A Lovely Shade of Ouch [Suncoast Society] (Siren Publishing Sensations) Read online

  He offered her a smile. “Tomorrow morning, I’ll be here at seven and I’ll bring you breakfast,” John said. “Your job tomorrow is to supervise. That’s it. We’re going to have enough help from everyone that you can sit and watch.”

  “I feel like I’m putting everyone out.”

  “Hey, you know how this works. We’ll have over a dozen people, it looks like. Askel and Mallory even wanted to help. He texted me earlier when he found out about the move, but we told them no, to enjoy their day together tomorrow.”

  “Sort of a honeymoon?”

  “Yeah. But he did offer free storage space, if you need it, over at his place.”

  “They’re so sweet.” She didn’t want to mentally steer in that direction, but her thoughts disobeyed her. “It’s nice to see a happy ending for someone, even if I don’t get one.”

  “If it’s any consolation, look at it like this. It’s a fresh start for you. And George.” He smiled, playful, encouraging.

  He was trying so hard to cheer her up, and she could see that.

  She appreciated it more than she had the words to express to him.

  “Thank you for all of this.”

  “Hey, if nothing else, at least you’re the reason Tilly won’t one day murder me.” He grinned, making her laugh.

  “True.”

  He squatted down in front of her. “Tomorrow, please, don’t hurt yourself. We know you’re in pain, and we know you’ve been trying to hide that. You will find yourself surrounded by a bunch of Doms ordering you to sit down if you try to do too much. And if anything, we are a group of people used to restraining people, and we won’t hesitate to tie you down to keep you from hurting yourself. So let us do it. Okay?”

  “Okay.” She didn’t have any fight in her. Pain had robbed her of most of that, and her emotional agony stole the rest. “When I’m feeling better, can we use your house to have them all over so I can cook them a thank-you dinner?”

  “Of course we can.” He stood and helped her to her feet and back inside. “So try to get a good night’s sleep, and I’ll see you in the morning.” She saw him out, locking the door behind him.

  As she undressed, she looked around. Her last night there, in that house.

  She remembered the first night she’d spent there, after moving in with Tom. Wasn’t her first night spent at his house, but it had felt like a solid new start. No, marriage was never part of the equation for her, but she’d been in love with him. Loved him. Thought he loved her.

  She’d felt secure with him. Emotionally, physically. That, she thought, had been the beginning of the smooth-sailing part of her life, where she could relax and enjoy things. They’d even talked about buying a house together.

  Then he’d lost his job.

  She’d just settled into the new normalcy of that dynamic when she got hurt, upending her world.

  Now…

  She felt lost.

  I hate this.

  Underneath everything, the desperate hope that she didn’t do something stupid and fall for John in some dumb-ass damsel in distress sort of way. The white knight swooping in and rescuing her from the brink.

  Maintaining her emotional distance had to remain firmly in focus. Otherwise, she might make another stupid choice. Although Tom only looked like a stupid choice in retrospect. He’d accused her of changing, but maybe she hadn’t. Maybe he had.

  Or maybe he’d never been who she thought he was in the first place.

  Too tired and hurt and in pain to think about it anymore, she took a long, hot shower before sliding under the covers.

  Chapter Eight

  John wondered why the hell his alarm was going off so early on a Sunday morning. He’d swatted at it, trying to silence it, when one thought broke through and pierced the bubble of sleep trying to hold on to him.

  Abbey.

  Tossing the covers back, he sat up, feet on the floor, and finally got the alarm silenced.

  Abbey.

  That got him moving. He’d promised to bring her breakfast, and he wanted to be there before the others arrived, so he could take charge and make sure she didn’t overdo things. He’d seen the pinched, agonized look in her face, the way she tried to breathe through her pain when standing up or getting out of the car.

  The way she leaned on the cane when on her feet.

  That was a woman in a lot of agony and trying to hide it.

  You’re running from your own issues.

  As he jumped in the shower he admitted that. Sure. A chance to help, to focus on something other than his own grief, a chance to fix something, to make a positive difference?

  Hell, yes, this was a trade-off he’d welcome.

  Gladly.

  After getting his shower and dressing he headed out, stopping by a Dunkin’ Donuts on the way for two boxes of coffee, a couple of bagel sandwiches to make sure Abbey would have a marginally decent breakfast, and a couple dozen assorted donuts for the crew. He pulled into her driveway five minutes before seven, surprised to realize how forward he was looking to this.

  Not just the chance to help her out, but the chance to make something easier on her. To fix this for her in the only way he could.

  Smiling, and feeling the first genuine bit of contentment since learning of Mick’s death, he grabbed everything and headed up the walk to her front door.

  * * * *

  Used to getting up early for work, Abbey was awake even before her alarm went off at six. She winced as she stretched her arm to silence the damn thing.

  When her mind briefly wondered where Tom the late weekend sleeper was, she remembered.

  He hadn’t even called or texted her yesterday to check on her, see how she was.

  Yeah, he really cares about me, all right.

  She bitterly wondered how long he’d spent online chatting last night with his new FetLife friend. When the thought of logging in to see what he was up to and track his movements came to mind, she shoved it away.

  No. I will not be crazy stalker lady. If he can walk away from me, I can walk away from him.

  As it always did now, it took her a couple of tries to log-roll herself into a position where she could push up with her arms so she was sitting on the side of the bed. And as it always did now, it was accompanied by lots of deep breathing in an attempt to control the pain.

  Her thoughts once again went to the prescriptions in her purse. Maybe she needed to fill them.

  I don’t want to.

  It was the last area of her life she had control over, how she dealt with her pain. Giving in and hoping medicine took care of it would be the final blow to her ego and dignity.

  She started a pot of coffee and then went straight to the shower to soak under the hot spray. She didn’t even care if she got her hair wet. It was only down to her shoulders, and lately she’d taken to wearing it either loose or pulled into a ponytail. Trying to take the effort to actually style it meant energy not there to deal with her pain. She was also overdue for a trip to the salon, and grey roots were showing here and there in her reddish auburn hair.

  Sitting for a couple of hours in a chair in a salon wasn’t exactly something she could do now. Not without a lot of pain involved.

  I took my life for granted.

  Her health, her job, her relationship—everything. She’d hit a comfortable point and assumed she’d always be there.

  When she finished with her shower, she donned an oversized T-shirt and comfy, baggy shorts. No bra, the effort to put on one would hurt too much, and it wasn’t like her friends weren’t used to glimpsing boobies anyway. None of them would be shocked by her letting the girls hang free under her shirt.

  At five till seven she heard a car out front and, remembering to grab the cane, made her way to the front door just in time to see John stepping onto the porch. He looked a little startled when she opened the door before he even had time to juggle everything around and knock or ring the bell.

  She stepped aside. “Holy cow, what’d you bring?”
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  “Everything.” He headed straight for the kitchen, setting the items on the counter. She shut the door and followed him.

  “And I expect you to eat,” he said, handing her a bag. “Ham, egg, and cheese on a plain bagel. Hope that’s okay.”

  “That’s…” She needed to clamp down on her emotions now or she’d be a blubbering mess all day.

  Instead, she hugged him. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

  “No worries.” He looked pleased, happy. “Sit and eat, please.”

  Then again, he hadn’t had the best couple of days himself. Maybe this was his way of compensating and taking his mind off his friend’s death.

  He’d purchased a sandwich for himself, too. After pouring her coffee and fixing it per her instructions, he settled on a barstool at the counter while she opted to stand.

  “Isn’t that hurting your back?”

  “It’s almost worse to get down and get up again. I promise,” she added, forestalling the protests she anticipated, “that I will take it easy today.” She stared out the sliders. “I’ll work on trying to get George corralled and figure out how to best go about moving his stuff. Did you say the Collins brothers are helping?”

  “Yes, Landry did. They’ve got a couple of pickup trucks. If you can tell me what needs to get moved into his kiddie pool, I’m sure that we can load everything into the back of a truck and put a tarp over it to keep it from getting blown out. We’ll save moving him and his stuff toward the end, so you can get him transferred with the least amount of trauma to him. Do you have something to transport him in?”

  “I have a pet carrier for him.”

  By the time they’d finished their breakfast sandwiches, Tilly, Landry, and Cris had arrived and the fun started. They unloaded the boxes and moving supplies out of Abbey’s car. Cris, Landry, and John started packing things in the living room while Tilly helped her in the bedroom.

  It took a little convincing on Abbey’s part for Tilly not to dump Tom’s clothes into the backyard and burn them, but she finally got her friend to leave all his stuff neatly stowed in the guest room dressers or closet or on the bed.

  Abbey wouldn’t fight dickishness with dickishness.

  No matter how tempting it was.

  Within an hour, they had ten more helpers, complete with trucks, and John was leading a caravan back to his house to start the unloading, as well as getting help moving the boxes out of the guest room into the garage so Abbey’s furniture could be moved into it.

  Cris set Abbey up in a chair in the kitchen to help people go through the cabinets there, one by one, and point out what went and what stayed behind. At lunchtime, someone brought in several pizzas and everyone took a break.

  Abbey was shocked to realize they were almost completely done with moving everything out of her house, although the second half of the day, arranging her furniture in her new room, was waiting on her presence at John’s.

  Not her house, she reminded herself.

  And this was Tom’s house.

  Despite what she’d thought over the past several years, what she’d believed to be true, it had never really been her house. Nor her home.

  Maybe he really had loved her at some point, or believed he had. She’d loved him. She never would have moved in with him if she hadn’t, giving up her privacy and independence to share a household with someone.

  As she looked out into the living room, where John stood with a paper plate and a piece of pizza while smiling and talking with Tilly, Abbey realized, in a way, she was doing that again. Only without the illusion of love or a relationship. This would strictly be a roommates arrangement.

  She wouldn’t let it become more than that. She needed to get through her surgery and recovery and then find another place so she could put her life back together. Until then, both she and George would be living out of boxes in someone else’s home.

  It wouldn’t be her home.

  I haven’t even told my family yet.

  Ugh.

  She could already hear her mother’s voice in her head.

  At least you weren’t married to the son of a bitch. Did you get yourself tested for STDs yet? He was probably cheating on you.

  Crap. That was something else she’d need to get done on top of everything else. No, she didn’t believe Tom had physically cheated on her. Didn’t want to believe it, anyway.

  Then again, she’d also believed he was in love with her, loved her, so why should she take his word on that when so many other things had been a lie?

  Essie, the fourth member of the Collins’ brothers poly quad, joined her in the kitchen. “How you holding up?”

  Why lie? “I’m so tired. I can’t begin to tell everyone how much this means to me.”

  “Hey, you’re family. I love your tortoise. Russian?”

  “Yeah. That’s right, you’re a vet tech, aren’t you?”

  Essie smiled. “Was. Now they have me helping them out with the clients. They’re even putting me on the TV show despite me trying to talk them out of it. I guess the network liked the ratings boost.” The brothers owned a disaster recovery and commercial cleaning service, but they also did hoarding clean-outs, sometimes filmed by a cable network crew for a show they were part of.

  “Do you miss it? Working with animals?”

  “A little. I volunteer at the shelter a few times a month and help them out there. The trade-off has been worth it. So, Russian?”

  Abbey realized her brain wasn’t in gear with everything else going on. “Sorry, yes. Got him when he was a hatchling from a reputable breeder.”

  “Love his enclosure. Mind if I take pictures of it?”

  “Go ahead. I hate having to disassemble it. He’s really enjoyed it.”

  Abbey finished her pizza, grabbed some romaine from the fridge, and led Essie out onto the lanai. “Watch this.” She dragged a chair over to the end and sat. “Hey, Georgie boy.”

  The tortoise lifted his head, slowly turned himself around, and headed toward her.

  Essie let out a laugh. “Oh my god, that’s adorable.”

  “He’s twenty-one. People don’t understand after a while, they get to know their owners and respond to them. They’re not like a dog or a cat or a parrot even, but they have personalities.”

  Essie knelt next to the enclosure and watched as George stretched his neck to take a piece of romaine from Abbey.

  “That’s the most adorable thing I think I’ve seen.” Essie pulled out her phone and took pictures of him, then of the enclosure. “Luckily, we’ve only had cat and dog hoarders. No reptiles so far. Does he get lonely?”

  “They’re solitary by nature. Some people have more than one, but I never had the room to have more than one.” He took another piece of romaine from her. “Kind of like I should have stayed, I guess,” Abbey mused. “Solitary.”

  When she saw the look of sympathy on Essie’s face, she realized she’d said it out loud.

  “Sorry,” Abbey said. “Just throwing myself a pity party. Don’t mind me.”

  “Don’t worry about it. You’ve been through a lot.” Her expression darkened. “Tilly won’t be the only one wanting a crack at that asshole if he ever sets foot in the club again, believe me.”

  “I don’t want him hurt. I just want this over so I can move on. Honestly.”

  Essie stood. “Hey, we’re all here for you. When you have your surgery, it won’t just be Tilly volunteering to help you out until you’re back on your feet. If it’s any consolation, one of the guys in our crew had to have back surgery, and he said he wished he’d had it done immediately instead of avoiding it and trying physical therapy first. Once the surgical pain started healing, he said he felt better than he had in the months leading up to the surgery.”

  “That’s what everyone keeps telling me.”

  John joined them on the lanai. “We’re ready to get started again, if you are.”

  Abbey dropped the rest of the lettuce into the water dish for George. It’d keep it from wilt
ing as fast and encourage him to take a dip and soak for a few minutes. John and Essie helped her up and Abbey had to bite down on her lower lip to stifle the moan of pain.

  He frowned. “Didn’t they give you any painkillers?”

  “Yeah, I have a prescription for them in my purse, but I don’t want to take them.”

  “Why not?”

  “I hate them.”

  He arched an eyebrow at her and then called out, “Tilly!”

  She appeared in the open slider doorway. “Yo.”

  John handed Abbey off to Tilly. “Take Little Miss Stubborn here to the drugstore to get her pain meds filled. She has a prescription she hadn’t gotten filled yet.”

  “What?”

  Aw, shit. “That’s not fair,” Abbey complained.

  John arched an eyebrow at her. “Who ever said I’d play fair?”

  * * * *

  John felt a little bad about ratting Abbey out to Tilly. But earlier that morning, as they were working together to clear Abbey’s things out of the master bathroom, John had promised to tell Tilly if Abbey was holding anything back about her health.

  This, as far as he was concerned, was holding back. Abbey’s face looked drawn and haggard, dark circles under her eyes as she made tiny, shuffling movements, which only seemed to get worse as the day went on.

  Tilly shuttled Abbey off the lanai, demanding to know where her friend’s purse was and ordering her to head toward the front door.

  Essie chuckled. “Aw, hell. Abbey’s in trouble.”

  “She’s going to be in more trouble if she doesn’t listen to Tilly and follow her orders. That’s a nurse with a mission, right there.”

  Meanwhile, John took a group over to his house to start organizing things there. They’d filled his garage after putting her bedroom set in the guest room, but hadn’t gotten any farther than that. They’d been able to transport the dresser drawers separately without unpacking her clothes, so that was a timesaver. But he got help rearranging the guest room to make space for her bookshelves, and they unpacked several boxes.

  Every bit that they could do that she didn’t have to do would be less stress on her.