Ozzy looked behind him. Dane was on the shorter side, even shorter than Eliza. A redhead, with a mohawk that flopped to the right. He wore baggy black and, after a moment of looking, Ozzy realized he was part of the production crew. Lighting? He thought maybe lighting.
Dane’s gaze darted side to side. Then he stepped forward, his shoulders sucked in, fiddling around with something in his pocket. But he did keep talking. “Yeah, um. I was here for filming this bit, so I heard it all.” He shrugged. “Don’t really like what this other guy was saying about the clients.”
“At least we’ve hiredsomebodyreasonable.” Aras stepped away from Eliza and Ozzy, shaking his head. “Talk to your contracting crew. I don’t want someone on this job who’s going to half-ass his work just because we’re putting together a house for senior citizens.” He scooted past Dane, patting him on the shoulder a couple times. Hard enough that Dane looked like he was a bout to buckle under the weight. “Thanks for speaking up.”
Then he marched out of sight. Eliza sighed, then nodded to Dane. “You can fill me in.” She pointed to the wiry guy. “You cango talk to your boss. I’ll confer and get over there as soon as I can to sort things out.”
“Oh, sure. Like you’re not going to automatically side with your host when he’s getting up in arms—”
“Maybe I will and maybe I won’t. This is a TV show. Like it or not, Aras is in charge of the electrical work. He gets final say.” Eliza stood at her full height and shooed him with both hands. “Go before I just decide it’s not worth my time and energy. You can get moved to another job, I’m sure.”
His mouth pinched down to a white line, but he said nothing else, just walked away toward the trailers.
Eliza sighed and looked up at Ozzy. “Don’t suppose you saw anything about that?”
He shook his head. “I just got called over to try and weigh in on the problem.”
“Andisit a problem?”
Ozzy waited a moment, then nodded. “Don’t know the whole story, but I wasn’t thrilled with what I saw. He was making the wrong call for the project, if you ask me, and then going off about how Melanie’s parents would be dead soon anyway—”
“That’s enough for me. He’s gone.” She patted Ozzy on the arm. “Thanks. I know I haven’t been super present. Don’t want to get in the way, but the yard looks amazing so far.”
“I do what I can.”
“Modest as ever.” Another pat on the arm, then she slipped around him and gestured for Dane to follow her out of the yard and off to whatever they had to do. Dane actually caught Ozzy’s eye and gave him a little smile. Is it supplicating somehow? Or sad? Guilty? It didn’t seem totally happy, but it was over too fast for Ozzy to get a proper read on it. It stuck in Ozzy’s head, though.
At least until he saw Evander carrying a plastic-wrapped sofa in through the fence. Then, Ozzy darts off.This is so stupid.
But he couldn’t quite handle Evander. They had a scheduled time to talk, and Ozzy needed every second of that to straighten out his shit.
Chapter twenty-seven
Evander
Somehow, Ozzy managed toavoid getting pinned down for even the briefest of conversations the entire day after he agreed to talk with Evander. Not that Ev didn’t try to get to him. He tried like hell, but Ozzy proved incredibly sneaky, somehow, able to hide out in spite of the confined space. He also muscled his way into the front seat of the SUV on the way back while Evander was caught in the back. Not that Ev would have brought anything upthere, in front of God and Eliza and everyone. He wasn’t insane.
Well. Maybe. There was a little insanity in even suggesting the two of them could…what, get together? Try to get together? Bounce off each other endlessly forever like they used to? All based on a couple blow jobs and a comment from Bunny. But he was aware of it, sothatcouldn’t be a real problem.
They piled out at the hotel and Ozzy was gone in a flash. How the fuck he was disappearing…it wasn’t like Ozzy was particularly small and nimble. Someone like Robinson could disappear into any little nook or cranny. It was what made him so good at getting into those tight spaces to do all the plumbing work. Ozzy was a block of muscle. He shouldn’t have been able to vanish.
I have his room number. Evander hung back so it didn’t look like he was rushing to get away too fast. Besides, there was still an hour before Ozzy had agreed to have a chat. No good to push the issue too hard, in spite of the incessant itch under his skin.
“You look twitchier than usual.” Aras has his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans as he came into view. “Freaking out for a reason or just too many cups of coffee?”
“I’m not twitchy.”
“Right. I’m just imagining it.” Aras shrugged. “Not my business if you don’t want to share. Forgive me for trying to give a crap.”
“Aras!” It was at least some kind of distraction until they had their meeting. If he could keep up. Aras was already heading inside, shoulders bunched up close to his ears. Ev had to jog to catch up, but when he did, he looped his arm through Aras’s and pulled him to a stop.
He snorted. “What?”
“Well, I may be twitchy, but you’re in an even more foul mood than usual.”
“Gee. Exactly the kind of thing to make me more amenable to chit-chat.” He unhooked his arm from Evander’s and took a step away. Then stopped and reached up to massage the bridge of his nose. “Sorry, I guess. Pissed off. Not your fault.”
“Want to talk about it?”
