Chapter Nineteen

What are you doing with a cad like Blake?”

Jewell stopped sipping her glass of sweet iced tea and laughed. “I don’t know, Bill, but I can tell you it’s worth it. Because if I weren’t with him, I never would have gotten to meet you. For that matter, what are you doing with a cad like Blake?” Her grin made Bill laugh in turn.

“I’ve known Blake since the day he was born,” Bill said, and his smile began to disappear. “His father was a good man, but his mama beat the good right out of him — I mean Blake’s dad. It broke the heart of my best friend, Blake’s granddaddy. I was just glad he passed on before he saw the final chapter of their story play out.”

“What do you mean?” She knew she shouldn’t pry into Blake’s life, but it was like watching a movie, one that you just couldn’t turn off because you had to know how it ended.

“I don’t think I should talk about that dark time,” Bill said with a negative wave of his hand.

“Of course not. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.” But of course she did — she was dying to know everything. She hoped Bill didn’t tell Blake about this.

“Oh, you aren’t doing anything wrong, sweetie. It’s just a really sad story,” Bill said as he got up to refill their glasses. When he returned and handed her a glass of tea, he looked at her intently. “Do you care about Blake?”

Jewell was so shocked by the question, she didn’t know what to do. Since this man was obviously attached to Blake, she could hardly tell him that she was only there because she was being paid to be. But at the same time, she didn’t want to say a whole bunch of mushy stuff either. It would be a lie. Gosh, she felt trapped.

“You don’t have to say anything, darling,” Bill told her after the silence stretched on. “I can see that I put you up against a wall there.”

Still, she had to say something now. “I’m sorry, Bill. I just…it’s just… Well, we’ve only been together a few days and the situation is…well…it’s just complicated.”

Bill’s penetrating eyes bored into her, making her squirm in her seat.

“I understand, darling. When I was younger, people didn’t play all these games they play today. If a boy liked a girl, or a girl liked a boy, they told each other. If it looked like it was going good, there was no need to draw the whole dating process out. Heck, you can know on the first date if the girl looks like she’ll be the one. I married my Vivian three months after we met, because I knew there’d never be another girl for me.”

“What happened?”

“The good Lord took her four years ago. I still think of her every single day, and I can’t wait till I get to go and be with her again.”

“I’m sure she’s waiting for you right at the gates.”

“Not quite yet, darling. My Vivian was always too busy to wait around for anyone. But when it’s time, she’ll be there to meet me all right.”

“If I may ask, how did she die?”

“In her sleep, so there was no pain. I think it was just time for her to go home. I was real angry about it for a while, but I finally accepted that someone up there knows more than I do, and I realized that being angry all the time doesn’t do any good.”

“You are a wise man, Bill. I’m glad I’ve gotten to meet you.” Jewell reached out her hand and took his, smoothing his wrinkly skin with her small thumb.

“I am glad I’ve gotten to meet you too, darling. You remind me of my sweet Vivian. She was always so calm and just loved everyone, but if you fired her up, she would have no problem taking the hide right off you,” he said with a chuckle.

“I don’t normally lose my temper, but…” She didn’t know how to complete that sentence.

“Don’t give up on Blake. He’s been through some dark times in his life. His mama wasn’t fit to be a mother, and it was her fault that she and the boys’ daddy died. To top that off, the three boys watched it happen,” Bill said with a sigh.

“Wait! They watched their parents die? Was it a car wreck?”

“No. If only it were that easy. Blake may one day open up to you about it. If he does, then you take the time to listen. I just want you to know that he has to deal with the hard times he’s known however he has to deal with them. Sometimes his bark is pretty bad, but that boy has a heart of gold. He’s just managed to bury it really deep.”

“He’s lucky to have you in his life,” Jewell told him.

“Of course he is, little missy. I’m a great man.” Bill smiled at her and she knew that all talk of sadness was over.

After the two of them visited a while longer, Bill fell asleep in his recliner without giving Jewell any tasks to do. So she went outside and saw the three brothers on the roof. They were working quickly, and shingles came flying over the side of the house.

A huge dumpster sat in the driveway, one that hadn’t been there when Jewell had gone inside with Bill an hour earlier. She walked over to the work truck — Knight Construction was stenciled on the door — and, finding a pair of gloves in the back, she put them on.

Over the next couple of hours, she picked up roofing from the ground and threw it into the dumpster. By the time the sun was getting low in the sky, she was completely exhausted, but the yard was mostly cleared of debris and she felt pretty dang good about herself.

“You don’t listen too well, do you?”

Jewell turned to find Blake behind her. He wiped his forehead with a rag before looking her in the eyes.

“No,” she told him. “It’s always been a fault of mine.”

“We’ll see if I can help you change your ways,” he said with more than a hint of anticipation in his smile.

“You don’t have time.”

“I invent time. Especially for those who need punishing.” He threw down the rag and tossed his shirt back on. “Let’s run back to my apartment and shower. But we had better get a move on. I want to do something tonight.”

He took her hand, led her to his work truck, and practically thrust her up inside.

“Where’s your car?” She just couldn’t picture Blake as a truck sort of a guy.

“I had my employee take it back when he delivered the truck. We needed tools.”

“Oh, makes sense,” she said, at a loss of what to say next. Everyone kept throwing her new curves, it seemed, and it was taking her overwhelmed brain time to catch up.

He didn’t even say goodbye to his brothers; he just started the truck and drove out into traffic. After a few minutes, Jewell’s curiosity overrode her need to be quiet.

“Where are we going?”

“That’s a surprise,” he replied. The eager gleam that shone in his eyes made his face look so much more handsome — not that he was a slouch in that department even in his worst of moods.

Jewell wasn’t sure if she’d be nearly as excited as he was about what was coming next, but she’d already argued with him far more than she should have today, so she decided to bite her tongue — if she had to — the remainder of the night.

An hour later, she would seriously regret her choice not to argue.