NINETEEN
WHEN CLAIRE CAME OUTOF the building at five to four, Luke’s car was already in the lot. She slipped off her tool belt and slid inside the luxurious interior as he started the engine.
“Finally,” he said, pulling her to him for a quick hard kiss. “I didn’t think you’d ever come out. Buckle up. I want to get out of here before Sparks corners me to talk about storage trailers.”
She laughed at the pained expression on his face. “I’m five minutes early.”
“It doesn’t matter. It was still too long.” He reached over to cup her face, letting his fingers trail down the sensitive skin of her throat. “Come on let’s go get something to eat.”
“I want to pick up my truck first. I need to get a few sheets of drywall to replace what was ruined. I can’t stand the idea of painting over it and just hiding the ugliness. I want it gone.” It still hurt to think about the damage that had been done to her house but she was ready to move forward. No one accomplished anything by holding on to a broken past. “I thought you could help me load it and hang it,” she said, giving him her bestyou know you want tosmile.
Something that looked like concern flashed over his face but before she could be sure she’d even seen it, he’d pushed the feeling aside and shielded his expression. The closer they got to the house the quieter and more withdrawn he became, and she was left wondering if she’d done something wrong. She hadn’t meant to say I love you when they were making love. It slipped out, but with the way he’d acted this morning, she was pretty sure he hadn’t heard her.
When they turned the corner and she saw the flurry of activity around her house, she realized she wasn’t the one that had made the mistake. The sheet rockers truck from the Ashton Court jobsite sat behind hers in the driveway and men were moving in and out of the house carrying tools and materials.
“What the fuck did you do?” She jumped out of the car as soon as he got close to the curb and raced into her house, pushing past the men she’d had nothing to do with hiring.
“Thank you gentlemen,” she said. “Pack up your things and get out. Now.”
The lead guy from the sheetrock crew looked up from the bucket of joint compound he was pounding closed. “We’re not finished yet.”
“You are here. Get your gear and leave.”
“Mr. Masters,” he said, looking over her shoulder with palpable relief. “We have about another hour’s work to finish the upstairs, and the floor guy should be done an hour or so after that. We’ve been chasing each other so we didn’t get dust in the mud.”
“I don’t care what you’ve been doing,” said Claire, gritting her teeth against the rage threatening to blind her. “I want you out of my house now. All of you or I’m calling the cops.” She hated sounding like a hysterical woman in front of the puzzled men, but right now, she hated Luke’s high handed arrogance more. The fact that the drywall guy chose to talk to Luke instead of her on her own job for fuck’s sake threw gas on the fire of her anger.
‘Wait a minute, Claire.” Luke laid a restraining hand on her arm, and she whirled to face him. “I’m the one who called them. If you’re going to be angry at someone, be angry at me.”
“Not a problem.” She spat back at him. “I am furious with you. A situation I plan to deal with as soon as I get all these people I didn’t hire out of my god damned house!”
She followed an extension cord, again not hers, to the front room and yanked it from the outlet she’d wired for temporary service. Upstairs a machine that sounded like a floor sander wound down.
“What the hell?” A man she didn’t recognize tugged a paper dust mask from his face and leaned over the railing.
“You’re done. Pack up and get out.” There was enough command in her voice to get him moving. “And tell anyone else up there to get out, too.”
SHE STOOD BY the front door ushering out the men that Luke had sent to her house like a colony of worker ants. Maintaining just enough control to keep from snarling, she fixed her face in what she hoped was a reasonable expression. By the time the last worker left and she turned to stare at Luke, her anger had cooled to an icy calm.
“Before you start,” he said. “I just hired them to fix what the vandals ruined. They didn’t do anything but take things back to the way they were before we left Friday.”
“It doesn’t matter. It wasn’t your project to fix.”
“I just took things back to the way they were Claire. You can’t seriously be mad about that. I fixed it for you.” The look on his face showed he had no idea what he’d done wrong or how insignificant his actions made her feel. Some of her anger slid into sadness which was much worse.
“I can and I am. Unless I file a claim and risk jacking up my insurance rates which I had no intention of doing, I can’t afford to pay your crews and still turn a profit on this house. In one day you made months’ worth of work irrelevant. You made the work we did together irrelevant.”
“Like hell I did. Whoever broke in here and trashed the place did that. I just fixed it.”
“Maybe, but it wasn’t yours to fix. I’ve spent too many years fighting to prove that I know what I’m doing. I work harder than everyone around me, and I’m a better contractor than ninety percent of the men. But because I have tits I have to scrap and claw to be respected. You took all of that away when you went around me today.”
“Wait a minute. That’s not fair. I’ve never been disrespectful to you. All I did was take things back to the way they were. And you don’t have to pay the crews. I hired them.” He looked genuinely puzzled, and it made her want to scream. Why couldn’t he see how small he made her feel?
“I will pay them. This is my house. They did work on my house.” The weight of how far apart they really were fell heavy on her shoulders. They couldn’t be partners or even friends if he didn’t see her as an equal. And they sure as hell couldn’t be lovers. She closed her eyes against the tears threatening to fall. She’d made herself vulnerable to him in every way. She wouldn’t lose even more of herself by falling apart in front of him.
“I can’t do this anymore,” she said when she was sure her voice wouldn’t break. “I can’t feel like my life is so small to you. Like what’s so important to me is just some little project you snap your fingers and fix.”
“Is this about last night? Because I couldn’t say I love you?”
