Running For It by Allyson Lindt

Five

Imade some calls, to get space heaters. It took calls to five different places to find enough heaters, but I secured them all.

“Cole’s here.” Luna practically lit up at the sound of an old truck parking on the street.

I followed her around front. Cole’s pickup was an ancient Chevy with a hardtop, with as many parts replaced as were original. I waved at Cole, and he gave me a terse nod. His gaze flitted past me quickly, to land on Luna. As he turned back to his pickup, I swore I saw the corner of his mouth twitch.

“Brought some stuff.” He opened the camper shell and tailgate.

He pulled out a couple of giant fans.

“Eep.” Luna squealed. “You’re amazing. Basement is soaked. Wet carpet everywhere. Does that sound dirty? Didn’t mean it that way. Promise.”

Cole glanced at her with a raised eyebrow, then grabbed more things from his truck. A bucket, some PVC pipe, and what I assumed was the pump. “This is temporary. It’ll get you cleaned out. Let you know when I’m done,” he said.

“Do you need help? That’s a lot of stuff.” Luna was already reaching for the bucket.

Cole moved it out of her range. “I got it.”

Luna didn’t look wounded by his gruffness. “Okay.”

“I could use some help.” I felt bad pulling her away from Cole, with as excited as she looked, but this was best for all of us. “I need to sift through the stuff that’s under the pavilion.”

“Of course.” Luna had recovered from her earlier stress, and I assumed it had something to do with the well-muscled, grumbly man standing a few feet away.

“Find me when you’re done,” I said to Cole.

He nodded.

Luna waved at his back, as I gently tugged her toward the yard. When we got there, she nodded at my T-shirt. “Westminster?”

Last night rushed back to me in a poofy cloud of pleasant memories. It tugged along a reminder that my past with Ramsey and Luna was messy. I was torn between giving her all the naughty details, the way I normally would, or keeping them to myself because of who they involved. “I didn’t make it home last night,” I confessed.

Luna let out an exaggerated gasp. “Was he cute? Well hung? All of the above, I’m sure. Probably smart.”

“All of the above.” I pointed her toward a box. “If it’s salvageable, set it on a table. If it’s unrecognizable, throw it out. If you’re not sure, ask me. We’ll decide. How’d your interview go yesterday afternoon?” Probably didn’t end in a job, since Luna hadn’t called me, but that didn’t mean it went badly. Few interviews resulted in on-the-spot offers.

Shit.I shouldn’t have mentioned her search for jobs. That would tie back to Ramsey, as well. But I did want to know, and between yesterday’s event and this morning’s crisis…

“It was all right.” Luna’s tone implied it wasn’t great. “I got through all the questions. They seemed really impressed with my credentials and my test results.”

“But…?”

“But then one of the interviewers asked me if I was that Luna. It’s not a common name or anything…” Her shoulders slumped, and she dove back into her work.

Luna was a brilliant programmer. Yeah, I was biased, but it went beyond that. When we were in college, Luna had worked with a professor to build a cure for one of the most malicious pieces of malware the internet had seen in about five years. Her code had saved hundreds of schools that had been held hostage billions of dollars.

The problem was, the last virus that was as bad, a few years earlier, was hers. She hadn’t done it maliciously. A lot of people might not believe that, but I knew Luna. She’d done it because someone said, Hey, I bet you can’t do this, and she said, That sounds like fun. I bet I can. She’d done it for the challenge, never stopping to think someone would do evil things with it.

When various international law enforcement agencies caught up with her for the earlier code, that was what she became known for. No one cared about the good she’d done since.

“I’m sorry, L.” I wished I could do something for her.

“I expect it. When it goes better, it’ll taste so much sweeter. And it will go better.” She shrugged again. “Don’t think you can dodge the question. Does your Westminster boy know you’re a U girl?”

“Lots of people wear Westminster shirts, not just alumni. And none of them care where I went to school.” The entire box I was looking through was clothing, caked in mud. Cheaper to replace through donations, than to get these back to wearable again. I carried it to the toss pile.

When I turned back to Luna, she was watching me with wide eyes, her mouth in an O shape. “You hooked up with Hunter.” Her voice echoed off concrete and aluminum.

“I di— What? Why would you say that?”

“Because you’re making a big deal out of a T-shirt, and he’s the only reason you would.”

“I’m not making a big deal out of anything. I didn’t even mention it.” I couldn’t deny her guess though. I couldn’t lie to Luna.

“Mhm.” Her serious expression melted to a grin when she opened a box of books and flipped through a few without any pages sticking together from water damage. She moved each clean book with reverence, giving the pile an isolated spot on the table. “Does Ramsey know?”

I sucked on my teeth, searching for the right way to say definitely yes. She knew I’d been with both of them before. My breakup with Ramsey had directly and specifically coincided with Luna’s legal issues.

“I see. That sounds fun. Was it fun?” Luna’s question was strained.

My heart sank. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t— I shouldn’t have— It’s not like it’s going to happen again.” I’d discovered early on in dating Ramsey that I struggled with his two halves—public and private. I was willing to overlook it most of the time, especially when we first hooked up. The sex was amazing, the conversation was amazing, Ramsey was amazing. So what if he’d been raised to be polite in mixed company?

“Why not?”

The question caught me off guard, and I struggled to wrap my brain around it. “We broke up.” It was the not-so-polite, upper-class company Ramsey kept that I started to have an issue with. The off-color jokes were nothing new. When we were in college, Luna and I spent a lot of time at parties, and I’d heard plenty of crude jokes and comments about my various body parts.

The more time I spent around friends of Ramsey’s family, the less tolerable they got. The worst part was Ramsey would laugh along with them.

“Because of me.” Luna stopped sorting. She was frowning now. “You still care about him. You miss him. You go out of your way to prove to yourself that you don’t, but you do. And it’s because of me.”

“No. What happened with you was a catalyst, but it wasn’t the cause. I should have left him long before that.” Things started to deteriorate when the jokes turned toward me. My decisions.

“That’s a sexy piece of ass. You plan on sharing her before you make her yours forever?”

“You ever worry she spends so much time with those kids?”

“You oughta lock her away before she starts thinking she can change the world.”

Those were the nice things. What hurt the most was that Ramsey never shut them down, and he actively worked to keep me from doing so. He’d apologize at home. They don’t know any better. He never wanted to hear that they might if he told them or let me tell them.

And then Luna was arrested. The people around Ramsey never said her name, they didn’t even know her, but her case was high profile in the business world.

“This is why you get them pregnant early. So they don’t get all uppity.”

“No way a pretty little thing like her was smart enough to do this.”

“Face like that looks better with something in her mouth.”

“Too bad she’ll turn in prison. A woman like that needs a good man to straighten her out.”

When I went off on them, Ramsey had to physically drag me from the room, apologizing for my behavior. After we left, he was sorry. It wasn’t enough. I told him I couldn’t do that anymore. He said I couldn’t ask him to pick between me and the people who could make or break his career.

“It definitely wasn’t your fault,” I repeated to Luna.

She fiddled with a damp fringe on a pillow. “He’s gotten better. Making a stand. Building his campaign on fixing some of these things. He was at the fundraiser.”

“It’s too late.” My reply came out with less force than I intended.

We were finishing up the box sorting, when Cole came out and said he was ready to set up fans. Luna jumped to her feet to help him, and I let her.

I tried to ignore my inner war over Ramsey, as I found places for the new mattresses and set up the space heaters that were delivered. We were past capacity. I hated turning people away, but we couldn’t take anyone else in.

When the plumber finally showed up, I breathed a sigh of relief. He spent about half an hour in the basement, before telling me he had to call someone else in.

That couldn’t be good.

I stuck close, as he took his associate first through the basement and then through the rest of the house. It was hard to hear them, with their heads bent together and the whispered words, but they made a lot of notes.

When they turned back to me, they wore matching grim expressions.

“The boiler can’t be fixed,” the plumber said. “The best way to heat the place is going to be installing central air, especially in this climate, with this setup. The problem is, the house isn’t built to support the ductwork.”

“So… what do I need to do?” A nagging thought in the back of my mind was starting to panic, but I couldn’t give it my attention.

They exchanged looks again, and the plumber handed me a tablet. “This is a breakdown of what we recommend. You’re welcome to call around for other estimates. I understand. The thing is, the house isn’t livable as a shelter as it is. If you can’t bring it up to code in a week, we’ll have to file to have the building condemned. And while the work is being done, we can’t have anyone living here.”

This couldn’t be happening. What was I going to do? Fundraisers like the one last night brought in operating capital, not the kind of money it would take to renovate or get a whole new building. And even if we could raise the money, we had to deal with where the kids would stay until this place was overhauled or a new place was ready.

I needed time. Ideas. Money.

Connections.

Damn it.I needed Ramsey.

You’re doing this for the kids, repeated in my head as I pulled up his personal number. The one no one had, except his closest friends and family.

“Hey, Taffy.” The smile in his voice sent pleasant shivers racing down my spine whether or not I wanted it to. “Long time no talk.”

The hint of playfulness should make this easier.

It didn’t.

“Hey.” I dragged in a deep, silent breath. This is for the kids. “I… um… I-need-a-favor.”

Silence.

Was this where he’d tease me? Give me grief about coming groveling, when I swore I’d never be one of those people who used their connections?

“Anything. What’s wrong?” Damn him, for sounding concerned.

“I’m at the shelter. A city inspector just left.” I’d keep this clinical and factual. More for my sake than his, since I was the one dreading this conversation. “He’s condemning the building. I know you can’t fix unsafe construction, but… I don’t know what to do.” It hurt to admit that. This call was my plan, and it was the best I had.

“I’ve got you covered. Give me the night, and I’ll call you back tomorrow morning.”

This would be okay. He’d help me figure things out. “Thank you.”