Chapter Twelve
Vanek
The doors to the warehouse had been replaced with shiny new ones, and a thick chain and padlock had been strung between them as well.
Vanek knew that Colonel Mara would be extremely displeased with him over breaking the door down again, so this time he went with the path of least resistance. He spent all night learning how to pick locks.
Which is why he was now glaring angrily at the padlock, not having expected that.
“Fuck this,” he snarled and snapped the metal chain as if it were made of paper. He coiled up the loose chain and padlock after picking the sliding door up and putting it inside. It had been long enough that it could be restrung, and he’d left the lock itself intact. Closing the sliding door behind him, he sauntered over to the maimed float.
Harlow had been very specific that he not show up until their appointed time, and he felt somewhat guilty about breaking his word to her. If he was right though, then his decision here was what would make or break them.
Looking around the float, he was brought back to the various memories the two of them had shared while working on it. Vanek smiled as he pictured the look of shock on her face after he’d bent that very first piece of steel pipe without thinking of what it might mean. The way her mouth had dropped open, eyebrows disappearing into her hairline, and pupils going huge had brought about smiles from the both of them.
He’d learned a lot about life as a general fixit person while working with her, studying hours of videos on the internet so that he could appear to know what the heck he was talking about and do a better job of helping her restore the float to working order, so that her business could continue on.
Vanek knew it meant a lot to her, despite the small size and odd nature of it all. Whatever it was that drove her, it was all centered on her floats and the business, though he’d yet to figure out just what the major thing was. Harlow had kept that closed off to him, even through their flirting and occasional serious conversations, she’d not opened up much about herself. He found himself wondering now if it had something to do with that.
Behind him the door rattled open as someone else arrived. Vanek kept working away, having removed one of the sides and working carefully to remove the wooden planking that formed the core of the interior of the float. It had been cracked in the accident and he wasn’t sure it would stand up properly, so he’d decided it was just going to get replaced. Wood, thankfully, wasn’t so expensive that he couldn’t afford it on the bit of money the military had given him upon first arriving in Barton City.
“What are you doing here?”
The frustration in Harlow’s voice was evident, and Vanek took it as a subtle confirmation that he’d figured out her plan.
“Working on the float,” he said, his voice distorted from where he was stuck under the float itself, propping up the entire side with one arm.
“I can see that. Why are you working on the float?” Her footsteps paced back and forth in front of him as she waited for an answer.
“Because I broke it. I told you I’d fix it.” He knew the answers were bothering her, but part of him was still irate over how she’d tried to break things off with him.
“Actually you told me you’d buy me a new one,” she corrected. “I should have known that was a lie.”
“It wasn’t a lie. You’re still going to get a new one. It’s just going to take me a bit of time. I gave you my word on that.”
Harlow’s teeth ground together audibly. “You also gave me your word that you would wait two days.”
Finally he pushed himself back out from under the float, gently lowering it back to the ground just above his head.
“Yes. Two days before I would talk to you. I have work to do here, and you’re interrupting it.”
“Vanek, you need to leave.”
He set his stance stubbornly. “No. I have work to do. You can either stay and help, or you can leave and I’ll get it finished for you. But you’re not going to be able to do it on your own, not this much. You need my help, even if you don’t want it. I’m not sure what happened, or what I did, or what you heard, but I promise you I’m worth the effort.”
Harlow’s face went still, devoid of all emotion as she thought about his offer. In the end she walked off to another part of the warehouse. He almost went after her, but noticed in time that her steps weren’t taking her away, but just to a far corner. Whatever she was doing, she needed some privacy for it, and Vanek could give her that.
His eyes ranged over the opposite end of the warehouse and the changes that had been wrought there since he had stormed in the day before, and not for the first time he believed his suspicions to be correct.
No wonder Harlow was mad he was here.