Unbearable (Undescribable) (22 page)

I turn back to face Angel. “Come on inside. We will
look for them later.”

Everyone turns to stare at me like I just told the
biggest white lie in the world. Thankfully, Angel doesn’t notice the looks
everyone is giving me and walks inside, that frown still on her face.

We all gather in the kitchen as Angel starts making
lunch. We repeat the story of our night about twenty times while being asked a
hundred more questions. I wish I could record it and just play it when someone
asks.

“I have to get ready for
work,” Angel announces, heading out of the kitchen.

“You’re not working today!”

We all turn to face Tate as he stands with his arms
crossed over his chest. If he hadn’t have repeated the same words I told her
earlier, I would have been mad.

“I have to,” she snaps. I lean against the counter
and take a sip of my beer. The fact that she’s pissed off at Tate and not me
makes me happy.

“The bar can live without you for a day.”

Her mouth falls open and she looks to me. I shrug.
“I already told you earlier you were not working today.”

“But—”

“Actually,” Holly interjects timidly, “when Micah
told me what happened this morning, I immediately called and got someone to
cover your shift, Sam.”

Angel lets out a puff of air when she looks at
Holly. I can tell she does not like the fact that everyone wants her to stay
home today. “That was nice of you. Thank you,” she says, trying to act
appreciative.

The girls strike up a conversation about the work
schedule for next week, and I look over at Tate. The feeling of happiness is
now gone. What if he had a part in last night? I mean yeah, I said I had
enemies, but for one to come after me right after he shows up… is it a
coincidence? That’s just something I’m going to have to find out.

I turn to face him and speak quietly. “You seem to
know everything about me and Angel. So, I’m guessing you know where I work?”

“Yeah,” he answers just as quietly.

“Why don’t you come by tomorrow? Say around one?”

He looks at me hesitantly. “May I ask why?” He takes
a drink of his beer.

“We need to figure out who was in this house, and
two heads are better than one.”

He gives me a small nod and I lean back against the
countertop with a smile on my face. That’s not the only thing we are going to
talk about.

We said goodbye to everyone
around seven last night. Although I had slept in late, I still feel exhausted.

The girls and I talked about work and having a
girls’ day sometime this week. The guys put up the board over the window and
Slade took them on a walk-through of the house after they all insisted on
looking around for themselves.

As soon as my head hit the pillow my eyes were
closed, but not for long. Slade was not as tired as I was and had other things
in mind that included handcuffs and a vibrator. I think he was trying to
distract me from our crazy day, and it didn’t matter how drained I was, I was
not going to turn the man down. But my ass sure is dragging today.

As I park at work, I hear my phone ringing in my
purse.

“Crap,” I say trying to dig it out of the bottom. I
figure it is Holly wondering where in the hell I am. The alarm company stayed
longer than expected, but I was glad they were able to come a day earlier than
scheduled. I thought they were just going to put in a keypad, but oh no. Slade
had to order some big bad state of the art security system, which took them
over an hour to install.

I finally find my phone and pull it out of my purse
only to drop it on the floor. After saying a few choice words, I grab it and answer
without even looking at the caller ID.

“Hey, I’m about to walk in,” I say as soon as I put
the phone to my ear.

The only sound on the other end is silence.
“Hello?” I ask. When no one answers, I pull the phone away from my ear to look
at it. I sigh when I see it’s a blocked number again.

“You have the wrong number!” I yell, frustrated,
trying to put stuff back in my purse.

“No I don’t,” comes a very familiar voice.

I stop dead in my tracks as I try to place the
caller’s voice. The first time I heard it was on the other end of the phone
line the first time I called Slade. Then the same voice showed up at my work
and slashed Nadia’s tires.

Jessica!

“How are things going?” she asks like we are best
friends.

“What do you want, Jessica?” I say, affecting a
dead tone to my words.

“Oh, you remember me,” she squeals happily. “I was
just calling to let you know it’s going to happen.”

I inhale a deep breath, not really wanting to hear
what she has to say, but my curiosity wants to know what bullshit she has come
up with. “What’s going to happen?”

She laughs a little and it makes me want to throw
this phone like the last one I destroyed. “Slade cheating on you,” she states
as if it’s obvious.

I remain quiet as I try to decide how to take this
conversation. I know Slade is not going to cheat on me. If there’s one thing I
have trust in, it’s our relationship.

She laughs again, getting my attention. “You really
think he can be faithful? Why would he only be with you when he could have any
woman he wants? The only difference between Slade and Jax is that Jax was a
careless idiot. Slade knows just what to say to keep you believing him.”

“Listen,” I say, ready to end this conversation.
“First, quit calling me from a blocked number. If I really wanted your number,
I’m sure getting it wouldn’t be hard. Second, quit trying to get me to believe
Slade will cheat on me. It’s not going to work. Give it up already. He wants
nothing to do with you. Give up and move on!” I snap.

“You think you know him, but you don’t. You’ll
see,” she singsongs before hanging up.

I shake my head and get out of the truck. Even
though I don’t believe her, the situation still pisses me off. This is the last
thing I want to deal with right now.

Trying to get Jessica out of my mind, I walk inside
and decide I need to have a good shift at work.

As I’m pulling cases out in
the freezer, Holly walks in. “Sorry I’m late. Slade had this high-tech security
system installed today and the guys were taking forever.”

She laughs a little bit. “I thought that was
tomorrow?”

“They had a cancellation. So I had them and the
glass company there at the same time.”

“Well, at least it’s all done.”

As she turns to walk out, I think of my phone call
with Jessica. “Hey, do you have Jessica’s phone number?” I ask.

Holly turns slowly, a scowl on her face. “Why would
you want her number?”

“That blocked number that called me a few weeks
ago. It was her.”

Her eyes go wide. “How do you know? It was
blocked.”

“She just called me again but this time she actually
spoke to me. It only took me a few seconds to recognize her.”

“She’s such an idiot.” She gives a little laugh
then she looks at me seriously.“You don’t think it was her, do you? The one
that broke into the house?”

“No. She’s not that brave. Hell, she’s calling me
with her number blocked for Christ’s sake. That was her third time to call and
she just hung up when I answered the first two times.”

“True.” She pulls her phone out of her back pocket.
“I do not have her number, but let’s check Facebook.”

Five minutes later, we find her Facebook page and
we get lucky that it’s not private and she has her phone linked to it, giving
us her number. Some bitches can be so stupid.

“What are you doing?” Holly asks as I pull my phone
out.

“I’m saving her number to my phone.” Once I add it,
I hold it up to show her what I’ve saved her under.

BITCH!

Holly throws her head back, laughing. “That’s
awesome!” she says between her snickers. “What did she want anyway?” She bends
down to pick up a case of beer and starts to walk out. I follow after her,
doing the same.

“To tell me Slade is going to cheat on me.”

She stops so quickly I almost run into the back of
her. She spins around to face me. “Sam. You know that’s not true.”

“I know, and I told her just that. That’s why I
wanted to save her number. I didn’t believe her shit, so I know that she will
continue to call me.”

She nods. “Did you mention how you know she slashed
Slade’s tires?”

“No. That would be pointless and I didn’t want to
have to talk to the bitch any more than I already had.”

She turns back around and continues to walk and I
trail behind. We spend the next ten minutes stocking beer in both the front and
small back bar.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you that you are training
someone today,” she says as we head back over to the main bar.

I groan and she laughs. “It will just be for a few
hours.”

“Who is it?”

“Jeremy. The guy that you said you didn’t like,”
she teases with a smile on her face. I frown at her happiness. The last thing I
want to do today is train someone. “You won’t have to do too much training,”
she explains. “He has been a bartender for the last two years. He is only going
to work behind the bar. Since he knows all the drinks all you have to do is
show him where we keep everything and how to work our computer system.”

“That’s it?” I ask skeptically.

She nods. “Yep.”

As I walk behind the bar, I hear the back door
open. Moments later Jeremy comes into view. I don’t know why, but just the look
on his face has me taking a step back from him. His arms are covered in tattoos
just like Tate, but Tate’s are tribal work whereas Jeremy’s are scary looking
skulls, one even has flames coming out of the eyes. Another one has a dagger
through a skull with blood dripping off of it.

I’m not one to judge someone by the art displayed
on their body, but do you ever just get a bad vibe from someone? I get it from
him, and it could just be because he pissed me off the first time I met him.
Whatever the reason, I’m going to have to suck it up because now he and I are
going to be working together.

“Hello, I’m Jeremy.” He reaches his hand out to me.

“I know. I remember you,” I reply flatly.

He smiles, and it’s that same cocky smile I
remember annoying me that night at the hotel bar.

“Sorry, I forgot that I met you when I came in to
get an application.” The sly smirk he has on his face tells me he’s lying
through his teeth.

“No. I was talking about the first night I met
you.” The smile falls off his face. “You were our bartender at the hotel.”

He stares at me with an expressionless face for a
few seconds and it just adds to my unease toward him. He slowly schools his
features and looks me in the eyes. “I’m surprised you remember me. Your
boyfriend got you pretty drunk that night, but you did seem like one of those
uptight chicks who needs a few drinks to loosen up.” Then he spins around and
walks off toward the back bar where Holly is standing.

Once I pick my jaw up off the floor, I place my
hands on my hips. What the hell was that about? If he remembers me from that
night, then why did he act like he didn’t know me when he first came into
Larry’s looking for a job? Why did he wait for me to mention it?

“So, Holly said you are training me today,” he says
as he walks back over to me, that cocky smile returning.

I just stare at him before I let out a long breath.
It’s only for a couple of hours I repeat over and over in my head, but I’m sure
as hell not going to be nice. He thinks I’m uptight. I’ll show him uptight.

“That’s the plan,” I state coldly as I start to
walk toward the back room. I stop and turn to see him standing there staring at
my ass. “You know.” I cross my arms over my chest as I turn my body to face him.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, unless you want to get fired.”

He smirks and it makes his lip ring bounce a bit.
“You can’t fire me.”

I take a couple of steps toward him and point my
finger at his chest. “I can do whatever the hell I want. So, don’t push me.” I
don’t know how true that statement is. Holly is the one who pretty much runs
this bar. I’m sure if I stomp my foot and throw a fit she would let him go.