A Trade For Good (17 page)

“You’re the one who has a lot to
learn. Leave the kid and his family alone. You hear me?”

“Or what?” Randy asked, and then
shrugged and left when he saw Mitch join Jeff and Sera.

“Ass crater…” P.D. was heard saying
behind them.

Ch
apter 17

On Monday, Sera was walking into work
with a headache. She hated ugly people and Charlie’s coach and
those two dads at the game had really bothered her. Sunday she had
spent the day wondering what she should do. She was happy Mitch and
Jeff had been there to help out, since this was a man’s world, as
Trish had pointed out. Life wouldn’t be easy raising four kids
alone if so many men kept getting in her way. All she wanted was to
get her life going in the right direction, and do what was best for
her kids.

The good news was that Charlie didn’t
know or care that he wasn't a good ball player. As long as he got
to run around with other kids and toss or catch the occasional
ball, that was all he needed to have fun. However, it wasn't fair
to Charlie or other kids that there were jerks who made the rules.
Benching a four or five year old was totally messed up.

She wished she could explain things to
Charlie without hurting him, or talk to someone else. She had never
really had someone who listened; Peter was not that kind of
husband, if such a husband even existed. It was obvious that Jeff,
Mitch, and Trish knew exactly how she was feeling, because all had
jumped in to help out. Sunday had been a day of moping and feeling
sorry for herself, today she’d have to snap out of it and face the
world.

Sera looked around confused. Today was
Monday, wasn’t it? Sera walked in to an office that was buzzing.
Not only was there activity everywhere she looked, but all of the
guys were in the office at once, and that’s something she hadn’t
seen since that first day when she met them all.

The guys walked by and waved hello’s
and Sera continued walking, past her desk, and over to Jeff’s
office to say hello.

When she walked in, Jeff was looking
at some files that were spread out on the once clean desk, and had
the phone to his ear, “Okay, sounds great. We’ll be seeing you this
afternoon. Yes, 837 Maple, got it. Take care… yeah, alright, aha…
bye.”

“Whoo. Hey there sleepy head.” Jeff
said in the form of a greeting.

“Sleepy head?” Sera laughed, “It's 8
o'clock and I'm not late according to the schedule my boss gave
me.”

Jeff smiled warmly, “We’ll have to
have a talk with your boss. Anyway,” he added, still all smiles,
“no worries, you're fine it's just that I've been here since six,
so it feels like it’s late afternoon by now.”

Sera smiled back, “Not my problem,”
and then went over to stand behind him and look over his shoulder
to see what he was working on.

Umm, he smelled delicious. Soapy and
musky delicious… Y-u-m-m-y—

“What?” Jeff asked Sera.

“What,
what?”
Sera asked turning
pink.

“Did you say
yummy?”
Jeff
laughed.

“Oh, I was thinking of something… ah,
never mind. What are you working on?” Good thing she was standing
behind him, or he might have noticed her face had turned a deep
shade of red.

“I’ll go over it after we get some
coffee, okay?”

Sera laughed and asked Jeff, “Is that
your subtle way of asking me to bring it?”

“It wasn’t, but did it
work?”

“Coming right up, boss!”

Sera walked over to the kitchen and
saw Alan and Mitch looking down at some papers on Mitch’s desk.
Everyone seemed busy but her.

‘Yummy?’
She had better start watching herself.

Coffees in hands, Sera returned to
Jeff’s office, who looked up at her as he heard her come in and
stretched his arms completely unaware of the fact that he was
showing off his beautifully muscled torso.

‘What the hell is wrong
with me?’
Sera wondered, while trying to
shift her eyes away.

“How is everyone at home?”

“What?”

Jeff laughed, “You’re a little
distracted this morning, aren’t you? I asked how your family
is?”

“Oh, good. Emma had a great day on
Saturday, and she skipped one of her fit times yesterday. I am
hoping her colic will start getting better. Melle had a friend
over; Charlie couldn’t stop talking about the game…” Sera paused,
poor Charlie. “Oh, and I think Peter and your niece have been
texting non-stop since Saturday.”

“Yikes! Really? I am not ready for her
to start dating. She’s only thirteen!”

“You're
not ready? What about me? I don’t think I can add THAT to my
worries.”

“Tru dat.” Jeff replied.

“Tru dat?
OMG! Who have you been talking to lately?” she
laughed.

“OMG?
We need to get out more, don’t we?”

There was a slightly awkward silence
after that and then he added, “I actually spent most of the weekend
with nephews and nieces, so you’ll have to bear with
me.”

“I’ll try to cut you some slack.
Anyway, what's happening, and what's everybody doing? I haven't
seen all of you under one roof and at one time since the first day
I came here.”

“Ah, well to tell you the truth, it's
all your fault lady.”

“Don’t blame me, I wasn't even here.
Remember? I came in at 8 A.M., which was your noon or something? So
do not go pointing fingers at me. I had a shitty weekend, so you’ll
need to cut me some slack too.”

“Because of the game?” Jeff asked her
with concern.

“Yes, well… Let’s not talk about that
right now. Sorry…”

“No need, but to answer your question,
it is your fault that we are jumping through hoops right now. This
has to do with those letters you sent out to the clients, and I
found several messages on the machine when I got in this
morning.”

“Wow, I didn’t know you knew how to
work the machine,” Sera pretended to be in awe.

“Cute. Really cute.”

“I thought so. Anyway, are these jobs,
jobs you did already, or new jobs for you to do?”

“New jobs. It looks like the inserts
with before and after pictures did it. There are some very
motivated clients who were still hesitant, and now they are
onboard. Sera, this is great, it really is. Business has been down,
and you’re helping to bring it back up.” Jeff was all smiles and
Sera felt like mush inside.

Jeff saw she was uncomfortable with
the praise, but kept going. You have been a lifesaver, Sera. I
mean, things weren’t bad, but let’s just say I didn’t really know
where we stood. Now I have spreadsheets and files, stuff I’m still
trying to figure out how to read,” he laughed, “and well… Thank
you.”

“We both know you’re the real life
saver, Jeff. I have no idea where I would be without you. Working
here helped me not only to pay a debt with a tyrant landscaper
guy,”

“Thank you,” Jeff smiled.

Sera continued, “but I’ve been able to
stay afloat. Even the hours, you’ve allowed me the flexibility I
need with the kids, and that’s H-U-G-E-!”

“When you started I thought it was the
only way to get paid, so I’d help you. But now… I mean, you
immediately took the knight in shining armor role away from me!” he
laughed.

“I guess we’re good together,” Sera
said and then blushed.

Jeff smiled and looked straight at
her, “We are good together. I have no doubt about that.”

After another awkward silence, Jeff
became all business.

“
Okay, now I’m going to
need your help to start mapping out our schedule for the next few
weeks. Mitch and I have some appointments this afternoon, and then
we will know what the jobs will be and how we should distribute. We
will be busy for the next few months, but this is a perfect time of
the year to get it done. I will also have to add a few more hands
here for laborers, and there are some contractors we have worked
with that might pick up some of the extra work. This is really
great and it seems to have exploded. I guess we kind of got into a
rut or something. It was too easy to sit back and wait for stuff to
come in, but I do plan to retire someday…” Jeff smiled and saw
Sera’s head was somewhere else.

Sera hesitated, she was about to say
something, but she stopped, “Okay, I’ll start setting things up.
Send me what you have and I will set up your calendar so I can send
out reminders. You will need to tell me the type of work you will
be doing so I can start ordering the materials to get better prices
in bulk. Put it on the requisition form like I showed you,
and..."

Jeff grabbed her hand and squeezed it,
“I love you Sera Henderson…”

Sera turned bright red. Among other
things, he had used her maiden name Henderson, instead of Sinclair.
She wasn’t even sure if she had squeezed his hand back it felt so
good. Now, red and flustered… She should have laughed it off and
come up with something witty. Instead, she turned a dark shade of
red and froze.

Jeff was looking at her embarrassed by
her reaction, and slightly taken aback, “I’m sorry Sera, I didn’t
mean to …”

“Oh, that,” she said flippantly, “I
hear that all the time,” she laughed and headed out the door as
fast as her feet could take her. She went straight to the bathroom,
hit her head against the mirror a few times whispering ‘lame, lame,
lame!’, turned, and made her way back to her desk.

Chapter 18

Sera spent half of her day creating
calendars, making schedules, calling on appointments, and making
lists of materials they’d be needing to get the jobs started. The
other half of the day she spent frustrated, mad, embarrassed, and
wondering what the hell was going on and why she was being so
stupid. She was getting all goo goo-gaga over Jeff, and there was
no time for that.

Okay, let’s evaluate the
situation,
Sera thought to herself.
He’s hot, oh my god he’s h-o-t! He’s really nice,
he saved my butt, he’s good with kids, he’s single…
Sera stopped.

I’m not single.

He’s financially stable,
and…
What the hell am I doing? Okay,
RE-EVALUATE:

I’m married, I have four
children, I am a mess financially, I have traumatized kids,
I…

Even Sera could see she wasn’t a
really good catch.

Ugh…

The day progressed and she found
herself alone for most of the afternoon. Jeff had left at two to go
to an appointment, and had scheduled back-to-back meetings until 9
P.M. that evening. He had an open slot between three and four, and
she told him she could call to see if she could get his last
appointment moved to an earlier time, but he had told her this was
fine. “In fact,” he had added, “please block out the hour from
three to four for me every day this week.”

“Do you need me to call anyone el…”
Sera yelled out, but he was out the door.

The rest of the week stayed
abuzz
with the guys coming in and out,
contractors stopping by, phones ringing constantly, and Sera loved
every minute of it.

The office was finally performing the
way it should. Jeff, Mitch, and the others were very good at what
they did, so promoting their work with the before and after shots
had simply allowed other people to recognize the business for what
it was. The difference was that now they would start treating it
like a business with Sera’s help. Sera could do the business side,
which she was proving to be very good at, and the rest of the team,
-the artistic minds and laborers - could do their thing.

Sera saw very little of Jeff that
week. He was out meeting with clients and contractors and spent
almost no time in the office. Sera forwarded all messages his way,
so he didn’t even need to call her back to check in.

Sera had to admit she missed seeing
him, but the way her body and mind had started responding to him,
it was better that he stayed away.

Sera went home every day feeling
tired, but fulfilled. She knew she had had a huge part in promoting
the business, and the guys were all thrilled; more work for them
meant more money.

It was Thursday already, and Sera was
ready for the weekend. One more day…

Sera left work and went straight to
Deb and Chad’s as she did every day to pick up the kids. Deb and
Chad had been talking to real estate agents to find them a new
home.

Sera was so happy for them. They were
great people and she loved the idea of a new home, a new baby, a
wonderful family, all for such an incredible couple. She also felt
she owed so much to them for all they did. After all, Peter was
Chad’s brother, but they had immediately jumped in to help her when
he left. Marion, her mother in law, helped, but it wasn’t the same.
There was still the fact that Peter was Marion’s son and she had a
hard time accepting what he had done.