Welcome to Sugartown (4 page)

“
Oh Elijah,
won’t you try my pie? I made it just for you,” she taunts in a
high-pitched, girly tone that sounds absolutely nothing like me.
“What’s that, you wanna stick your fingers in my deliciously silky,
warm pie?”

I’m so
focused on Holly’s taunting and the wickedly jabby broom handle
currently tenderising my rump that I don’t hear the bell signal a
customer. And this is how Elijah finds us as he stares through the
serving window: me in my underwear, covered head to toe in
chocolate and flour, standing on the chair I’d slept on and having
my arse poked by a very dead best friend—or at least, she will be,
once I get him to leave. For a minute we are frozen, all three of
us just gawking at one another.

“
Mornin’.”
Elijah grins. And there they are, both dimples popping out to say
hello. And it’s not even ten am yet. The snide bastard makes no
attempt to hide the fact he’s ogling me from head to
toe.

With a
squeak, I drop the rag and attempt to cover myself, but in my haste
the movement throws me off balance, which then causes my chair to
tilt at an angle that’s not conducive to keeping me on my feet. I
fall flat on my face and, to my absolute horror, while I’m down
there acquainting myself with the checked lino and the dust
bunnies, Elijah sidles right up to the window and starts up a
conversation about our brand new pies. Like he didn’t just witness
the single most humiliating moment of my life, and neither he nor
Holly can see my half-naked arse sticking out from behind the
island bench.

I. Am.
Beyond
.
Mortified.

And, just
when I’m thinking this day couldn’t possibly get any worse, I hear
the shop door open and my dad’s gravely greeting. Big Bob enjoys
mornings about as much as I do.

I quit trying
to dig myself a shallow grave through the linoleum floor, shoot up
from behind the safety of my counter with a very calm head and nod
to each of them.

“
Elijah.
Bob.”

Dad’s eyes
narrow and his ever-present scowl threatens to divide his forehead
in half. “Ana?”

Oh crap. I
know that voice. I haven’t heard that voice since I was
ten-years-old and he caught Holly and I with a stolen packet of
cigarettes. We hadn’t even had a chance to light up before he was
pulling us out from behind the supermarket and humiliating us in
front of the whole town. The look on my dad’s face now says he’s
about two seconds away from picking me up by the scruff of the neck
and crucifying me where I stand.

And yeah,
okay, maybe from his standpoint this looks bad, but despite me
being a nineteen-year-old woman, Dad’s still struggling with the
fact that I’ve moved from training bras to push up bras, and
thinking boys were stinky to maybe wanting to sleep with one. And
since Elijah seems to be the only male within a 5 kilometre radius
and he just caught his daughter half naked in the kitchen, things
aren’t looking good for any of us.

He turns the
full weight of his scowl on Elijah, who is still smiling like he
just won the freaking lottery
and
a Christmas ham. “Son?”

“
Uh-huh.”

“
Haven’t you
got a bike to fix?”

Elijah still
hasn’t taken his eyes off me, but my dad’s tone brokers absolutely
no argument, and what’s more, when he gets an eyeful of Bob Belle’s
infamous scowl, he clears his throat.

“
YES, SIR!
I’LL GET RIGHT ON IT …” he yells. And why wouldn’t he yell? After
all, it is what I told him.

Dad winces at
the volume. Holly is laughing again, like a whacked out chimpanzee
and I’m just too mortified for words. Elijah scurries back through
the shop with a nod in our direction and an exclamation of, “I
freaking love this town!”

“
I’m. Just.
Gonna. Go … now,” I mutter and exit through the back door with my
tail between my legs.

Chapter Four

Elijah

Two weeks on
and I still can’t forget seeing hot waitress Ana standing in her
underwear. Not that I’d want to forget. In fact, that image has
been on replay in my spank bank twice a day for a fortnight now.
I’d give my left nut to get beneath those lacy little boy shorts.
The fact that she’s still playing hard to get is pissing me off and
turning me into a fucking horn dog. I don’t usually walk away from
a challenge, but sometimes life throws you so much shit you’ve just
gotta quit while you’re ahead.

And other
times life throws you a bone, or in my case, a raging boner for the
hot waitress in the pie shop across the road. If I were a smart man
I’d walk away, I’d cut my losses and move on to the next hot piece
of arse, and I’d be better off—hell, that waitress would be better
off. But no one ever accused me of being smart. Like all men, I
think with the little head more than is good for me and I can’t
walk away without a taste of that girl.

And speaking
of the “little head”, I’ve got a date with a slice of pie and a hot
waitress who’s about to fill my spank bank fantasies for another
fortnight.

I slide out
from under the hood of a 1971 GTX Plymouth Road Runner. It’s the
kind of car you want to drape a warm body over the hood and fuck
till you’re both senseless. And, with all the bikes I’ve been
workin’ on lately, it’s been nice to slide beneath a machine as
beautiful as this. I’m pretty confident that I’ll have this thing
purring like a kitten before the afternoon is out.

I wash up in
the sink in back, scrubbing the pungent smell of grease and brake
fluid from my hands. My stomach growls.

My cock
twitches when I think of the way Ana smells as she leans across the
table to set my pie in front of me. I always sit in the very last
booth, closest to the counter. I face away from the windows so I’m
looking directly into the kitchen and sit as far back in the booth
as possible so she has to lean in to slide my plate in front of me.
It’s kind of a dickhead move, I know, and I’m sure she knows
exactly what I’m up to, but I don’t care.

Fuck, I’m
getting hard just thinking about her in that cute little uniform,
those gorgeous tits spilling out the top. I squeeze my eyes shut
and think about old ladies and nuns and sweaty old man balls,
anything to take my mind off Ana’s big, beautiful tits that are
making me so hard I can’t see straight. I’m playing these things on
a loop and whispering, “Old ladies, nuns, sweaty old man balls”
over and over, and just praying that the meat muscle will chill the
fuck out and let me get through one friggin’ day without getting a
boner in public for the hot waitress, when I glance into the mirror
above the sink and see Bob standing behind me. His arms are crossed
in front of his chest and he’s scowling. Nothing new there; he’s
always scowling.

“
You heading
to lunch?”

“
YEAH, YOU
WANT SOMETHING?”

“
A word
before you go.”

“
ALRIGHT.” I
tear off a chunk of paper towel and take the opportunity to
readjust things below as he walks toward the back seat of a sawed
in half Ford Falcon that Bob uses as a couch. I follow him over and
sit on an old milk crate that someone strapped some foam to at some
point to make a stool. The tape is worn around the edges, it sticks
to my jeans and the foam has worn down to nothing, picked away by
tiny fingers.

“
You got a
problem with your ears, kid?”

“
NO,
SIR.”

“
Then quit
friggin’ yellin’ at me.”

“
But I
thought—”

“
Son, do you
own a shirt?”

I glance down
at my tattooed torso, taking a minute to appreciate the fact that,
although I haven’t seen the inside of a gym for six months, my
work, the mini workouts I do in my room every morning and my daily
runs are enough to keep me pretty built. I look back up at Bob and
he’s not at all happy with the way I look. Maybe he’s into hairy
guys?

“
Yeah, of
course,” I say, feeling a little uncomfortable at the way he’s
glaring at me.

“
Well, why
the bloody hell don’t you ever wear it, instead of parading around
here like it’s the fucking Mardi Gras?”

I grab the
shirt tucked into my back pocket and pull it over my head, utterly
confused. “I thought … I thought you were into that?”

Bob turns
three shades of pale. No shit, it’s like I’m staring at a fucking
ghost. “Look mate, you’re a real good worker. You keep your head
down, you don’t carry on like a pork chop when I ask you to close
up late Fridays. Now, I gotta be honest, I wasn’t too sure about
this whole … arrangement in the beginning, and despite riding some
import pushbike, you know your way around an engine. I know you’ve
had some trouble in your past and I can see you’re trying to make
amends for that. You’re a good kid and what you do in your free
time is none of my business. I like you, Son. As an employee. If
you like blokes then … we’ll find a way to co-exist, but you’ve got
to start wearing a shirt. It’d be a shit fight if OH&S came in
and saw you—”

“
Wait. You
think
I’m
gay?” I
start laughing at how fucking ridiculous that notion is,
considering I’ve been jacking off to the image of the same girl for
the last two weeks. The same girl that told me my boss was
partially deaf and that he’d require me to work half naked.
That sneaky bitch.
She
is so going down for this. “Dude, I’m not gay. I thought you
were.”

“
Son, I am
not gay. I’ve been married twice. I have kids.”

“
I didn’t
know you had kids.”

“
Well, you
should, you spend enough time with them at the pie
shop.”

“
Hot waitress
Ana is
your
daughter?”

“
Hot
waitress
?” Bob’s eyebrows shoot all the
way back into his hairline. “Whaddya mean, hot
waitress?”

Fuck! I just
said that out loud, didn’t I?

I shoot up
from my stool. Bob’s standing now, too. His enormous arms are
folded in front of his enormous body and I’m not afraid to say I’m
shitting myself at the scowl I’m seeing on his face. This scowl is
different from all his other scowls: it’s a don’t fuck with my
daughter kind of scowl, and yeah, I may have seen plenty of those
in my twenty-three years, but none have ever been this scary. It’s
the disapproving dad scowl to end all dad scowls and what makes it
worse is that it’s also coming from the dude who pays my
wage.

Fuck! I am so
screwed.

“
I’m just
gonna head out now,” I mutter, as I take a step back, and then
another, and soon I’m half way across the shop.

“
Take one
more step and I’ll bust your nuts with my favourite wrench.” He
smiles but it’s not a friendly smile. It’s a
we’re-going-to-have-us-a-little-chat-and-then-I’m-gonna-cut-off-your-balls-for-even-thinking-about-what’s-between-my-daughter’s-legs
smile. In other words, this is the moment where I’d normally run.
“We’re gonna have a talk you and me.”

“
It’s not
what you think.”

“
Really?
‘Cause right now, son, my thoughts aren’t fuckin’
pretty.”

I put my
hands up in surrender. “I haven’t touched her, I swear.”

“
You’re not
gonna touch her, are you, son.” That really wasn’t a question. He
meant: do not fucking touch my daughter!

“
No,
Sir.”

“
You keep
your mind on the job and your dick in your pants, are we
clear?”

“
Yes, Sir.” I
gulp. “Crystal.”

After that,
Bob leaves to beat the shit out of a rusted old engine. I skipped
lunch that day, and the next.

By closing
time on Friday I was itching for a way to get back at Ana and,
yeah, I’m not gonna lie, the thought of her tits spilling out of
that uniform may have been responsible for my feet carrying me
across the road to Belle’s Pies instead of releasing the throttle
on my bike and travelling as far away from hot waitress Ana as I
could in order to keep the family jewels intact.

I smile at
the girls behind the counter and slide into my usual
booth.