bristled. “There’s nothing stupid about that sign!”
“Right, nothing stupid except for the fact I’m not a son!” My shout shot around the room and hung there for a moment until silence defeated it.
Everyone had assumed my brother would take over from my dad. Everyone but Craig. The news had finally been delivered one Thanksgiving when the inevitable argument erupted between him and our dad about Craig stepping into the shoes of the son in Frawley and Sons. Craig, eighteen at the time, planned to go to NYU film school instead. Craig had left the table and not come back for a long time. He lived in New York with a series of increasingly younger actresses and made commercials and music videos. One of his documentaries had been nominated for an Emmy.
“I’ll get these back to you in a few days,” he said.
My dad pushed through the door and I watched him go, then sank back into the seat behind the desk. My chair. My place. My fucking desk, if you wanted to get right down to it. This was my office, and my business now.
Even if I wasn’t a son.
I’d never thought of Jared as anything other than an intern, but knowing that other people were making romantic assumptions about us, I couldn’t stop thinking about him like that. It pissed me off. Until now, we’d had the perfect working relationship. It was as uncomplicated as my dates with Mrs. Smith’s gentlemen.
It wasn’t as if I’d never noticed Jared was attractive or anything. He had a nice face, kept in shape, had an affable personality that made him easy to get along with. We joked a lot, but I’d never had even a hint that he was flirting with me, and I know I never did with him. Why couldn’t men and women just be friends without someone, somewhere, shoehorning sex into it? On the other hand, why did everyone assume that having sex with someone meant you had to fall in love?
“Hey, Grace. Want me to give Betty a bath while I’m out there?”
“You know, I have noticed you have a serious hearse fetish, Jared.” I took the last pile of brochures from the printer and stacked them neatly on Shelly’s desk for her to fold. “But sure. If you want to.”
“Sweet.” Jared grinned and headed out through the back doors into the parking lot and the fresh April air.
Black Betty was my car. A 1981 Camaro, it had been Craig’s first, purchased with his after-school newspaper-delivery money in honor of his obsession with the punk band The Dead Milkmen. I’d inherited it when he’d moved to New York. I only drove it when I didn’t want to use the funeral home’s minivan emblazoned with the Frawley and Sons logo. It was my sex car. She didn’t quite run like lightning, but she sure sounded like thunder. Jared lusted after her. I noticed boys did that a lot. Ben had, too.
I followed him to the garage, a converted carriage house barely big enough to fit our hearse, the minivan we used to transport bodies and Betty. Bigger funeral homes had more cars, and someday I hoped to add a flower car or a vehicle mourners could ride in. One thing at a time.
“You coming to help me?” Jared filled a bucket with water from the spigot and grabbed up a big sponge from one of the neatly kept shelves. He’d already pulled the hearse out into the driveway. “I thought you hated washing the hearse.”
“Yeah. My dad used to make me and Craig do it every Saturday.” I didn’t take a sponge and stayed well away from the splash zone. I was still dressed for work and had an appointment in an hour.
Jared gave me a curious look. “You worried I’m going to hurt Betty or something?”
“No.” I looked fondly at the car that had seen me through two proms, college and numerous other escapades. “She’s a big girl. She can take care of herself.”
Jared snorted and dipped his sponge into the soapy water, then knelt next to the hearse and started working on the wheels. “Just as long as she doesn’t come to life and start killing people. Hey. That would be a good twist, huh? The car goes around knocking people off to bring more business.”
“Ha, ha.” I shook my head. “Don’t ever say anything like that to my dad.”
“I won’t. Your dad’s scary enough.” Jared scrubbed, then gave me a glance over his shoulder. “Boss, you’ve got something to talk to me about?”
I didn’t, really. I couldn’t exactly tell him my dad and maybe half the town thought we were schtupping. “I just wanted to tell you that you’re doing good work. That’s all.”
Jared stopped washing the tires and stood, his hands covered in foam. “Thanks, Grace.”
His smile was nice enough but didn’t send sparkles through me, and the fact I was even trying to see if it did pissed me off. “You’re welcome.”
He was still looking at me curiously. “Anything else?”
“No. Carry on.” I shooed him with my hands and went back inside, where Shelly was busy folding brochures and answering the phone.
I went to my office, where I sat in my chair and surveyed my realm without the satisfaction it usually brought me. No matter how hard I worked, there were always going to be people, my dad and sister among them, who measured my success by their standards. I didn’t want to let their view of what my life should be affect me.
Unfortunately, it did.
Jack’s self-description had not been incorrect. He waited for me where I’d told him to, and though I knew he was a smoker I couldn’t smell it on him. God, he was young. He looked no older than twenty-two or twenty-three, and that was being generous. Young but pretty, even with the metal in his face. More than pretty. Jack was downright gorgeous.
He’d said his hair was dark, but it was impossible to see that under the ball cap he wore pulled low over his eyes. I didn’t recognize the name of the punk-rock band on the black T-shirt he wore over a long-sleeved white Henley pushed up on his elbows to show off an intricate design of tattoos beginning at his left wrist and covering all the skin I could see on his arm. He wore faded jeans low on his hips and held in place with a black leather belt.
“Jack?” I held out my hand.
He shook it firmly and didn’t squeeze too tight or hold it for too long. “Yes.”
“I’m Miss Underfire. But you can call me Grace.”
Jack smiled. “Pretty name.”
If my name were Esther or Hepzibah he’d have said the same thing. As if a name matters. And again, I was thinking of Sam.
“Thanks. So’s Jack.”
Jack smiled, and I stared, dumbfounded at the transformation in his face. Without a smile he was gorgeous. With one…incandescent.
Either he didn’t understand this or he’d long ago learned to deal with gape-mouthed women, because he didn’t look taken aback. “Sure, if you don’t mind the nicknames.”
I burbled something incoherent, unable to manage much more than that, at least until the superpower of his smile released me.
“Nicknames?”
He hung back a little, letting me lead. I turned
