Not Quite Perfect (Oakland Hills Book 3) (18 page)

“You’re just a freelancer,” Virginia said. “Don’t kill yourself trying to cover for her. They’ll hire more people if you can’t handle it.”

But she wasn’t just any freelancer—she was the family slacker, the baby. She
had
to handle it. She
would
.

When she went back to her desk, she saw the pile of clothes, boards, swatches, and paper. Her stomach twisted. Less than an hour now to get it done. And they’d hate it anyway.

She sat down and got to work. Whatever she didn’t finish, she could get in between six and eight Monday morning.

The phone rang. Teegan’s line.

On the third trill, April picked up the receiver and slowly put it against her temple, as if it were loaded. “Yes?”

It was a man’s low, calming voice. “Just thought you might like to know they’ve all gone to LA for the rest of the week.”

At first she thought it was God. Or an angel. “Zack?”

“In case they forgot to mention it to you,” he said. “It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. They just left for the airport.”

“Who?”

“The entire team.”

“Teegan?”

“All of them. Men’s and Women’s. Designers and assistants. They decided to go shopping,” he said.

“Just like that?”

“You’re one to talk,” he said. “Spontaneous shopping trips are your specialty.”

“But…” She looked at the pile of work on her desk. “Do they want this shit or not?”

“Sorry. Not privy to their inner workings. So to speak. Just couldn’t help watching them all run off with their suitcases.”

“If they had suitcases, they must’ve known they were going at least last night,” she said.

Zack was silent.

“Thanks for letting me know,” she said. “I’ll… talk to you later.” She hung up.

Virginia appeared in the opening of her cubicle. In a daze, April looked up at her. “The entire design team just went to LA.”

Virginia nodded. “I was coming to tell you. I saw them go a few minutes ago.”

April got to her feet, gesturing at the mess of her desk. “Teegan said she wanted it by noon. Today.” April picked up the top sheet, flung it back down.

“Who was it who just called you?”

April felt her face flushing. “The business consultant. He’s using a cube in their department and overheard.”

Virginia laughed. “Zack, you mean? ‘Business consultant.’ As if I don’t know his name.”

“Yeah, well, he thought I’d like to know.”

“Nice of him,” Virginia said.

April hadn’t told anyone about the kiss. That way it was easier to pretend it hadn’t happened. But now the memory washed over her, leaving her hot and achy. “He’s just doing his job. He was hired to improve morale.”

“Starting with yours.”

April sat down. “Watch it.”

“He likes you.”

“Who doesn’t?” April asked. “Other than the design team of Fite Fitness, that is.”

“Do you like him?”

“This isn’t sixth grade,” April said.

Virginia nodded. “I’ll bet you lunch something’s going to happen between you two.”

“Save your money. He never gets involved at work.”

Virginia’s brown eyes widened. “He told you that?”

Too late, April turned away and began rearranging the swatches of fabric and sketches on her desk. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“He must be interested. He wouldn’t call you like that otherwise.”

“Trust me,” April said, “he’d rather gnaw off a limb than touch me again.”

Virginia whistled softly. “Again?”

“Nothing happened.”

Virginia cocked an eyebrow.

“Over a month ago,” April muttered. “So don’t waste your money. It’s not going to happen.”

“A hundred. I bet you a hundred it does.”

“You’re throwing your money away,” April said.

“I doubt that. Deal?”

 
To get rid of her, April agreed, and Virginia finally returned to the front desk. April looked at all the work on her desk, finding it difficult to motivate herself to do any of it.

Her phone trilled again. Teegan’s line. She picked up, her heart skipping. “Why do you keep using her phone?”

“She has you on speed dial,” Zack said. “Big yellow sticker next to your name.”

“Surprised it’s not a bull’s-eye,” April said. She loved his voice, deep and rich.

“It is slightly round. Should I draw a black circle in the middle?”

April put her hand over her heart, felt its ridiculous dance under her palm. “What are you calling about this time? Not that I’m not thrilled to hear from you.”

He paused. “I was headed your way at lunch. Thought I could offer you a ride.”

“To Oakland?”

“I have a meeting with Bev at their house,” he said.

“You could take BART.”

“I’m continuing on to Bakersfield for a few days to see my parents. I actually rented the car just for that reason.”

It was only Thursday. Interesting that he wasn’t waiting until the weekend. “Is everything all right?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?” he asked.

He obviously liked his privacy. She’d try to respect that, but it wasn’t her strong suit. “When are you leaving?”

“Noon. Meet you in back. I’m parked in the alley.” He clicked off.

She set down the receiver and stared at her screen, where the latest version of a polka dot Fite logo flickered in pink and blue spots.

He seemed rigid, but made his own rules. He was aloof but went out of his way for people.

For her.

She brushed her fingers against her lips, remembering.

The phone rang again, this time from Liam. “I just talked to Jennifer,” he said. “She called from the cab. She said Teegan expected you to revise the sketch for the 534 hoodie before they left for the airport. She’s asking me why you didn’t get it done yet.”

Teegan had specifically told her two hours ago that she would do all her own sketches. And having her boss call her brother… that was a new level of slime.

But April’s thoughts had drifted to Zack, and latched on.
I hope his parents are okay
. Why hadn’t he waited until the weekend?

She glanced at the clock. Not much time until she’d meet him. A different kind of stress pulled at her now.

She opened up the sketching program on her computer, made the revisions in three seconds, and put it on the network, all the while holding the phone at her ear.

“What should I tell her?” Liam asked.

“The sketch
is
done,” April replied. “I just checked. Maybe Teegan was looking in the wrong network folder. She’s not exactly a computer genius.”

“Good to know,” Liam said. “Thanks. Sorry to bother you.”

Smiling, she hung up, pulled out her compact, and reapplied her lipstick, realizing that, indeed, her morale was
much
improved.

* * *

Zack tried to hand a few bucks to George at the back door for watching his car—parking spaces in San Francisco were as rare as affordable housing—but the old guy waved him away, wrinkling his nose.

“Save it for a haircut,” George said. “You’re a few weeks overdue.”

Zack ran his hand through the waves flopping over his eyes. “More like a month. I haven’t found a place I like to get it done.”

“What’s not to like?” George asked. “You got hair, they cut it off.”

Zack didn’t explain that the quarter-inch of white stubble at the base of George’s skull didn’t need as much skill as his own hair. In the wrong hands, his thick, cow-licked waves would look ridiculous, with tufts sticking out at odd angles unless he plastered it down with gelatinous goo that worked for only an hour or two.

His mother would tell him to get a haircut, too. His father would tell him his mother was right and then haul him to Quickie-Cut himself.

Maybe that’s why he hadn’t cut it yet. It would give him something to do with his parents while he was home, even if the results would lead him to wear a hat for the next month. His parents were even more introverted than he was, happiest when they were at work on their own solitary tasks. They were slow to talk, reluctant to pry, and always went to bed early. He spent most of his time at home reading on the couch.
 

He thanked George again and got into his rented Mazda, keeping one eye on the back door for April. His promise not to talk to her brother about the way Teegan was treating her was becoming increasingly difficult to keep. The drive over to Oakland would give him the chance to… he didn’t know what. Suggest she ask for help. Now that he’d been in the design assistant area for almost two weeks, he was convinced that Teegan—and the other assistants—were trying to sabotage her in particular. While they weren’t always nice with other support staff, they didn’t laugh about them once they’d left the room.

He saw April pop out of the back door, scan the alley for him, and jog over, looking much happier than he’d expected. If Teegan had hoped for tears and a resignation letter, she’d failed. April was rosy-cheeked and smiling.

An increasingly familiar hunger struck him.

She climbed in and caressed the plastic dash. “Sweet wheels. Went all out, did you?” She put on her seat belt. “Let’s bail this jail.”

Her uniform was different today. She continued to wear the conservative trousers, but the poncho had returned. And pink safety pins pierced her ears like a punk rocker’s.

“You look nice,” he said, starting the car.

“Let’s not kid ourselves.”

“I’m not kidding.”

She held up a hand and made a dismissive gesture. “Sorry. You look nice, too.”
 

Luckily, his ego wasn’t entangled with his appearance. Turning his attention to the narrow pavement, he snaked his way through the busy city streets to the Bay Bridge.

After ten minutes of silence, when they were careening away from the city on the bridge over white-tipped black water, she asked, “Are you sure everything’s fine?”

“So far as I know.”

“Have you visited them since you got here?” she asked.

“You’re curious,” he said.

“Sorry,” she said. “It’s just because it’s a Thursday. Who goes to Bakersfield on a Thursday?”

“Oil tanker drivers?”

“Which describes you to a T,” she said.

He smiled. “I’m just overdue for a visit, that’s all.”

“Nobody’s birthday?”

Usually he avoided talking about his family, but at that moment, while the shadows of the top layer of the bridge flickered over the road, he heard the words pour out of him. “My parents never celebrate birthdays. They were raised in a religion that didn’t believe in it.”

He squeezed the steering wheel, waiting for the outrage that usually came when he told people that. Not celebrating birthdays got more of a reaction than finding out his first wife had died at twenty-six.

“Interesting,” she said. “Were you raised in that religion too?”

Surprised by her mild tone, he relaxed slightly. “They left the church when I was a baby. But they never tried to be, you know, like other people.” He cleared his throat. “They’re very private people.”

“Unlike me, obviously,” she said, making a face. “Sorry. I thought you’d have to have a really good reason… or a bad one… to miss a workday.”

“Well, since the design team would be in LA anyway, I figured it would be a good time to take off.”

“I was such the last to know, wasn’t I?”

“If I’d realized you didn’t know earlier, I would’ve called,” he said. “I heard Rita is out on family leave.”

“Both her kids are sick.”

“Bad luck.”

“Yeah. Poor babies,” April said. “I thought about getting some candy or toys for them, but I don’t know what little kids like these days.”

“I was talking about you,” he said. “Does Liam have any plans for getting somebody in there to manage the department?”

“I was going to ask
you
that,” she said. “But no, I don’t think so. The assistants have to do more of their own work until she gets back.”

“Or lay it on you.”

“I’m not going to worry about that. It’s much too nice out. I love spring, don’t you?” When he didn’t say anything, she added, “Thanks for calling to tell me they’d left, by the way. That was… nice.”

He felt himself blush. For Christ’s sake. “You’re welcome.”

The car became very small and quiet for a few minutes. Then April cleared her throat. “So, you’re going to meet with Bev?”

“Yes.”

“I think she’s looking forward to getting back to work. She asked me to babysit Merry on Fridays from now on.”

“All day?”

“For a little while. She’s going to work one or two full days a week, with hours from home on the other days.”

“That’s a lot of babysitting for you, isn’t it?” he asked.

“It’s the deal we—” She fell silent.

“Deal?”

“Nothing. Forget it.”

“I don’t want to know, do I?” he asked.

“You really don’t.”

“Was this Liam’s idea?”

“I forget whose idea it was. Mine, probably. I wanted to work in the art room at Fite, they needed help with Merry. It just made sense.”

“It makes a lot of sense for them, I agree,” he said.

“It makes sense for
me
. I wasn’t going anywhere. If I took another temp job, I was going to jab my eyes out with some stranger’s hole puncher.”

“Sounds messy,” he said.

She crossed her arms over her chest. “So, why are you going to the house?”

At that moment he was driving through the Oakland Maze, a region of tangled concrete spaghetti where the major freeways collided at the edge of the bay, and he couldn’t respond for several minutes.

“It was on my way,” he said finally. “And I won’t be in the office tomorrow.”

“What does Bev want to talk about?”

“You’re full of questions,” he said.

“And you’re full of answers.”

He smiled. The truth was, stopping by had been his idea. He was on his way to the Central Valley anyway, they hadn’t met in person for a few weeks, he knew April was headed this way…

“Will you be scheming for a dinner invitation, too?” she asked.

He lifted his chin. It had occurred to him. Not that he’d admit it. “I’ve got a long drive ahead of me.”

“Just as well,” she said. “Mark won’t be there until Sunday, when the whole family gets together. Maybe you can find a way to get Mom to invite you to that one,” she said. “Casually mention you’ll be driving past the house at around, say, four o’clock.”