Lead (4 page)

“Do you need anything else?” I asked, following him like a little lost puppy. My toes stretched and strained while my hands hung limp at my sides. No way did he need to know he’d made me jittery.

“I’m good.” Socks and shoes waited at the end of the bed. He sat down, getting busy. His suit jacket hung over the back of a chair, a long black woolen coat folded atop it. We were fine, everything set.

“You’ve got your speech?” I asked.

The frown increased. “Yeah. It’s in my pocket.”

“Great. I just need to get my bag and jacket.”

His chin jerked and his gaze skittered over me. “You look nice, by the way.”

“Ah, thank you.”

“Just stating a fact. You look good.” He turned away.

I, however, didn’t move. At first I was stunned at the compliment, but then for some reason, leaving Jimmy alone didn’t feel right. It niggled. What if he got upset again and I wasn’t here to talk him down? His sobriety was too important to risk.

Lips fine, he studied the slowly drying patch on the front of my blouse. “You definitely won’t tell anyone?”

“No. Never.”

The air hissed out between his teeth and his expression calmed. “Okay …”

I nodded, giving him a small smile.

“Listen, Lena?”

“Hmm?”

He turned away. “There’s nothing in here, no pills or booze. I haven’t scored. I’ll do a spit test if you need it, and you can search the room…”

“No, I know,” I said, perplexed. “If there was, you wouldn’t have wanted me to get you something and we’d currently be having an entirely different conversation. Either that or you’d be back in rehab and I’d be out of a job.”

“True.”

Neither of us said anything for a moment. I crossed my arms over my chest, my face stiff, tight with tension.

“You can leave me on my own,” he said. “It’s fine, go get your stuff. Do whatever so we can leave.”

“Right!” One of those false embarrassed little laughs startled out of me. Crap. I’d completely forgotten. “Yes, okay. I’ll get my stuff.”

“Great.” He pushed a hand through his hair the same as he’d done maybe a dozen times a day since I’d come to work for him. It was nothing new. Immediately, however, my heart did the drop-and-squeeze thing again.

No. NO.

It couldn’t be connected to him, I refused to believe it.

“Are you going?” His face skewed with annoyance and thank God for that. His open irritation relieved me no end, we were back to normal.

“Yes, Jimmy. I’m going.”

“Now?”

“Right now.” I strode out, slamming the bedroom door shut behind me.

I did not have feelings for Jimmy Ferris. What a ridiculous thought. He was a former addict. And while I admired and respected him for taking charge of his life and fighting that battle, I did not need to get involved with someone who’d barely been dry half a year. Also, Jimmy was not a particularly nice guy the bulk of the time. A general lack of interest in, and consideration for, everyone else inhabiting the planet was his go-to setting.

But worst of all, the man was my boss.

I didn’t have feelings for him. I couldn’t, no way. I’d fallen for unsuitable, unstable, and outright criminal assholes in the past, but I was done with that. Especially the asshole and unstable portion. There’s no way I had feelings for him. I’d really grown as a person and shit, right?

I slumped against the nearest wall. “Fuck.”

I took a deep breath, focused on the funeral.

Things would get better.

Things didn’t get better.

Mal’s mom had apparently loved lilies. My head swam with the sweet rich scent. Seats had been saved for us down in the front with the family which was fortunate, because the church was packed. It felt all kinds of awkward sitting with the Ericsons given I barely knew them, but that was where Jimmy wanted me. Security stood out front, putting the kibosh on any uninvited guests. A group of fans stood outside despite them and the weather. They’d called out to Jimmy, waving T-shirts and other shit to be signed when we walked in. I’d wanted to growl abuse at them, tell them to get a clue. Jimmy hadn’t given them the time of day. You’d have thought in the guy’s hometown, there’d be more respect for his privacy, especially at a time like this. Some people just didn’t think or it didn’t suit them to think. What they wanted was more important and screw everyone else.

God, I hated people like that.

Up front, the organ player pounded out a hymn and people sang along as best they could. Jimmy would talk next. His face still seemed paler than normal, a little grey even. The man might not be clinging to me, but he clearly wasn’t all right. I grabbed his hand, holding on even when he flinched back from the contact. The look he gave our joined hands was distinctly bewildered.

“It’s okay,” I said.

He gave up trying to free himself of me and started fussing with the knot in his tie.

“Jimmy, you’re going to be great.”

The song wound down. Mal turned to us and god, the man’s face. He looked devastated, eyes stark with loss. Anne, the drummer’s girlfriend, stood at his side, her arm wrapped tight around Mal’s waist. There’d been a hiccup with their great love affair a week or two back. It was good to see them together again, especially today.

Mal nodded to Jimmy, giving him the signal, and it might have started out with me holding onto him, but now the situation had definitely been reversed. Fingers clutched mine, bruisingly tight, but he made no other move. He’d frozen.

On my other side, David leaned forward, frowning. “Jim?”

There was murmuring in the hall, the crowd growing restless. Up in the pulpit, the preacher stepped forward, craning his neck and looking out expectantly.

Someone had to do something.

“Let’s go.” I put my hand to his back and pushed. Hard.

He blinked ever so slowly, like I’d woken him from a deep sleep.

“Time to go, Jimmy. You’re on,” I whispered. “Walk.”

Steps painfully slow, he moved out into the aisle. I followed, the weight of all those stares making the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. No matter. We walked side by side, my hand guiding him, never leaving his back. Up the steps and then onto the podium. I fished in his coat pocket for the speech, laying it out flat in front of him. There was whispering out in the crowd about our odd behavior. Screw them. Nothing mattered but getting him through today intact.

“You got this?” I asked.

He scowled. “Yeah.”

I stepped to the side.

For a moment his gaze searched the crowd, moving over David and Ev, Ben the freakishly tall bass player, and then Mal and Anne. Next he turned to me, his mouth a grim line but his eyes asking for something. I gave him a little smile, a discreet thumbs up. No part of me doubted he could do this. Whatever else he might be, Jimmy Ferris was special and complicated, beautiful and beastly, all rolled into one. A natural-born performer.

His chin dipped infinitesimally in response and I let out a breath. He could do it, and he would.

Still, I swear I could feel his pain bearing down on me, threatening to snap me in two. Some sort of empathy overlord had begun back in the hotel room and now I couldn’t separate my feeling from his. Worse, I didn’t want to. He’d let me in whether he meant to or not and I couldn’t leave him alone with all this.

Tomorrow I’d take a nice big safe step back. Today he needed a friend.

* * *

“Hi,” he said, his deep strong voice carrying perfectly. “My name is Jimmy Ferris. I first met Lori Ericson when she let us start practicing in their garage. I was about sixteen at the time. Mr. Ericson wasn’t too happy with having us play there at first, but Lori talked him around. No one else would have us. To be fair, we made a hell of a racket. Barely a fucking … sorry, we barely had a clue what we were doing.

“In summer she’d bring us out these big jugs of Kool-Aid. People that know me won’t be surprised to hear I used to dump about a quarter out, fill it up with this cheap vodka I’d talk one of the guys down at the liquor store into getting me.” He looked to his brother and David gave him a tight smile.

“Anyway,” he said, clearing his throat. “This one time she came back in, busted me doing it. Didn’t matter that I was bigger than her. She grabbed me by the ear, nearly tore it off my head. Then she marched me outside and ripped me a new one. I was about an inch tall by the time she was done. Nice or not, Lori knew how you cut you down to size. And once she was done doing that, she calmed down and she talked to me. Just about general stuff. All sorts of things, really. But every time I went there from then on, she made time to talk to me, even if it was just for two minutes. Our own mom had taken off by then, so it wasn’t something I got at home. Now, I wasn’t Lori’s kid. I probably wasn’t even a kid she wanted around her kid. Still, she always made a point of giving that to me. She kept an eye on me and Dave, made sure we were clothed and fed, that we had what we needed. She cared when no one else gave a shit.” He grimaced, cleared his throat. “She cared when no one else
did
.”

His fingers stretched then curled tight as he took a moment. “I’d like to tell you how I stopped drinking in Lori’s garage after that. That’s how the story should finish. But some part of me was an addict, I guess, even back then. I did stop for a couple of days, and I was real sneaky about it afterward. I couldn’t bear the thought of disappointing her. Maybe that makes it sound like she didn’t do that much, that she didn’t have much of an effect. But what she did was enormous. She was the first person I’d ever met who made me wish I was better. Was a good person. Could make more of myself. And that’s a power, right there. If you can get even a guy like me to want to be a better man, then you’re something special.”

Jimmy carefully picked up the piece of paper in front of him, folding it back up. It didn’t matter, he didn’t need it. The poetry was in him, in the way he was baring his heart to these people. He stood tall, facing the crowd. His truth might not be pretty, but there was strength in his stance, pride. Warmth bloomed in my chest at the sight. A sense of satisfaction I hadn’t experienced in the longest time. Not that I’d made the eulogy, I know, but still …

“This might seem a weird story to tell you,” he said, his voice measured and calm. “It certainly doesn’t make me look good. But I think it goes a long way toward explaining to you why Lori was so important. What made her so amazing was … she cared. She genuinely cared about people. And that’s as rare as it is beautiful. It’s why she’ll be so badly missed.”

I scrubbed a tear off my face with the heel of my hand before Jimmy could catch me crying. Sadly, not fast enough. At least it wasn’t like I was the only one in a similar condition. Lucky the hall hadn’t flooded.

He turned to me, face bereft of emotion. “Let’s go.”

I sniffed. “Yep.”

We walked back down to our seats, his hand at the small of my back this time, guiding me forward. Before we could reach them, Mal stepped out. Wordlessly, he put his arms around Jimmy. He gripped him tight, giving him a thump on the back in the way men do. It took Jimmy a moment to respond and thump him back. The organ player started up again and everyone rose to their feet around us. Voices filled the hall.

I slid into the pew and retook my seat. Jimmy deposited himself next to me, the leg of his suit pants brushing against mine. I waited for him to grouse at me to move over, not that there was any room to be had due to of the sudden appearance of some woman’s handbag. But he didn’t. Honestly, after all the drama and emotional upheaval, sticking close seemed a good idea.

For him, of course. I was fine.

His gaze dropped briefly to where we connected before moving away. “You okay?”

“Yes. You?”

He made a noise. It sounded agreeable enough.

“Good.” I settled my hands in my lap.

Up in the pulpit the preacher started talking. Jimmy’s leg leaned a little more firmly against mine. He looked straight ahead, however, apparently unaware of what his thigh was doing. Nothing showed on his face. Maybe it was his way of acknowledging me, of saying thank you. Or maybe the man had a cramp. Whatever. A small smile curved my lips, my shoulders sagging with relief.

We’d done it. We’d made it through.

Huckleberry pie was the devil’s work.

It had taken me two thin servings to be certain. But now I knew.

I sat in the corner of the Ericson’s living room, Ev on one side and Anne on the other. Empty plates sat in all our laps. The wake had been something else. Something involving food, good music, and almost everyone the Ericsons knew. A sad vibe had prevailed at first. Of course it had. But talking and quiet laughter had slowly permeated the space until it became more of a celebration of Lori’s life than a mourning of her passing. Now, five hours later, the crowd had begun to thin out. I smothered a yawn, blinking tired eyes. It’d been one hell of a day with all the emotional highs and lows.

Mal knelt at Anne’s feet. His lush lips were understandably turned down at the edges. Not that I made a habit of checking out other women’s men’s mouths. Sometimes, however, these things were kind of hard not to notice.

“Hey,” Anne said softly, placing her hand against his cheek.

“I need a happy.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Tell me you love me.” He leaned in and she met him half way, placing a gentle kiss on his lips.

“I love you, Mal,” she said.

“No you don’t. You’re just saying that to make conversation. That’s a horrible thing to lie to me about, pumpkin. I don’t know how you can sleep at night.”

“I sleep very well, lying right next to you.” She smiled and threaded her arms around his neck. For a long time they held each other tight, teasing and mumbling endearments.

“Where’s Jimmy?” asked Ev, interrupting the show.

I guess we shouldn’t be perving on the loved-up couple. Even if they were whispering sweet nothings and making out right in front of us. They were cute. Yes, I could admit to missing having someone special sometimes. Though the men I’d dated were more inclined to cause trouble than comfort. Hence my vow to stay sexless and single. I had to protect myself from my own shitty taste in men, even if I did find my own hugs somewhat lacking.