“Well,” Mr. Cooper continued on the moment his co-owner seemed to have settled into the seat beside me. “We brought you in here because of what happened earlier.”
And, I was right. This was about Jason. Or maybe my cousin coming to my job and starting issues…. But I didn’t think Mr. Cooper would blame me for that. Luckily, there hadn’t been any customers around to see it, so it wasn’t like it would impact business.
Rip leaned forward and took hold of the conversation, his gaze leeching straight on me. “Tell us what’s been going on with Jason.”
Mr. Cooper jumped in immediately. “From the beginning, Luna. Tell us what’s been going on with him when he’s with you. You’ve told me some of it, but I think Rip should hear it from the beginning too.”
So this was where we were going. It had nothing to do with Rudy—thankfully. But either they had watched the video or heard that Jason had been the one to let him into the lot, and his disappearing act afterward hadn’t helped either. The dummy hadn’t thought that through at all. Didn’t he know that even if he never came back, employers checked references?
So I told them, “I never said anything, but I knew him before he started working here.”
Somehow I missed how Rip’s eyes narrowed as they flicked from Mr. Cooper to me and back to the older man again. I didn’t like the look that came over Rip’s face before he asked, “How?”
Here we went. “He dated my sister two years ago. It was a mess. I didn’t like him when she introduced me to him, and I didn’t like him six months later when it turned out he got another girl pregnant. I stayed out of it, but when he would come by the apartment and try to see her, if I was home, I would tell him to leave. Anyway, then he applied here—I hadn’t even known he was interested in working in this field back then—but I didn’t want to bring up personal stuff to either of you. I could live with thinking he was a… you know, not a good person.
“But almost immediately after he started here, he began being really rude and disrespectful. I wasn’t exactly the nicest and warmest person to him, but he was really defensive about everything. I didn’t like him, and he knew that, but I tried to be professional. Nothing helped though.
“He’s messed up a bunch of times since he started coming to help me, and I swear he does it on purpose. He doesn’t listen. He’s got a bad attitude. Insubordinate. He’s petty and lazy,” I kept going. “We get into it over everything, even before he came over to my section. Mr. C knows he’s done some petty crap, but it was on purpose, I swear. And, Rip, you’ve heard him on the phone with me, you know he’s a weasel.
“Today though, we got into a disagreement and he walked out of the room and didn’t come back for half an hour, so that was when I went to look for him. You can ask Owen and some of the other guys, they saw me or asked what I was doing, and I told them. Miguel told me he saw him outside, and that’s why I went out there in the first place. I saw him, and he ignored me and walked right by me, and the next thing I knew…” I’d gotten shoved from behind.
“You saw it happen?” Mr. Cooper asked Ripley with a frown.
“I got there after,” my younger boss confirmed, his expression tight. “Miguel and I were by the back door when we heard Luna yell, and we went right by him on the way out the door. I was too… distracted to stop and think about what he’d been doing.” I didn’t miss the way he fisted a big hand.
“You should’ve gone back in and made sure he didn’t leave,” Mr. Cooper replied pretty freaking crisply, sounding angrier than I had ever heard him, and that was saying something because I’d eavesdropped on his arguments with Rip before.
My younger boss’s mouth slackened, and I knew whatever was about to come out of his mouth was no good.
So I tried to but in. “It’s my fault. I should have said something to one of you and told you the truth when he was being a pain over the last few weeks. I should have followed him back into the building when he was making it obvious he was ignoring me—”
Rip cut me off, blatantly ignoring me as he asked Mr. Cooper tightly, “I was busy making sure Luna was all right. Whatshould’vehappened is that youshould’velistened to me when I said you needed to quit trying to make him Luna’s apprentice.”
Wait. He’d told Mr. C not to stick him with me?
Rip kept right on going. “I told youthere was something off about the kid.I told youshe didn’t like him working with her.”
He’d done that too?
“I told you we should have fired him after his first fuckup, but you said ‘Let’s give him another chance. He’s young. Everyone makes mistakes,’didn’t you?”
“I didn’t know it was that bad,” the older man claimed in a wobbly voice, his face flushing.
“Me telling you wasn’t enough?” Rip returned. “Her telling you wasn’t enough?”
Shit, shit, shit. “No, it’s my fault. Mr. Cooper, I should have insisted—”
Ripley’s hand came up and he waved me off. “No. I told him.” He pointed one thick, long finger in Mr. Cooper’s direction. “I told you, and her fucking cousin could have had a gun on him. He could’ve had a bat on him, a tire iron. She could’ve gotten her brains bashed in because you always think you know what’s right!”
I could have not been there or within ten miles based on how intense the stare down they were having with each other was.
And suddenly, I had a feeling that this conversation had just taken a sudden turn to This Has Nothing To Do With Me.
I would have been right.
“I had no idea—”
“You never have an idea,” Ripley said, loudly.
