“I was thinking more like some kind of therapeutic counseling with pugil sticks or padded boxing gloves. Tilly was watching that on TV the other day during aDr. Philshow.” She shook her head at him. “What about Reid? Do you want to hit him too?”
“I do, but I’m afraid I’d break him. He’s a little weak.”
“It’s obvious you could clobber him. Why not go to dinner and feel him out? A free meal is never something you turn down, you know,” she teased.
He speared her with his stare. “Would you go with me?”
“Did you not just hear me? Free dinner? Of course.”
The relief he tried to hide brought tears to her eyes, so she pretended to choke on her coffee to hide her compassion. Man, she hadn’t figured on today being so emotional. Learning about each other’s likes and dislikes had seemed a simple enough thing. Smith hated chocolate but liked fruity treats. He loved soccer, hated football, and wasn’t into shopping. At all. But he’d walked and talked with her, held her hand a few times, and glared at anyone who walked too close.
And he kept trying to buy her stuff, which freaked her out. So used to being the one to cater to others, she didn’t know how to handle someone being there for her. God, he had to stop being so darned sweet. He was making her fall for him, something she swore she wouldn’t do so soon after being dumped by Cody.
Looking back, she had trouble understanding how she could have thought herself in love with him. He’d been slick and handsome but nowhere near as attentive and kind as Smith.
Erin sipped her coffee and pondered her dilemma. “Tell me about Cash,” she said to Smith. And as he described a man very much like himself, she wondered how she could help Smith deal with his family problems. Or if she should. None of this was her business. Heck. She could barely deal with her own messy life.
An apartment on the fritz. An argumentative landlord she needed to please to keep her rent affordable—or what passed for affordable in Seattle—and an ex-boyfriend she hadn’t gotten the nerve to deal with. Cody continued to leave her messages, and she knew she needed to resolve her past to make a new future. Why ignore him any longer? She should just talk to him and put him in her rearview mirror.
But… it had only been two weeks since he’d dumped her. Only? It felt like a lifetime ago. She couldn’t imagine being with Cody now after having known Smith.
Still, the realization that so little time had passed cautioned her to slow down with Smith. Just because she happened to find a decent man under all his bluster didn’t mean hearts and flowers and forever would follow. That was nonsense.
So she kept her smile in place, asked the right questions at the right times, and enjoyed the rest of her day with Smith. Then she went home to fetch Tilly’s dinner and fell asleep in her own bed by herself. Wondering when she’d stop feeling so alone and be content with her own company.
Smith didn’t knowwhat had gone wrong. He couldn’t pinpoint when Erin’s attitude had changed, but he had a feeling he’d ruined things by getting all emotional in the coffee shop. She still laughed and smiled with him, but she seemed distanced.
Or he could be imagining it all, because what the hell did he know about women?
“Hey, dickhead, watch where you’re going,” a large man in fatigues and a short haircut yelled at Finley, who was trying to move a monster of a table by himself down a hallway. Finley ignored him and managed to find the elevator.
Friday’s schedule needed everyone out in the trucks. Smith would love to know who’d made the assignments. Today he had a three bedroom move in an apartment that fortunately had an elevator. They’d parked the truck outside, with Stan, one of the ex-air farce guys, as he liked to call them, guarding the truck. The neighborhood fell on the dark side of shady, and the sheer number of questionable types in the building and the surrounding area reinforced the notion. He could see why the small family of five wanted to move.
Between Stan, Smith, and Finley, they had the house covered. Stan guarded the truck while Finley and Smith moved the family’s belongings. Only Mr. Chen stayed behind, his wife and kids already at the new place in Tacoma.
“I’ve packed up the last of the kitchen items,” the man told Smith, who nodded.
“Thanks. We’ll have it moved out and all set to go in no time.” Smith figured another two hours at this rate. They could move faster if they’d had one more body, but with everyone so spread out, they’d made do with what they had.
They needed Stan right where he was. A truck full of goodies had drawn too much interest, in Smith’s opinion. He would have helped Finley move a few items, but he didn’t trust the neighbors not to help themselves to Mr. Chen’s boxes. And Mr. Chen would be little help. The guy seemed afraid of his own shadow.
The large man moving down the hallway lingered by Mr. Chen’s open door. Smith stood just inside and stared at the guy. A few feet shorter but bulked up with more meat than muscle, this nosy neighbor would prove to be a problem. Smith could feel it.
He wanted to tear the guy a new one, especially when the fucker made eye contact and sneered. “You leaving anytime soon? Your guys are blocking the hallway and hogging the elevator, asshole.”
Smith wore his work uniform. Not a good idea to go off on anyone without provocation. Not liking the guy’s looks wouldn’t cut it. He knew beating up dickheads went beyond the scope of his employment. But it would be so satisfying to break this guy in half. He’d been casing the apartment since they’d arrived that morning.
Smith decided to answer the man. He stepped forward, until they stood nose to nose. More like nose to forehead. “Yeah. I’ll be leaving as soon as all of Mr. Chen’s things are moved out. Not one single box had better go missing, or I’ll have to stick around and look for it.” He glared at the guy. “We’re a full-service company, and we take our clients’ security seriously.”
The big dude snorted and scrubbed his military short hair. If this dick had served a day in any service, Smith would eat two helpings of Naomi’s gross chocolate cake—which he prayed she didn’t serve the following night.
Finley returned. “Excuse me, No-neck. We have shit to do.”
Smith would have called him on it except Finley had been talking to the asshole blocking the door, not him for a change. Though slighter than Smith and a lot more glib, Finley had done his time in the Navy as a Master at Arms, what the Navy called their military police. The guy joked too much, had a stupid sense of humor, and liked to perform magic tricks that Smith would never in a million years admit stumped him. He didn’t seem all that intimidating, but Smith had a feeling Finley could hold his own.
He wondered if he was about to watch shit go down. No-neck turned to Finley and glared. “You talking to me?”
Finley grinned. “Well, I’d call him No-neck” —he nodded at Smith— “but I have other names for him. Like Staff Sergeant Grumpy. Or Thanos. Or Satan, which seems to fit the more I come to know him.”
