Seth's Cravings: An Endless Series: Book 2 (10 page)

     Jerry was a forty-four year old master plumber and had
been working at Anderson’s for a month. He was six-one, lean, with blond hair, brown
eyes, was always impeccably put together, and I found him lazy and sexist. The
other four guys that worked here hadn’t said anything negative about him as yet
so I was biding my time to see if it was just me or maybe they would speak up given
enough time. As I was the only female working here I assumed the others weren’t
dealing with later problem…but who knew for sure. 

     I had only worked with Jerry twice so I wasn’t ready to
complain about him just yet, but if he continued on his current course words
would be exchanged heatedly and I would be informing Tom of my opinion. Jerry
may be a Master to my Journeyman, but I’d been working here for four years. I
had little doubt that Tom would believe me.

     Tom Anderson had taken me on as an apprentice at
sixteen years of age. He’d never done that before and had been doubtful of my
resolve at sticking with it, but when I’d shown him my grades and how well I
was doing in math, and told him my reasons why, he’d taken a chance. I greatly
appreciated that chance.  

     I spotted Tom’s list on the table in front of where Jerry
was sitting. Oh goody, he’d waited for me. Expelling an irritated sigh I strode
over and snatched it up. Without acknowledging him I walked over to the wall of
supplies to collect what we needed.

     “Hey Shortcake.” Jerry called out behind me.

     Coo-doe’s! He thought up a nickname for me. “I’m not
short.” I corrected impassively looking at the list. The less he knew he got to
me the better. These type of guys thrived on attention.

     “No…but you do have strawberry blonde hair. It brings
to mind the sweet carton character strawberry shortcake. So…Shortcake.”   

     “Never heard of it.” I moved to grab a cart.

     “It’s an American cartoon; you probably grew up on
Russian cartoons.” He snickered. “But believe me it fits you perfectly.”

     “Then I will call you
Savva
, it has specific
meaning and was also a character in a cartoon. I think both fit you well.” I
really hoped he looked that up. The meaning of the word was ‘old man’, and the
cartoon character had been a guy who spent most of his time hanging around
doing nothing but drinking. ‘Lazy old man’ fit him perfectly.

     “While you start on that list, Shortcake, I’ll go bring
the truck around so we can start loading it.” He gave me a smirk and walked
away.

     I shook my head and rolled my eyes. I would rather do
this job than with him, but it would take longer to the get supplies together
alone and we were slotted to be at the house at ten o’clock.

     Twenty minutes later Jerry finally brought the truck
around from where it had been parked fifty feet away. He got out and threw me a
dirty look telling me that he’d done some internet research on the name I’d
bestowed on him. I stared innocently back. Hopefully that would be the end of
‘shortcake’.

     We loaded everything silently and then headed out to
the job site with Jerry at the wheel, and again we remained silent apart from
the country music coming from the radio. With any of the other guys I would be
joking and laughing, but then maybe I wouldn’t have during this trip because I
found myself tensing up the closer we got to Seth’s residence.

     I wasn’t looking forward to working near him. He
elicited some singular emotions in me that I didn’t want to experience or
acknowledge. Therefore, my strategies for this job was to focus on my work,
stay out of Seth’s way, and get the job done as quickly as possible.

     Unfortunately, Jerry was probably going to mess with my
third objective.

     We arrived at the house at ten after ten, which was fifteen
minutes late. I hated being late. Giving Jerry a scathing look I jumped from
the truck as soon as we stopped and headed up to the house. Giving the door a
sound thumping I waited patiently hoping Seth didn’t answer.

     When the door opened it wasn’t Seth at the door, it was
a beautiful female with long black hair and the most striking blue eyes I’d
ever seen. She made me instantly feel bland, more so since she was in dark blue
form fitting Capri pants with a white tank with random letters all over it. I
was in my work outfit of old jeans, my blue work shirt, and hair up in a
ponytail.

     The girl was smiling when she opened the door and when
she noticed my shirt it became curiously surprised. “Are you the plumber?”

     “Yes, I am.” I answered waiting to see what she would
do.

     “That is so cool, and you’re so young. Do you like it?”
She asked looking extremely interested.

     “Yes, I do actually.” I answered honestly. I could tell
right away that this girl would be hard to dislike. Sweetness radiated off her
like stink off a pig. “You live here?” The thought of her living here had my
stomach tightening uncomfortably, I have no idea why.

     The girl continued to smile but she blushed slightly.
“No, I date one of the occupants.” She waved me in. “My name is Carrie. Please,
come on in.”

     Gut still uncomfortably tight I stepped in. “Thank you,
I’m Nadia. So, how many guys live here?” I asked.

     “Five. It’s a house full of raging testosterone, and they’re
all on the college lacrosse team which just makes it worse.” The girl said
laughing.

     I knew that Seth and Landon were on the lacrosse team
because I’d heard Landon mention it, but
derr’mo
, five of them under one
roof. The house was quite large though.

     I wanted to ask the girl which of the guys she was
dating but that would have said I cared…which I didn’t. “Do they all know that
the water will be off for a couple of days, so there will be no water for
showers or toilets?” I asked instead.

     Carrie’s smile widened. “Yes, they know and they are not
happy about it. They rented a Port-o-Potty for those days and they will be
taking showers at the stadium, so they won’t be too uncomfortable.”

     “That’s good. We are going to try and do everything as
quickly and unobtrusively as possible so you can go back to life as normal. My
associate and I will get most of our supplies downstairs right now and than
hopefully you won’t see us for hours after that.” I stated.

     “Well, don’t worry about me. I have to leave for class
right now, so the house will be empty for a few hours because the guys have
classes this afternoon. So, go crazy.” Carrie replied grinning.

     I returned it unconsciously. This girl was just too
nice. Was she Seth’s girlfriend? I winced inwardly at the wayward
thought…because I didn’t care.

    “We will try to keep the mayhem to a minimum then.” I
responded.

     “Okay. I will probably see you around because I’m here
pretty much every day.” She waved and picked up her backpack as she headed out
the door. Jerry finally made his way up to the house and eyed Carrie in a way I
found offensive and by the blush suffusing her face she might have as well.
Hui
!
 

     I followed Carrie out of the house giving Jerry another
glower and began gathering up the supplies to carry into the house. I did this
ten times to Jerry’s three. Stacking what we carried down in one corner of the
full sized basement I plugged one ear bud in my ear so I could listen to music then
started to take apart the old plumbing.

     Jerry went back upstairs to do…I don’t know what…which
had irritation flaring. While I had no problem working alone Jerry was being
paid to do a job. Tom had promised this job would get done in a certain amount
of time, so it ticked me off that he was pulling his typical lazyass behavior,
but instead of arguing with him I just worked doubly hard to get what I could
finished.

     Two hours later Jerry finally came back downstairs and
started hauling―in small loads―the old piping I’d dismantled up the
stairs. I heard more than one set of footsteps up there telling me that some of
the renters were home.

     Was Seth home?

     I don’t care I reminded myself as I focused on the old
shitty piping. An hour later I almost fell off the ladder as a voice startled
me. “Why in the hell are you down here alone while that other guy sits in the
truck outside playing with his phone?”

     The ladder rocked unsteadily under me as I jerked in
reaction to Seth’s angry tone. In under a second his long legs ate the distance
to steady it for me. “Are you trying to make me fall?” I yelled. My heart beat
double time, and not just in reaction to the shot of fright that rushed through
me at nearly falling. Seeing him again immediately caused havoc to my nerves.

     Seth looked instantly contrite. “Shit, I’m sorry.” He
said gruffly. “You okay?”

     I looked down into his ruggedly handsome face and found
myself getting pulled into the dark blue intensity of his eyes. I looked away
hastily. “Uhm, yeah. Sorry for yelling there, you just startled me.”

     “I totally had it coming. I should have known better
than to surprise you like that.” He said. “But I still want to know why you’re
down here by yourself?”

     I wasn’t going to snitch out a fellow employee to a
customer, even if I didn’t like him. That was just bad form. “You’re going to
have to ask him.”

     “And who is him?” Seth grumbled.

     My lip twitched at his grumpy tone. “Jerry Harris.” I
offered. Nothing wrong with disclosing the man’s name.

     He didn’t speak for a few seconds and I looked down at him
curiously. His hard gaze was tracking the room taking in what had been done.
“Did you do most of this by yourself while that guy sat on his ass?” His fixed
his eyes back on me.

     I gave him an arched look and went back to dismantling.
I was going have no problem taking my complaints about Jerry to Tom, but I
wasn’t going to air them in front of a client.

     Seth walked over to the bottom of the stairs. “Evan!”
He yelled deeply.

     A moment later a voice yelled back. “Yeah?”

     “I want you to stand on that front porch and stare as
hard as you can at the guy in that plumber’s truck outside and if he’s not
moving to get his ass in here in two minutes than inquire as to why he’s not.”

     “Sure thing.” The voice responded like Seth had just
asked him to go retrieve the mail.

     I stared at Seth impressed by his commanding manner. The
arrow of heat that shot straight to my core I could have done without though.
He moved back toward the ladder taking hold of it again. It was like he was
concerned for my safety. But I was used to taking care of myself. Returning my
attention to the pipes I ignored the warmth flooding my veins at his
unremitting scrutiny.

     A tension filled silence reigned before Seth broke it.
“You’ve gotten a lot done today.”

     “It’s easy to take things apart.” I pulled the pipe I
was working on loose and moved to step down the ladder with it, but Seth took
it from me before I could.

     “I got that.” He said walking it over and placing it
with the other discarded piping.

     I stared after him finding myself running my eyes over
his large, burly frame. He was in shorts which showed off his muscular calves,
and a t-shirt that emphasized his beefy chest and well-developed arms. The
overall vista was wholly imposing…and magnificent.

     I tore my gaze away and shook my head. Focus girl! I
tried ignoring him as he ambled back over. Maybe he’d go away. My grip on the
wrench slipped slightly and I nearly dropped it.

    
Hooyea
(fool)!

     “Careful there.” Seth cautioned.

     “Yes, I know.” I retorted irritably.

       Seth chuckled. Chuckled! The sound was deep and
seemed to reverberate through my body sending warmth everywhere. That was
not
good! I reinforced my irritable tone with an irritable look, but he just stared
at me with amusement in his eyes.

     Even though I’d gone through some serious shit in my
life and could at times be a real bitch, I was a naturally humorous person and
enjoyed a good laugh. I tried hard but I couldn’t hold back the reflexive curl
of my mouth.

     “Shut up…and go away. You bother me.” Shit, shit, shit.
I shouldn’t have admitted that. It was like saying that he, quote, unquote: ‘
bothered
me’
.

     “Do I?” He drawled in his gravelly voice…and there went
another shiver down my spine.  

     I wrenched hard on the fixture above me. “Do you what?”
I asked going for clueless.

     “Do I bother you?” He repeated even more gruffly.

     “Of course not. You’re the customer.” The fixture came
free with a yank.

     Footsteps tromped down the stairs. “Hey Shortcake,
how’s everything going down here?” Jerry called out like we were old friends.

     He wanted to play it that way, did he? “It all depends
how you look at it,
Savva
.” I replied in mocking sweetness.

     I was lowering the pipe and I observed Seth giving
Jerry the darkest of glares. Jerry was doing his best to look unconcerned and
jovial under the pressure of it but I could see little sweat beads forming on
his brow and lip. It was a vindicating sight.

     “Hey
Jerry
.” Seth’s voice was hard and he continued
to stare at Jerry like he was a bug he wanted to squash. “I was just helping
out Nadia while you were busy outside, but now that you’re here I’m sure you’ll
want to take over.”

     I gave Seth an astonished look. Did he just commandeer
the situation putting himself in charge? Jerry was giving Seth the same
dumbfounded look. “Uhm, yeah, I came down to do just that.” Jerry confirmed
with a wan smile.

     “Good, I’ll lend her a hand taking up this old piping
she
removed
and then I want to ask her some questions on something since she
was
so helpful
the last time she was here.” Seth held out his hand for
the pipe I’d forgotten I was holding while he’d been berating Jerry subtly and
skillfully.