Chapter Ten

In Which Men Are Confusing

T uesday morning, I head over to Marcus’s just a few minutes before nine, reluctant, but not willing to ghost, if nothing else for Lugh’s sake. There’s no answer at the front door, so I take my chances with Ramona and let myself in the side gate. I find Marcus standing with a couple of Dvergar men outside the small back door Willow escaped from.

I feel like an idiot as a small bolt of excitement fills my belly at the sight of Marcus standing and talking with the other men. “Sorry to interrupt,” I say as I come up behind him. “Where would you like me to start?”

“Hey, haven’t we met before?” one of the Dvergar men asks me.

“Steely?” asks another man before I can answer the first. It’s not the first time I’ve been recognized in public, and honestly, if anyone was going to recognize me, it’d be the Dvergar.

They are super reclusive and don’t leave the mines much, so once they knew it was a possibility, the men of the mine looked for all sorts of excuses to have us do private shows at their compound. Darla even told us their event planner was very close to booking us for a baby shower before one of the human women that work their private brothel intervened.

Being recognized may not be a big deal to me, but I can almost feel the tension roll off of Marcus.

“Only sometimes,” I tell him with a quick smile and a wink before turning back to Marcus.

Marcus frowns and turns to me. “There’s coffee upstairs. We’re almost done here. I’ll be up there as soon as I can.”

“Sounds good, Sergeant,” I can’t help but tease before heading back inside.

I go upstairs and make myself a cup of coffee then start to look for Freddie K. He’s not in the great room.

“Freddie K.!” I call out, hoping he'd pop up on his own.

No such luck. Immediately, I get a picture in my mind of what seems like a giant bed.

“I can’t go in there. It would be rude to just bust into Marcus’s room.” I say out loud.

Apparently, he can hear me, too, or maybe the things I say create pictures in his mind. Again I get the picture of the giant bed. There’s no sign of Marcus anywhere, so I take a chance and open the door closest to the kitchen.

With the movers still a few days away, the room Marcus sleeps in is still very Spartan. A few large suitcases take up one side, while a mattress and box springs are centered on one wall but lay directly on the floor. His bed is a nest of plain blue pillows with plain blue sheets and a blue comforter crumpled up at one end.

Freddie K. is laying in his favorite position, all four paws in the air, in the middle of a king-sized bed. An image of me holding him comes to my mind and I sigh.

“You’re asking me to do very rude things,” I mutter, feeling weird about crawling on Marcus’s bed to retrieve the dog. Quickly, before I can change my mind, I kneel on the edge and reach for Freddie K.

“Is he demanding you carry him again?” Marcus voice asks from behind me. I jump at the sound, embarrassed at being caught.

“Yes. I’m sorry to just butt in, but he wouldn’t stop asking me to come get him.”

He chuckles softly. “Don’t feel bad. It’s not like I use the bed that much anyways. Sorry, my place doesn’t usually look like a frat house. The realtor and his son had to help me get this stuff in here. I only brought what we could fit in my truck. The movers have the rest.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”

I pick up Freddie K. and turn back to Marcus.

“Are you ready to get started?” he asks.

“Yes, but you could have just texted me and I would have come down.”

“It’s good to practice.”

We head back down the stairs in silence until we’re nearly at the ground floor. “Hey, what’s that?” I ask as we come face-to-face with a rectangular shaped indentation in the wall.

Marcus stops and looks at where I’m pointing. “Oh, it’s the baby box.”

“Baby box?”

He nods. “Yeah, it’s locked up now. The new fire station has one that’s active. You know, it lets moms give up their baby safely without legal consequences. They put the baby in the box and an alarm would sound so the firefighters would know to come and pick up the baby then take it to the hospital or call Child Protective Services, whichever was applicable depending on the condition of the child. We got a few calls back when I worked for CPS.”

“You worked for CPS?”

He looks back at me. “You sound surprised.”

I shake my head. “Just… isn’t that out of the frying pan into the fire in terms of stress?”

“From the Army?”

I nod.

He huffs a laugh. “Yeah, you’re right. It was. I got burned out quickly, seeing people hurt their kids and not being able to do much about it. That’s why I’m here. What about you? How did you end up dancing?”

I shake my head. “After I gave up on college, I worked the normal jobs for a while–fast food, retail, waiting tables. A friend worked as a dancer and she was working half the time I was for the same amount of money, so I auditioned and the rest is history.”

“Have you thought about what you’ll do when you can’t dance anymore?”

“You mean they won’t want me up there when I’m sixty?” I try to tease, but he just frowns.

“I’m serious, Sarah. What if you suddenly couldn’t dance anymore? What if it got dangerous?”

“Marcus, did Lugh set you up to do this? Is this an intervention?”

He shakes his head. “I’m just worried about you.”

This conversation is going nowhere. How many times have I heard the same lines from guys I’ve dated and Marcus and I aren’t even together. I try to keep the exasperation out of my voice. “I’m fine, Marcus. I came to help you today, not talk about my life choices. Can you just show me what you need me to do?”

We walk the rest of the way in silence out to the backyard. The Dvergar are long gone, and the yard is empty. I check both ways before I step out the door. Ramona is nowhere to be seen, but it doesn’t mean she isn’t waiting.

“Don’t worry, she keeps running off to the back pastures.”

“How did you–?”

He chuckles, “Ramona’s the reason you ended up in a pile of shit. I wouldn’t expect you to be too eager to see her anytime soon.”

“And you would be correct.”

“Unfortunately, most of what we do for large animals involves shit.” I put Freddie K. on the ground. Marcus hands me a device that looks like a shovel and rake combined, grabs one himself and drops it in a wheelbarrow. “It’s one thousand percent unglamorous, but necessary or we’ll be drowning in crap before we know it.”

He starts to scoop up piles here and there, so I do the same. I’ve honestly done probably most of these chores at one point or another for Jacqueline and Lugh, but if he wants to show me exactly how he does it, I don’t mind. We work in silence, cleaning the messiest part of the yard–an area close to the back door where he has a feeder for the animals and a few huge buckets for water. After most of the piles are picked up, we put fresh hay in the feeders and refill the water.

“I’m going to let them out now.” The back doors have a chain connected to a pulley that he pulls on to allow it to roll up. As soon as the door is open high enough for them to duck under, the donkeys come wandering out, making a beeline straight for the hay. Freddie K. stays close to my feet. Images of the donkeys in my yard float across my mind.

“So,” Marcus says as I watch Willow shove her way into the feed troth, “your stage name is Steely?”

I guess we’re on this topic again. “It is.” I turn and look at him. “You can ask me anything, you know. I’m not embarrassed about what I do.”

“I don’t want you to be. I’m not trying to make you feel that way. I guess I’m just trying to wrap my mind around it.”

“If you don’t mind my bluntness, it’s really not something you need to worry about.” I try to keep my voice steady, to hide the emotion that threatens to come out. “It’s a job. I sell my body just like you and Lugh did to the U.S. government.”

He snorts. “Only they wanted our minds, too.”

“Did they get it?”

He runs a hand over his head and looks out at the donkeys. It’s a long while before he says anything. “Sometimes I think I made it, and sometimes I’m not so sure.”

I shrug. “If you were crazy, you wouldn’t question your sanity, so you’re probably fine.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Thanks, doctor.”

“Anytime.” I dust my hands off on my pants. “What else can I do to help out today?”

“We’ll have to clean up inside too for the next few days. The Dvergar will be here tomorrow to put up a shelter for them so they can start living outside.”

I grab my shovel and follow him inside, where we clean in silence.

“Sorry to keep you so long. I didn’t realize the time.” Marcus says as we finish up. I check my watch–it’s ten til noon.

I shrug. “I came to help.”

“Yes, but you’re here as a volunteer, not an employee. My goal isn’t to work you to death.”

“It’s fine, Marcus. Do you mind if I wash up?”

He nods and I follow him back inside to the sink in the bay. We wash in silence but on the inside, I’m wishing I could go back to how it felt to stand next to him a few days ago.

“Sarah,” he starts. I meet his eyes and I’m sure the annoyance that gnaws at my gut shows on my face. I’m not a kid anymore, but having to say that aloud would make me feel like one.

“Marcus, I appreciate your concern for me, but I can’t be friends with you if you’re going to continue to question my decisions like this. I’m not going to spend every minute in your presence defending myself and the choices I’ve made.”

He runs his hand across his head like he does and sighs. “I’m fucking this up. I’m not–I want to know the adult Sarah.”

“The adult Sarah?”

“The last time you spoke to me, you were fifteen and now you’re twenty-seven…it’s a change I’m getting used to.”

“So, in your brain, I’m still fifteen?” Well, that’s gross.

He shakes his head. “In my head, you’re two different people and I want to get to know this version of you better.”

I fold my arms across my chest. “Then why all the weirdness about my job?”

He steps closer, boxing me in against the wall, and sighs. “Sarah, you don’t walk with the evil in this world like I have and not see a lot of fucked up stuff. You might be safe in this job, but I can’t tell you how many people in this world are trafficked into jobs just like yours all the time. It’s a little unnerving.”

“You don’t think Lugh would have dragged me out by now?”

“He’s your brother. He’s got three kids and a wife. His hands are full.”

“So are yours.”

“It’s not–” He leans forward, his lips barely inches from mine as I hold my breath, not sure what to expect next. “Can you please just let me worry about you? I want more than just a–”

“Than just a what?”

He says nothing for a moment. I hold my breath as my heart pounds, not sure what to expect next. He closes his eyes.

I want to scream in frustration as the silence stretches out for what seems like forever. Freddie K. appears out of nowhere and presses against my leg. The emotions threatening to boil over settle and cool inside my gut instead of boiling over and exploding. I look down at the dog. He looks back at me calmly with his one good eye before loudly grooming himself.

Marcus looks down at the dog and sighs. “You’ve got excellent timing, dog.”

If you only knew , I think.

I take a deep breath. “Whatever you’re hoping for, Marcus, this can’t be a thing if you’re not ready to accept me as I am. That includes my job. I know from experience, that you can’t just say you accept it without really meaning it. It never works. I get it. As a man, it’s probably a hard thing to accept, but I’m not changing my whole life for someone else. I’ve done that too many times and been burned every single one.”

“I’m not expecting you to change your whole life, Sarah–” Marcus starts.

It definitely sounds like a “but” is coming, but before he says it, a Dvergar man steps into the bay and clears his throat, cutting Marcus off mid-sentence.

Marcus’s attention turns to the man for a moment, and I seize the opportunity to slide out from under his arms.

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” I tell him, taking my voice down a notch. We haven’t been shouting, but our voices haven’t exactly been quiet, either. I’m sure the gray Dvergar man who is looking anywhere but at us heard everything we said. I turn and leave before he can say anything else. I slip out the front door so he can’t watch me go, Freddie K. on my heels. I still have baby witch school tonight, so it will be nice to nap and not think about how confusing Marcus Jones is.

On the front porch, I pick up Freddie K. and give him a big squeeze. “Be good for Marcus,” I tell him. What kind of picture that conjures in his mind, I can’t begin to fathom, but he seems to understand. He scratches at the door I just shut. I open it for him and let him walk back inside before I turn heel and walk home.