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Quit. The inner voice sounded like an echo, like something whispered to a character in a movie, carried on a breeze in the misty gloom of evening.
But this wasn’t a movie, and the sun bearing down on his shoulders reminded him where he stood. In the glaring now.
Trudging toward the Ullo home, solid stone and stucco with massive columns and a message of “Somebody with power lives here,” Graham decided he had to move forward. Though quitting would send Tess a message, it would put him in the poorhouse. Living paycheck to paycheck reminded him he didn’t have the luxury of playing the martyr. No amount of self-sacrifice would appease Tess. She would need time to temper her opinion of him and even that might not be enough.
He’d hurt her.
Not just by taking the job Frank offered, but by not calling. Taking the job had merely pissed her off. Anger on top of hurt was never a good look on a woman… and he couldn’t blame her.
Shaking his head, he closed his eyes before entering the discomfort he’d left a moment ago. He’d tried to convince himself what he’d shared with Tess that night was run-of-the-mill. Seemed a rational thing to do. Treat it like every other one-night stand he’d ever had. Tess was a random hookup—a nice one—but nothing ever amounted to anything with hookups. He’d even convinced himself she wouldn’t care whether he called her back or not. But he’d fooled himself. It was easier than facing the truth.
Graham was on a short trip to becoming his father, a man who’d had so much potential but had thrown away his dream over pride. He’d left New Orleans, spent too much and lived too recklessly, all to soothe his ego… and had paid the price when he’d opened his wallet and found it empty.
Tess didn’t date losers like Graham. She deserved better. So he hadn’t called her.
Doubt consistently turned inside him, and the bitter fear of failure pecked at his psyche. Sadly, he’d grown accustomed to feeling that way over the last few months, and it would be hard to repair things between him and the only person who’d made him forget his failures for one night.
It was, as Tess said, too late.
“Hey.” The front door opened and the priest stood there. “Is Tess gone?”
“Yeah,” Graham said, trying to clear his throat of the knot sitting within.
Michael narrowed eyes that looked just like his father’s. “Something more is going on here.”
Graham shook his head but didn’t argue. He didn’t particularly like the idea of being struck by lightning or having a piano dropped on his head for lying to a priest.
“Yeah, I know Tess, and I can see right through this thing. You knew her before you took her job?”
“Look,” Graham said, aggravation rising to replace the sadness in his gut. “I didn’t take anyone’s job… except maybe your father’s. I had nothing to do with what happened between Tess and Frank.”
“You had a little to do with it, but I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about something else. I know Tess.”
“So you’ve said,” Graham muttered, jerking his head toward the entrance of the house. “Shall we?”
“What?”
“Go back inside? I need to make my exit and thank your mother for the, ah, coffee.”
“You never drank it,” Michael said dryly.
Graham gave him a flat stare, somewhat liking the man despite his acerbic and prying comments.
“I’m watching you,” Michael said, doing that double-finger jab at his eyes and then turning them to jab at Graham.
“Better mind my p’s and q’s then.” Graham didn’t try to keep the sarcasm from his voice.
“You better. The big guy is on my side.”
Graham snorted. “God?”
“No, Eddie ‘the shark’ Russo. He’s about six feet, four inches and cracks skulls for a living. Friend from my bookie days.” Michael smiled, but Graham wasn’t sure if the man was kidding or not. Where was the pious man of the cloth? Michael almost looked like a shark himself. Guess when it came to protecting little sisters from jerks like himself all bets were off.
“Right,” Graham said, slipping by the man who came to his nose in height but didn’t budge from his original stance. Entering the house, Graham headed directly for the dining room.
Everyone’s head swiveled toward him when he reentered the dining room… except for the old bird with the naughty gleam in her faded eyes. She was digging into her dessert with a relish reserved for those under the age of ten and over the age of eighty.
“I’m sorry,” he said, not sure he offered the apology for the whole craptastic debacle or for following Tess without asking their pardon.
