Nicole Helm - All I Am

“Why not?”

“I’m not a people person. I don’t like to talk or be friends. I get angry easily, and I’m rarely nice.”

“You have no idea how much I like not nice.” When he gave her a quizzical glare, she shrugged. “Seriously. Niceness carries with it a certain level of...” She couldn’t believe she was about to be so honest with the guy, but if she couldn’t be honest with the dog-whispering super hermit, who could she be honest with?

“Expectation. I prefer it when people are mean. No pressure to live up to anything. I’d take a good screaming fit over disappointment.” Okay, she could probably stop talking any minute. “Anyway, believe it or not, you don’t scare me in the slightest.” Maybe a slight exaggeration. Something about the guy made her...she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Restless, maybe, but surely that was just her life and not Wes.

“I...” His eyes moved around the room as if taking in the enormity of the mess, then his gaze returned to her. She didn’t think she imagined the perusal, though it was quick.

“On second thought, maybe it’d be a great idea.”

“Really?” She wasn’t sure if his sudden turnabout was normal or not, but she did thrive on spontaneity.

“Yeah, but I want the references before we agree on anything. And no negotiating wages or hours. I pick those.”

“No problem.”

“And there are rules.” He crossed his arms over his chest, scowling. Somehow the dude with the long beard and unkempt hair was cute when he got all gruff.

“Rules? Like what? I’m not always super great at following rules.” She never meant to break them, exactly; it just always turned out that way.

“I...I’m not sure what they are yet, but you’ll have to follow them.”

“Aye, aye, captain.”

“I’m not a captain.”

“Would you prefer sir?” She didn’t mean to make that sir come out all sultry and suggestive. The words had a mind of their own. A dirty mind, at that.

“I j-just... Call me Wes. My name is Wes, a-and that’s what you should call me.”

Cara cocked her head. He was a strange guy. One minute he was standoffish, but the minute she did anything remotely flirtatious he got stuttery. Nervous. The two things didn’t jibe. She found herself a little too curious as to why.

Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea if she was going to be tempted to flirt with him. There was one line she’d yet to cross in the dating department, and that was the boss/employee line.

Of course, her bosses had always been women before, making it rather easy.

“It makes business sense to hire someone better with people than I am. If you actually think you can tackle this and follow my rules, maybe it could work. Maybe. I could fire you any time I wanted. If I hire you.”

“Okay, well, do you have a pen and paper? I can write my references down for you. You can call everyone and get back to me with your rules, and we’ll go from there.” She looked around the stacks of paper, mail and God knew what else. “Or maybe you have a phone or laptop I could type it into, so you don’t lose it.”

He grumbled, then flipped open a laptop on his desk.

Cara cleared the chair off and settled herself in. Which, she knew very well, meant he would have to reach over her to type in his password. She told herself she didn’t do it on purpose.

He grunted, then reached for the keyboard. On the back of his right hand there were a few small scars. Obviously something was wrong with his arm or he wouldn’t have dropped Sweetness’s bin, but she hadn’t noticed the white marks before.

“It’s a scar.”

Busted. “I know.”

“Rule number one. Don’t stare at my scars. Rule number two, don’t ask about them.”

Well, poop. Now she was really curious. “Not a problem. Your scars. Your business.” Maybe she could look it up. Surely the local paper had done a story on him when he came back.

He pulled up an empty document, and she typed in her references, reminding herself multiple times not to stare at his scars. Not to wonder about this strange man with his strange energy.

This so wasn’t going to be easy, and challenges weren’t her strong suit, but it wasn’t as if failing here would be a big deal. All in all, what did she have to lose?

Not a whole lot.

* * *

EVERYTHING ABOUT HIRING Cara screamed bad idea. Bad, tempting idea.

No, the bad idea would be keeping her in that space of his life that would allow this little crush or whatever it was...to linger. Grow. Want.

Sure, if she worked with him she’d be around more than if he just ran into her at the market all season, but hiring her made her off-limits. Wes was very good at following the limits he set for himself. Following rules. That was where he thrived.

As much as he could thrive with a faulty body.

Besides, he’d never had any trouble repelling a woman before. Occasionally, they thought the blushing and stuttering was cute. At first. That never lasted past the whole kissing meltdown part.

So, it was better to have her around. Remind himself what happened around women. Not kid himself into thinking he’d grown out of his hang-ups.

She typed fast, one point in her favor. Long fingers whirring over the keyboard, her nails a flash of purple.

“There we go.”

She pushed her hair behind her ear, a little glimpse of blue catching his attention. A tattoo behind her ear. A bird? It was hard to tell with strands of her light brown hair covering parts of it.

He wasn’t sure why he was trying to tell. It was colorful like the rest of her. What more did he need to know? But it was like a beacon. He couldn’t look away—

“It’s a bluebird.”

“Huh?”

She turned in the chair to meet his gaze. “My tattoo you’re staring at. It’s a bluebird.”

“Oh, um.” Could he be any more of an idiot? Stuttering and um-ing all over the place.

She grinned. “For what it’s worth, I don’t have any rules. So, you can look at it. You can even ask about it if you want.”

“I was trying to figure out what it was. You’ve told me now. A bluebird. Okay.”

“All right. Anything else you want to ask me?”

“Anything else?”

“You know, what I consider my biggest weakness, what’s one word that best describes me, my hobbies. How I feel about interoffice dating.”

She smiled at him. A flirty smile. While he could recognize when someone was flirting with him, it always put him on edge and he never knew how to respond.

That kind of jokey flirting might be innocent, but in his experience, it was the kind used to ridicule him if he ever responded positively.

So he crossed his arms over his chest, standing at attention minus the salute. “No.”

“Right. Well. Suit yourself.” She gave a little wave and turned to go. It was only because he saw the loaner dog kit that he even remembered why she’d come in the first place.

“Cara?”

“Yeah?”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

She furrowed her brow, patting her pockets.

“Sweetness.”

“Oh, right.” She slapped a palm to her forehead comically. “She’s what I came for. Not to hound you into giving me a job.”

She seemed almost embarrassed. Of course, she didn’t stutter, and she didn’t stop smiling. “Guess I got distracted,” she said easily, sauntering over to pick up the loaner kit.

Yeah, she might get embarrassed, maybe, but she certainly wasn’t a basket case like him and the every-other-day reminder would do him a world of good.

* * *

CARA DUG THROUGH the loaner kit on her passenger side floorboard, pulling out a leash and attaching it to Sweetness’s collar.

“Home, sweet home, Sweet,” she said to the white ball of fur as she maneuvered them out of the car. “Well, temporary home.” She walked the dog along the patch of grass next to her apartment building until Sweetness did her business.