Page 2 of The Damaged Hearts Bargain

Cal shrugged. “Don’t be. Haven’t seen her since I was seventeen. We weren’t what you’d call close.”

“Still though,” Syd said, tucking her blonde hair behind her ear in a way that Cal had found sexy this morning but didn’t now. “It’s your mum, isn’t it? It must be… strange.”

Was it strange? If she thought about it, maybe. She’d left home at seventeen and never gone back. She supposed that her mother had always been there, but she’d not spared her many thoughts over the years. Not after what had happened.

She’d thrown herself into her own life. Working bar jobs, traveling when she could, saving up for the bike. Sleeping with bartenders and waitresses, that seemed to be a theme. Speaking of which, Syd was still looking at her somewhat expectantly.

“Um, yeah, I suppose it’s strange,” Cal said.

Syd stepped up to her, put a hand on her arm. “I am sorry.”

She had friendly dark eyes and was as sweet as they came. Not that it made much difference now, or would have even before. There were rules to this. No more than six weeks. Six weeks behind one bar, six weeks in one bed. That was how things went. Cleaner and easier.

Cal turned back to the lemons and started slicing. “So, uh, I’ll be heading out at the end of shift, things to deal with and all of that.”

“Yeah, yeah, of course, I’ll take you off the schedule. Take aslong as you need.” There was the smallest of pauses. “Um, how long do you think that might be?”

Cal leaned on the bar. She was under no illusions about how she looked. A fully butch lesbian, short hair, pot belly and all. She was no super model. And yet… there was always someone who found her interesting enough to spend time with.

She never stopped being grateful for that. Never stopped being thankful that she didn’t have to spend too many nights alone.

She also never made any promises, which made the conversations like the one she was about to have all the more difficult.

“Listen, Syd.”

Syd’s face fell. “I already don’t like where this is going.”

“You know that you’re amazing. I know that you know that,” Cal said. “You’re beautiful and you’ll find someone for real one day and remember all of this with a smile.”

“And… you’re not coming back, are you?”

Cal rolled a lemon on the cutting board, softening it up. “I was only ever the pre-summer help. It doesn’t make sense for you to hold a job for me when I was going to be leaving anyway.”

“You could have stayed,” Syd said. Then she looked like she might be regretting saying that already.

Cal laughed. “See? You know as well as I do that this was just a bit of fun. Well, a lot of fun.” She quirked an eyebrow and Syd blushed satisfyingly. “But life moves on and so do I.”

Syd sighed and came to stand next to her, nudging her aside with a hip so that there was room at the cutting board for both of them. “I suppose so,” she said, grabbing a knife.

“Is that a good suppose or a bad suppose?” Cal asked, eyeing the knife. “Because if you’re going to gut me with that thing you should know that I’ve just mopped all the floors back here.”

“Trying to get on my good side now, are you?” asked Syd, slicing into a lemon. “Do all your break ups end up like this?”

“Like what?”

“You know, sort of… happily, I suppose?” asked Syd, still chopping away.

“So, you’re happy that I’m leaving?”

She stopped chopping for an instant and looked up. “No, Cal, no, I’m not happy. But… I get it. No strings attached, going where the wind takes you, I wasn’t under any illusions that you were going to stick around for me.”

“I try not to make promises that I can’t keep,” Cal said.

“Yeah, you definitely didn’t do that.” Syd grinned and went back to chopping. “I suppose you’ll want a pay check as well.”

“I’ve done the work,” Cal said. Then she reconsidered. “Mind you, I’m an heiress now, apparently, so maybe I don’t need it.”

“Rich, was she? Your mum?”

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