“Yeah, I write everyone’s number down in my book in case my phone ever decides it wants to purge my contacts or something,” she said, flipping it open and flashing through pages.
“Good idea,” I said and nodded. She was having a hard time juggling the book and the phone to turn pages so I took the book from her and held it open. She found the page and frowned at my phone.
“Shit, sorry, it’s five-four-seven-three,” I told her so she could unlock it.
“Um, you didn’t have to tell me that,” she said with a nervous laugh.
“It’s cool,” I said with a wink. “I trust yah.”
She blushed a bit and pulled up the keypad and entered her friend’s number and I smiled as she turned her back and took a few steps away. While she waited for the call to ring through, I slid a pen out of the inside pocket of my jacket suddenly inspired.
I flipped through her book until I got to the ‘F’s and wrote my name and number on an available line, even threw the address for the farm in there. I put the pen back, slipped one of the farm’s business cards out of my inside pocket and bookmarked the page with it, leaving it sticking out the top of her book.
If she ever needed anything, she could find me.
“I ended up at the bouncer’s house last night,” she said and there was hostility in her tone. I looked up to her hunched shoulders and had a quick moment of regret that quickly turned to pleasure at her next words – “And thank God, he was there to take care of me, because you sure weren’t. I just want my stuff back.”
There was a long pause, and she pinched the bridge of her nose.
“One of those yahoos put something in my drink, Lindsay. I’m glad you had a good time, but I really didn’t.” She turned and looked at me and said, “At least not until this morning. I just really want my purse and my phone back.”
Another pause.
“I’m at home. I had a hidden key… Yes, that’s fine. Okay. See you in a few. Bye.”
I was proud of her. She wasn’t taking any shit from her friend and letting her gaslight her. I held out her book when she held out my phone.
She took it, one eyebrow going up at the card sticking out the top.
“New number to add when you get your phone back,” I said. “Just call if you need anything.”
“Oh, thank you,” she said with a light blush. “I don’t want to impose any more than I already have, though.”
“Hey, it was no imposition,” I said. “Just glad I was there to catch you.”
“Me too,” she murmured, setting her address book aside on top of one of the boxes.
“I’ll, uh, be right back,” she said. “Just two seconds.”
“Take your time,” I murmured at her back. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t checking out the rounded curve of her ass beneath the checkered flannel of mine she had on.
She disappeared into one of the bedrooms and I sighed, rocking back and forth impatiently between my heels and the balls of my feet on the area rug that covered the worn-down hardwood floor beneath it.
I could already tell, she was gonna be on my mind for a minute. I somehow hoped she would find an excuse to call me soon.
Chapter Three
Aspen…
I kept thinking about him – Fenris – long after he’d left and Lindsay had arrived. She was wholly unrepentant about things and genuinely didn’t understand what the big deal was. She seriously thought it was just another rowdy night out with the girls. Like, I was fine and overreacting. I didn’t think I was angry enough, but to be honest? I just couldn’t muster up the energy for it.
Instead, I’d taken my things, had checked to make sure everything was there, and I’d ended the friendship. Done. Right then and there. No going back.
I was tired of being mistreated. Only thing I was more tired of was the fact that I’d been allowing it for so long.
I took a hot shower, a proper one with shampoo and conditioner this time. I hadn’t used any of the stuff at the goat farm. I didn’t want to dry out my hair and let it turn into a frizzy mess on me – so I’d just watered it down really, really, good until I got home. Now, I felt truly clean and that was saying something.
I’d washed a lot more down my shower drain than just dirt and used soap.
I made myself some hot tea in my favorite hand-thrown mug and settled into my favorite old chair of my mom’s in the living room.
So much was up in the air, it wasn’t even funny. I didn’t know how long I had to live here with Mom still owing on the house and everything still caught up – even more tangled now that my brother had died.
I supposed I would have to sell it, which I didn’t want to do, but I didn’t see any other option. After paying the rest owed, I might get out with at least a decent down payment for a place of my own. I just didn’t want to think about any of it right now.
I unlocked my mostly recharged phone and picked up my address book from the side table where I’d relocated it.
I couldn’t imagine calling Fenris for anything else, but I couldn’t deny I wanted to. Just… Jesus! How soon was too soon? My divorce wasn’t even final. I’d only left Charles four months ago.
He was being an ass over the division of assets, trying to get me to talk to him, but I didn’t want to.
I heaved a big sigh at the big fat mess in front of me and let my gaze un-focus, drawing up the image in my mind’s eye of my unlikely savior.
He was unconventionally handsome – rugged, and those blue eyes of his… I shuddered to think of how they seemed to see through right down into my soul. He was massive, imposing, and downright scary but I couldn’t help but realize how kind, gentle and how sweet everything he had done for me had been. He’d been a perfect gentleman, and it just didn’t make sense to me, what with his rough exterior.
I plucked the business card out of my book and read it over again.
Fjordson’s Family Farm
Fenris Fjordson, his address, and an office number. I wondered if Fjordson was his actual last name or if it was made up too. I mean, he’d already said that he went by Fenris, so that couldn’t really be his first name.
I sighed and entered him in as a new contact, adding his mobile number that he’d written in my book and the business line under ‘work’ for good measure.
It was raining heavily outside the front window and I sat in the little golden pool of lamplight, cozy in my pajamas and robe, hands wrapped around the steaming mug in my hands and just let the sky cry for me, too spent to shed any more tears right this moment.
I wanted to, though. Just how many losses am I supposed to take this year? I wondered. First Mom, then Copper, then Charles, and now Lindsay – I didn’t have many friends and so I was feeling the loss keenly.
I sniffed, sipped some tea, and closed my eyes, letting my tears match the rainfall outside my mom’s window.
I missed them. I missed them all terribly.
God, I felt too old at thirty-eight to be starting all over again… but here I was, and that was just what I was going to do.
I sighed and tried not to let my misery swamp me which was a lot easier said than done. It felt like my mind was literally on fire. I had this funny feeling in my chest, and every time I looked around at the mountain of boxes around me, I felt overwhelmed.