats.

But Kayla
bursts out laughing and smacks Steph on the shoulder. “I’m fucking
kidding! Jeez, can’t we joke about the past anymore?”