Page 35 of Blue-Eyed Jacks
Harley Owners Group, HOG, was the civilian equivalent of bad-ass with about as much bad in that designation as a kitten.“I’m being careful.”
She set the sanding block down and put a hand on my arm.“You’re hiding.”
I looked around the house pointedly.“Duh.”
“And you’re missing out on life.”
Next, she’d ask me to smoke pot with her or something.“I’m not missing out on anything.”
“Jeffery asked about you.”
Said man was the owner of a seaside restaurant.He had kind eyes, but thick eyebrows.I didn’t trust him because of that.“So?”
“You might want to go out on a date or something.”
The thought made me queasy.A lot of things did.“No.”
Crystal tried to infuse compassion into her expression, but I saw some pity in there, too.She proved me right when she finally said, “He’s gone.”
She and I both knew who she was talking about.“Obviously.”
“And he’s not coming back.”
There it was.Spoken out loud in a room I was stripping, rebuilding, and completely altering because sleeping in it the way it was reminded me of Jackson.So did the kitchen and that damn tub.And the living room… stairs, and face it, this whole island.I couldn’t look at the bay or the bridge and not wonder how it would be if he were beside me.I had “it” bad.It being obsessive lust disguised as passion and probably love.Or, at the very least, whatever was the opposite of a trauma bond.
I gestured to the room.“Good.Because I looked up his bullshit story about this being a historic property, and it isn’t.I’m gutting this place one room at a time.”
My dearest and currently only friend shook her head.“You’re nesting.”
“What?!”
It shouldn’t have come out as a shriek.Nesting was something… No.I wasn’t; I couldn’t be.We’d used condoms, mostly, and I had an implant.
“When was your last period?”
“No.”I waved my hands in front of me to ward off what she was implying.
“Kate,” she put a warning note into her voice.“You’ve been sick every morning for the last two weeks, and you can’t stand clams.”
“That’s not surprising since I puked up that bowl of chowder.Why would I like something that tried to kill me?Besides, I have an implant.”
She sat on her heels.Puzzlement caused her face to twist into a frown.“How old is it?”
I thought back with some trepidation.“Four years, in August.”
“Sweetie, it’s October.”
I knew that.
“You may want to get it removed and get tested.”
“No.”
“Kate, as your friend and as the person who will have to run your dumb ass to the hospital, you need to get checked out.”
“I can’t.”That was the biggest thing holding me back from acknowledging what I didn’t want to face.“If I use my real name, my social security number, or ID, he’ll find me.”My voice shook.My hands shook.My whole body shook.And the crackers I’d eaten for breakfast started back up my throat as clumpy acid.I shoved Crystal out of the way and ran down the stairs, skidding on the third to the last one that sloped downward, and catching myself on the landing before twisting around the newel post and racing to the bathroom.I tried to expel my soul through my mouth for a good five minutes straight, the dry heaves catching so bad that every smell from the moldy tile to the piney sap on the boards made my head spin.
Crystal held my hair away from the bowl.“You need to go in.We’ll use the traveling nurse clinic on the island.She’ll keep your name out of the records.
