CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Four Days to Deadline

 

 

Well, that’s a pisser. No more Jilly on site?

I hand my phone over to Security and stride through the scanner, straight out the door toward the pumphouse.

It may be a blessing in disguise. These final days of the project are going to be brutal, and I don’t need distractions. Especially ones I’m not sure how far to trust.

But once we’re signed off and done, I can walk away and try to reconnect with her. Get to some truths. Work everything out. I didn’t ask how long her harvest would take. I’ll ask her the next time I’m able to call. Hopefully, both our projects will be done close to the same time.

Frank’s waiting for me when I get to the pumphouse office. He looks tired. Times like this I remember that he’s got almost twenty years on me.

“Evenin’, Jack.”

We shake hands briefly. “Evenin’, Frank. Give me good news.”

He moves out of my chair and comes around the desk. “The schedule’s caught up and on track.”

It feels like a thousand-pound weight crumbles off my shoulders. “Well done.”

“Yeah, the crew did a good job. We also finished the scaffolding in the well.”

“Ready for me to go test it out?” I hope to hell his next answer is yes.

“Fucker-Felix is standing by.”

I sneer a chuckle. “I’d hate to disappoint him. I’ll go find him after we finish here. Any news on the pilfering?”

“Nothing new’s missing today.”

“More good news? Frank, you’re spoiling me.”

He rolls his eyes and passes me the clipboard of jobs to complete this shift. “So, now you owe me a beer.”

“Cheap at twice the price,” I say absently, already absorbed in the tasks ahead.

Stopping in mid-stride at the door, he turns to laugh. “That sounds like something my grandfather would have said.”

“Meaning?”

“You need to get a life. With people your chronological age. Maybe that girl? Where is she, by the way?”

“Wrestling chickens, last I heard.”

His forehead wrinkles, confusion clear in his eyes. “What?”

I walk out the door he’s holding open. “Inside joke. Why’d you ask?”

“Harvey was feeding her goobers. I wondered if they made her sick.”

It feels good to laugh out loud. “And she let him? Brave woman. Did she know what they were, or was she expecting candy?”

He’s grinning, too. “No, she didn’t know what to expect. She gagged a couple of times. It was something, that beautiful madonna’s face scrunched like she was sucking on a lemon. But she swallowed those slimy peanut shells, and when he dared her, she took more.”

An odd pride fills my chest. Miss Debutant choking down goobers? Wish I’d seen it.

“I think ol’ Harvey fell in love. He followed her around, smiling, for a half-hour until I shooed him back to work.”

“Thanks, Frank. I needed some comic relief.”

I don’t miss the knowing twinkle. “Now go do some good.”

“On it. Rest up. I’m planning on leaving a shit-ton of tasks for you tomorrow.”

“Bring it on,” he scoffs, heading down the path toward Security. “Makes the day go that much quicker.”

I watch him walk away, his long legs a little bowed, shoulders still broad and strong, and I thank my lucky stars again for bringing this man into my life. I gotta figure a way to help him dial back the workload on future jobs—without insulting him. I want him with me for another twenty years.

When I finally navigate toward the plant, Nola’s ahead in the distance, and so is Felix. She’s carrying something, which she hands over to him. It looks like part of a tarp. Considering she’s a painter, it’s not surprising to find her with a tarp, but why would she give it to a pipefitter?

Felix takes it from her, they exchange words I’m too far away to hear, then they leave in opposite directions.

“Felix!” He stops when I call. “What’s that?”

His face is carefully schooled to neutral while he waits for me to catch up. “Piece of tarp Nola found.”

I take a dirty corner in my hand and study it. “You think it’s from the missing tarp?”

“Might be. I was taking it over to Painting to see if they could identify it.”

“I’ll be interested to hear. In the meantime, I’m on my way to test the scaffolding in the well, if you’re interested.”

Eyes cool, he nods. “Let me drop this off, and I’ll meet you there.”

The man lumbers away like a high school football jock, throwing his weight around, trying to look tough.

Sorry, man. If you had a prior claim, she wouldn’t have let me touch her. Now, she’s mine.

Jilly and I need to chat about him. I shake my head and turn toward the plant.

The wells are just outside the plant walls in their own hut. They used to be boreholes for extracting oil and gas from an underground pocket in the rock. This particular pocket is now empty, making it an ideal reservoir for Lonestar Petroleum’s geothermal purposes.

The new piping resides in a special casing for part of the well depth. The scaffolding I designed allow piping to be monitored and maintained as efficiently as possible. Climbing down between that casing and pipes is something most borehole wells don’t use, and it’s what has Felix all twitchy.

“Jack!” Doug Battles says, coming over to shake hands. “Ready to inspect some scaffolding?”

“Definitely. Like I promised at the emergency meeting, I’m gonna weld a stretch of pipe, too, for your pipefitter who’s worried about safety. I sent word for him to bring me some tools.”

He rocks on his heels, hands in pockets. “Ah, yes, Felix. That’s good. Here he is.”

Carrying a welding torch and face shield, Felix joins us and peers down the ladder nearest him.

“I’ll climb down this ladder and come up yours,” I say, throwing a leg over the edge. As I climb, I purposely jerk and pull harder than necessary, making sure everything is as solid as the various other times it’s been tested. After a few hundred feet, the temperature is considerably warmer, and I’m glad to reach the metal walkaround. I take that to the other side of pipe, to Felix’s ladder, and climb back up.

“Looks fine,” Doug hollers. “I’m going down.” He retraces my steps, his focus more on the pipe than the scaffolding.

“Ready to weld.” I don the propane tank, check the fittings from it to the torch, grab the face shield, and climb back down the scaffolding. I pick my spot, fire up the torch, and go through the motions of welding the pipe. It’s a tight fit, but not dangerous to pipefitters used to dealing with the hazards of their craft.

I turn off the torch and climb back up the ladder. “Who’s next?”

Doug goes next, and Felix goes down at the same time to see what it’s like with two people in the well. I join them, and they take turns firing up the torch and pretending to weld.

Test complete. Another item checked off the list. Now maybe yesterday’s meeting agenda can be laid to rest.

Topside, Doug pumps my hand. “Great stuff! Felix, send a couple of guys down the production well and test it, too. Then we’ll be ready for the inspectors to sign off on it.”

“Get what you wanted?” I ask Felix.

He stares at me, then nods. “It’s good. Good job. No excess safety issues. I’ll send a few of my men down later tonight.”

Doug claps his hands together, rubbing them in glee. “Excellent. Then, if you don’t need me anymore, I’m going home.”

We all shake hands, and he leaves. Felix and I walk in the direction of the pumphouse. He’s still wearing the tank on his back, holding the torch in one hand.

“Any info about the tarp?” I ask, taking the face shield from him.

“The painters can account for all the rest of their inventory.”

“Where’d Nola find it?”

“Not far from here, actually. Between here and the Paint shed.”

“Wonder what it was doing there?”

Felix shrugs. He acts like somebody who’s strangling on things he wants to say, and they aren’t about tarps or stolen materials. I could try to make it a little easier on him, but I’m not feeling all that charitable after that “emergency” meeting. Let the worm squirm.

Finally, he throws a glance over at me. “What are your intentions?”

“Beg your pardon?” As if I don’t know exactly what he’s talking about, the little fucker.

“Jilly.”

“Why’re you asking?”

His jaw clenches. “You’re leaving in a few days. What do you want from her?”

I don’t have that clear in my own mind. But even if I did, there’s no way I’m going to let him grill me about a woman who’s not even part of his family. I just keep walking.

“I don’t want to see her hurt,” he persists.

“She has a father and brothers to look out for her.”

The plant’s lighting show violent color splotching up his neck. “She’s like my little sister.”

“Is that what all this is about? The meeting? Your safety concerns?”

He has the grace to turn his head away. “They’re real concerns. For her, too.”

My fist curls, itching to fly. “Appreciated. Dealt with.”

We walk a ways more, and I can feel the struggle going on inside him, coming across in waves. “Let it go, Felix. Before you damage your friendship with her.”

Blue eyes snap to my face. “I won’t let you hurt her.”

“I won’t be asking your permission.”

He sneers and heads in another direction.

I sigh. He’s not totally off-base. I will be gone sometime after the project’s done. I’m hoping that I can talk Jilly into taking a short trip with me to unwind between our projects and the holidays. I’m not ready to turn her loose. But if she can’t go or won’t, what’ll happen then? She’s the kind of girl you take home to Mom, not off for a mindless, sex-drenched fling.

Talking and thinking about Jilly makes me need to see her, talk to her, touch her. Grab and hold onto her like she’s a life preserver. The night’s not even half over, so I can’t call her. She needs her sleep anyway.

Guess I need to stop bawling like a lost calf and get this damn project done. We can figure the rest out later.

About 6 AM, I’m doing my run-through of all departments, checking on progress, filling things out for Frank and the daytime shift change, when the intercom blasts my name.

Jack DePaul, report to Production Well.

I hit it on a run, wondering what my friend Felix has cooked up. When I arrive, staff medics are tending to a man on a stretcher, getting ready to transport him to a local hospital.

“What happened?”

Felix leaps from his crew member’s side, shoving his angry, mottled face at me. “I told you it wasn’t safe. I knew it!”

I scan the scene, trying to find out what’s happened. As the stretcher passes, I grasp a medic’s arm. “What happened?”

“Took a fall with the torch burning. We won’t know the extent of his injuries until a doctor checks him out.”

The man is out cold, a knot on his forehead, three deep scratches on one cheek, and both hands wrapped in gauze. “Will he make it?”

“He’s got a good chance.”

I nod and let them pass. Felix is still standing, hard as a brick wall, fists bunched at his sides. “I said your scaffolding would get someone killed.”

“How’d this happen? Show me?”

He wasn’t finished railing. If I struck him, it would probably stop his rant. But with the crowd gathering, I couldn’t take the chance. “Felix, calm down and show me what happened. I can’t fix what I don’t find out about.”

“There’s nothing to fix. It needs to be thrown out and done by somebody who knows what he’s doing. Somebody who’s not distracted by a girl.”

Red haze clouds my vision, and my heart rate jumps so fast, I may pass out. More than anything, I’m dying to shove those words back down his throat. I take a step, fists clenched. Strong hands grab me from behind. “Ignore the pussy,” Frank says in my ear, but loud enough for others to hear, including Felix.

Eyes locked on Felix, I let him snarl at me. A couple of his men are holding him from coming at me.

Bring it, motherfucker. I’ll rearrange your face for you.

Frank, my voice of reason, cuts off that satisfying train of thought. “Let’s go check things out.”