Eli
I walked into the rec room and nodded my head to a few of the guys from the crew who were up late playing cards.
“You want in?” Snake, one of the guys on my team, asked me.
“No, man,” Frank, his playing partner, said. “Not Angel. That guy always fucking wins.”
“Oh that’s right. Fuck him.”
I snorted. “Don’t feel like it tonight anyway, but I promise I won’t take offense, assholes.”
“Right. You’ve got priorities. How is that wholegirlsituation working out?” Snake asked with a sneer. “You’re probably not up for cards because you were busy working your dick off tonight.”
He started to laugh at his own joke.
I stopped and calmly walked over to where the two guys were playing.
“Her name is Shelby. She’s a woman, not a girl. You say anything crass about her or me again, and I’ll make you swallow your teeth. You know I can do that, right, Snake? You know, I would have no problem fucking you up.”
“I was kidding, man. Relax.”
I got up in his face. “I’m not. You feeling me?”
“Sorry, man,” he said immediately backing down.
Oil rig operations were like the military in a lot of ways. Way more men than women, a shit ton of testosterone and a semblance of hierarchy between top dogs. Snake knew his place and I knew mine. On top.
I also knew even the slightest suggestion that Shelby was putting out, or easy, or here for dick and nothing else, would be an open invitation for everyone in this camp to start sniffing around her.
Cal ran a tight ship. He didn’t employ men he knew couldn’t control themselves. However, Shelby was nothing but temptation. It was hard enough keeping company with only your hand for months at a clip. Harder still when you knew there was a single, young, beautiful woman in town.
Which is why they all needed to know whose woman she was.
Mine.
“See you around, assholes.”
I could hear them talking as I walked away. Frank letting Snake know the deal when it came to me.
“Bro, you never talk smack about women in front of Angel. It sets him off like a damn firecracker.”
And it did. I had seen up close and personal the way a man could disrespect a woman, with a leer, a joke, a damn raise of the eyebrow. Never again. Not in front of me.
I had been in my room a few minutes when there was a knock on the door.
I opened it to find Cal on the other side. “You need something?”
He rubbed his hand over his beard and looked away. “I saw what went down in the rec room. I was in the kitchen, but you didn’t notice me.”
“Is there a problem?” I asked, feeling defensive. Of Shelby, of me.
He shook his head slowly but thoughtfully. “No. No problem. Everybody knows not to talk shit about women. Not on my watch, but certainly not in front of you. And it’s probably best to set the right tone with more of these women coming in. Still, I guess I want to know…how long is this going to go on?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.” Was he talking about me and Shelby or all the other dates whose visits were planned?
“I have to be honest, Eli. When you came up with this stupid idea, I really didn’t think anything would come of it. What woman in her right mind flies up to Alaska to hang out with a bunch of strange men?”
Four,I thought. The four we had picked. Cal didn’t know about that, though, and I wasn’t ready to tell him.
