His Uptown Girl

Tre didn’t say anything, because he couldn’t make things better for Shorty D at present. The kid had to go to school. Cici needed to beg for her job so they could pay the electric bill. And Tre had to figure out some way to get Big Mama strong again so she could take care of Kenzie. The woman who’d been minding his little cousin while Cici worked had just taken her own job. She’d told Tre he’d have to find someone else by next week.

No one to help him and he needed to make more money than what he did lugging furniture around town for little more than minimum wage.

He pulled out his bus pass and said a small prayer.

God, help me through another day. Help me be strong and be the man You want me to be. And, please, God, help me say no to Grady when he asks me to ride with him.

As he reached the bus stop at the corner of Carrollton, he caught the exhaust as the bus pulled away, heading toward the city and away from them.

Shorty D looked up at him with a smirk. “Now, that’s some bullshit.”

“Watch your language around this baby girl.”

Shorty’s eyes were an old man’s as he slid off his sunglasses. “Like she ain’t goin’ find out soon enough.”

Maybe God was tired of listening to Tre.

Maybe, despite his best intentions, life was some bullshit.

* * *

ELEANOR LOVED THURSDAYS because it was delivery day, and today she was getting a new carton from the Cotswolds.

However, the carton arrived late. There were only twenty minutes left before closing time, and the afternoon was dead. Maybe just a peek? She shoved the keyboard back and pulled her screwdriver and hammer from the bottom drawer.

“Hey, Pans,” she called out her open office door. “Want to open the crate and see what’s inside?”

She accidentally dropped the screwdriver and rooted under the desk for it. Grabbing it, she emerged to find Pansy staring at her thoughtfully.

“Creepy Gary said he saw you and the jazz pianist climbing into your car together the other day. Is there something you want to tell me?” Pansy asked, bending over Eleanor’s desk, dropping her pointed jaw on her folded hands and batting her eyes like a deranged debutante.

“No.”

Pansy narrowed her eyes. “No?”

“Why does everyone make a big deal about going for a drink?”

“Uh, because your girl parts haven’t been oiled in a decade, and you went for a drink with sex in a pair of tight jeans....”

Eleanor leaned back in her chair. “Oh, Jesus, Pans. It’s liquid and they pour it in a glass.”

“Is he circumcised?”

Eleanor stiffened, causing her office chair to shoot upright. “What?”

Pansy giggled, doing a little finger-pointing thing that accompanied a jaunty wiggle. “Come on. Spill the beans. What’s he got down there?”

“You’re seriously cracked.”

Pansy dropped into a wing chair with carved cherubs etched into the wood. The dressing chair had been damaged in Hurricane Katrina, but Eleanor couldn’t bear to part with it even if it were no longer worth kindling. “That’s why you keep me around.”

“Who told you that? Your dusting skills and witty repartee with the customers are the only things that keep you gainfully employed.”

“You call this gainful?”

“As gainful as it gets, chickadee.” Eleanor rose from her chair and tugged one of Pansy’s farm-girl braids. “Let’s go see what Charlie sent us this month.”

Pansy sighed, but struggled to her feet. “Right-o,” she said in a bad British accent. Charlie Weber was a buyer from England who scoured auction houses and estate sales for the perfect antiques for Eleanor’s store. The man had a notoriously good eye for spotting masterpieces beneath grime and paint, even if his stuffiness and fondness for responding with right-o drove Pansy bonkers whenever she talked to him on the phone.

“Just one crate today, but there should be an eighteenth-century cupboard inside along with some rare French books. Charlie said he wasn’t certain about the quality, but several were first editions. And there’s a painting he found in a widow’s attic that could be a—”

“You’re a pro at avoiding things, you know that?”

Eleanor moved some empty cardboard boxes aside and ignored her friend.

“So you’re not even going to tell me about Dez? About the drink? It shocked the hell out of me when Gary sidled over and spilled those delicious beans. Didn’t know you had it in you.”

Eleanor spun. “Why? Like I can’t do something...atypical? Besides, it was a drink.”

“With sizzling-hot Dez Batiste. So is he still the enemy?”

“Having a drink with him doesn’t change the opposition I have for the club he’s opening. I needed vodka and Dez wanted to convince me his club could be an asset to the community. That’s it. Practically a business meeting,” Eleanor said, not daring to meet Pansy’s gaze. The woman could have been Sherlock Holmes had she been male, British...and a fictional character. She didn’t want her friend to see how much her odd afternoon escape with Dez had affected her. Even now she couldn’t sort out what it had meant.

“So did he?”

Eleanor studied the nails in the crate. “Did he what?”

“Change your mind?”

“No.” But he’d made some good points.

“Oh,” Pansy said, holding out her hand.

“What?”

“The hammer and screwdriver. I’ll break the fingernail this time.”

Eleanor handed Pansy the tools. Pansy had better leverage with her height.

While her friend struggled with the crate, Eleanor allowed her mind to drift back to her strange afternoon at the Bulldog pub. Back to the way Dez looked gulping down the bitter German beer, his neck strong, masculine, nicked by the razor. The way his hands had cupped the mug, the flash of his teeth, the hum of electricity between them, unacknowledged but allowed to hang in the air. She’d wanted to touch him again, but didn’t.

It had all felt too dangerous.

Had there been three or four years between their ages, she might not have worried. She might have asked him to come to her house for supper. Or a drink. Or a roll in the bed she’d slept in alone for too long.

But she was eight years and nine months older than him.

Too much to bridge.