Chapter Seven

If He Stands His Ground…

The next day, Lindsay weaved her dark flame-colored hair into numerous braids and ate breakfast by herself. For work, she dressed up in an old concert tee, some jeans she would have rather not wrecked, but she had traveled light from the mainland and she needed the job more than she needed the jeans. Construction work paid more in an hour than the price of the pants.

Gavin greeted her at the loading dock and took her down the hall to their first bathroom. The tub, sink, and toilet had already been removed and they were pulling down all the drywall. He gave her a facemask, safety goggles, and a pair of work gloves.

They ripped the old drywall loose together and then she carted it in a wheelbarrow to the dumpster bin in the back of the hotel while Gavin tore out the ceiling.

The time went by quickly, and soon it was time for lunch. They went to a grocery store and bought sandwiches there. She was going to buy strawberries and cantaloupe instead of a sandwich, but Gavin stopped her.

“You can have that if you want, but you need to put fuel in your body if you’re going to work alongside me. Get a sandwich.”

She chose one, but it was a little deviled egg sandwich on multigrain bread, unlike what he bought, which was a sandwich that had been built inside a loaf of French Bread as big as the Bastille.

In the afternoon, Gavin gave her a hammer and had her remove all the loose nails, while he took care of other things.

By five in the afternoon, she was completely bushed.

When she took her mask and goggles off, she found Oliver leaning against the railing by the bay water. He hung his cast hand over the rail and waved his good hand at her. “Hey,” he said pleasantly as she approached.

“Is Ricky working? Is that why you’re here?” Lindsay asked.

“Yes. She’s working. But she loaned me her truck if you have any more errands that need to be run after yesterday.”

“Hmm…” Lindsay contemplated. “Actually, yes. I could really use a trip to a thrift store. We went to one yesterday, but I didn’t get everything I was hoping for. I was told there are dozens of them here on the Island.”

“There are,” he agreed. “We can do that. Do you need to buy any more groceries?”

Lindsay nodded. “Yes. I bought the necessities when I was out with Gavin yesterday, but I wasn’t thinking about baking and you’ll never guess what I have.”

“What?”

“An oven,” she said, gloatingly. “I’ve never had an oven in my life. I’m gonna make cookies and cupcakes and…”

“You’re going to have me over, right?”

“Sure. Except I don’t have a couch. You can come over as long as you don’t mind sitting at the breakfast nook, which I only got to keep because it’s attached to the house.”

“That’s handy. Can we go now, or do you need to tell Gavin that you’re clocking out?”

“Oh, he already told me to leave and go have a shower.”

“Do you want to do that before we go shopping?” Oliver offered.

She made a face. “Now that you mention it, I don’t have any towels.”

He put his arm around her. “We need to go now.”

***

They skipped the thrift store and went for the towels first. Then they stopped at the grocery store on the way back.

“Are you going to make me dinner?” Oliver asked as he carried two bags with his good hand up the long flight of stairs that led to Lindsay’s apartment.

“If you’re cool with avocado toast for dinner, then yes.”

“I’d love that,” he answered as they came into the apartment. “Ricky is working late.”

They were greeted inside the apartment by a blonde woman screaming. She shrieked as if surprised and then calming down enough to form words, she wailed in alarm, “What are you doing here?” She looked between Lindsay and Oliver like they couldn’t possibly be robbers with groceries.

Oliver smiled his smile that was all charm and no sleaze. “Excuse us,” he said sweetly. “But you are the most beautiful squatter I’ve ever seen.”

“I’m not a squatter!” she yelped. She was surprised and upset at being barged in upon, but her temper made her cheeks rosy and pretty. It wasn’t what she looked like that made Oliver compliment her. Oliver was the type of man who would have said that to a bag lady.

“Well, you’re standing in Lindsay’s kitchen,” he pointed out.

Lindsay dropped her bag of flour and flicked him in the ear. She had never seen this woman in her life before, but if she was willing to bet (and she was), Lindsay knew who it was. “This is Marissa, Gavin’s…” she wanted to say ex-girlfriend, but the sight of Marissa in her apartment made Lindsay stop.

“Fiancee,” Marissa filled in the blank.

Lindsay would not have finished the sentence that way, but Marissa became about a thousand times more interesting when she finished it that way.

“Umm… Well, this apartment was in Gavin’s name and it was empty. He said I could live here until the lease expired. Is there going to be a problem with that arrangement?” Lindsay asked, keeping her voice simple and light.

“Are you…” Marissa started, looking at Oliver.

Lindsay wasn’t sure which way Marissa was going with that, but she didn’t let her finish. She had to keep the conversation on neutral facts. “This is Oliver, Gavin’s brother. I guess you two haven’t met.”

“Sorry, I haven’t had the pleasure,” he said, letting a little sleaze ooze. “I’ve been on the mainland for the last three years.”

She nodded. “I remember now. I’ve seen pictures of you at your mother’s house.”

“And I’m Lindsay,” she said, trying to figure out how to explain the situation further or get Marissa to explain what she was doing there when she had already moved out. “So… is there a problem with me bringing the rest of my stuff up?” The towels were still in Ricky’s truck.

Marissa didn’t answer. She bit her lip like she didn’t know what to say. In truth, she was perfectly lovely. From Gavin’s description, Lindsay had not been expecting perfect loveliness. She had been expecting someone ordinary. Marissa was older than Lindsay, approaching thirty, but it didn’t stop her from being exceptional. She had short hair that was shaved up one side and bleach-blonde curls topped her well-shaped head. Her purse was a work of art. Marissa dived into it to retrieve a tissue, with which she was blotting her eyes.

“What’s the matter?” Lindsay said, rushing to help the other woman.

“Nothing. It’s just… I misunderstood. I was told something that was clearly wrong. I didn’t know Oliver was in town or that he brought a girl with him.” She finished dabbing at her eyes. “Everything is fine.”

Lindsay rather objected to being called a girl. It was this woman’s way of putting her in her place by making her sound lightyears younger when she was three or four years younger at the most. Lindsay was about to voice her feelings when she glanced at Oliver.

He was suffering.

Lindsay smirked and bit her lips together to stop herself from laughing. Marissa was acting teary and Oliver longed to pull her in his arms and comfort her. Lindsay had seen it many times, not just with herself, but with other women in their actor camp. He was an incurable sucker for a crying woman. His jaw clenched tightly as he held back.

Lindsay wanted to correct Marissa’s second misunderstanding. Yes, Carleen had misunderstood when she dropped Gavin’s things off at the cabin. She saw Lindsay in a nightgown and Gavin’s shirt and she had jumped to conclusions, but now Marissa was jumping to another conclusion that was just as wrong. She thought Lindsay was there as Oliver’s side piece because that made her happier than to think that Gavin had replaced her so easily.

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Lindsay was about to open her mouth to explain that everything this woman thought was wrong when Gavin reached the top of the stairs and joined them in the now suffocating kitchen.

“Whoa!” Oliver said, moving so his brother could get the door open. “Hey man, we’re just meeting your fiancee.”

“My what?” Gavin said, carrying a hex wrench case and peering over Lindsay’s shoulder to see Marissa standing by the stove. He’d clearly come to help her assemble the dresser they’d bought.

“Hi, Gavin,” she said with the air of a woman who had unfinished business and she was about to finish it. “Your face looks good, without the beard.”

He nodded at her, and said stiffly, “I didn’t see your car downstairs.”

“My sister dropped me off.”

“Why? It’s over an hour's drive back to Victoria from here and there isn’t a bus until tomorrow morning.”

She looked at him meaningfully. It was a trap. He had walked into the apartment, and fallen into it. Not that fact that mattered so much. If he hadn’t been there at that moment, she would have simply called him and told him she was there. He wasn’t going to be able to leave her in an unfurnished apartment, alone until the next bus came. When he took her home, she’d have a whole hour to talk to him and he would simply be a monster if he put her in a cab and sent her home.

The look on his face was monstrous, and Lindsay could see he was running scenarios through his head as to how to orchestrate avoiding the conversation she wanted to have.

“Are you going to Victoria?” Lindsay chirped, smarter and faster than he was. “If you’re going, we should all go on a double date. I haven’t been to any of the spots in Victoria since I got to the island. What restaurants are good?”

“That’s a terrific idea!” Oliver joined in. He slipped his arms around her waist and drew her into a back hug. Lindsay knew he did it partly to annoy his brother, but also to double the amount of available floorspace.

“Yeah. I bought four plates, but can you see the four of us having dinner here? We’d be cramped like sausages! Let’s go out!” Lindsay and Oliver looked at Gavin with encouraging smiles.

At long last, Gavin seemed to figure out what the two of them were offering. If they all piled into his truck, he wouldn’t be alone with Marissa and he could avoid the conversation if he desired.

“Sounds fine to me, as long as the two of you keep your PDAs to a minimum.”

“I make no promises,” Oliver said, tugging on the edge of Lindsay’s ear with his canine.

She shrieked with laughter. Gavin frowned and held open the door for Marissa, who allowed herself to be guided down the stairs and out the door.

Over Oliver’s commotion, Lindsay heard Gavin whisper to Marissa, “I didn’t know you still had a key.”

“The door is broken,” she replied. “If you know how to fiddle with the lock, it opens every time.”

“I’ll have to get that fixed,” he grumbled, annoyed by everything.

The ride to Victoria was joyful. Oliver kept pinching and tickling Lindsay. If the conversation lagged, her squeals kept the truck noisy and intimate conversation impossible. To Marissa’s credit, she was not a wet blanket. She immediately fell into a rhythm where she treated Oliver like he was her younger brother as well as Gavin’s. She even threatened to sit between Oliver and Lindsay if he didn’t keep his hands to himself. He responded by pinching Marissa’s side, and she enjoyed it twice as much as Lindsay did.

“I love being tickled,” Lindsay said. “If I didn’t love it so much, he wouldn’t do it.”

“You do sound like a puppy when you laugh,” Oliver agreed.

Gavin placed his rear-view mirror so his eyes didn’t see the road behind them, but Lindsay. She sat directly behind Marissa. It was a different kind of flirting, completely different from Oliver’s pinches and giggles, but effective nevertheless. She found herself getting warm under his gaze. It made her scream louder when Oliver tickled her.

At the restaurant, a beautiful building called the Stone Steakhouse, Marissa reminded them to be well-behaved as they went in. “I’m not sure you two are mature enough for a place like this,” she cautioned.

“These people handle drunks all the time,” Oliver said. “I’m sure they can handle us stone-cold sober.”

Lindsay remembered the two drinks he had before he crashed her car and felt like getting rowdy with him for an altogether different reason. “I swear, Oli, if you cause another car accident, I’ll…”

“Break up with me?” he taunted. “Go ahead. You can break up with me as many times as you need to. And don’t call me Oli.”

“Why?” she asked with her arms crossed sternly.

“Try saying my name properly. Oliver,” he demonstrated for her.

“Oliver,” she repeated.

“Now that you’ve practiced, you can try saying it at level two. O..”

“O…” she said obediently, expecting a gag at the end.

“Lover.”

Lindsay choked on a laugh. “O-lover?”

“Yeah. Sounds perfect when you say it like that,” he chuckled as he opened the door to the Stone Steakhouse for her.

Once in the restaurant, there was no need for conversation. The place was a cacophony with too loud music playing on the speakers overhead, and since they were dining late, the place had a more adult crowd than it would have had a few hours earlier.

Oliver tried to be charming and make jokes and Lindsay encouraged him, but it was completely impossible once their food arrived. Lindsay was exhausted and the food in her stomach had been too long coming. At the least, she should have shoved one of the bananas they bought in her face before they left to go to Victoria. It made her a ravenous beast once their food arrived. She felt sick eating so much so fast.

Afterward, they drove quietly to Marissa’s. A little folk tune played on the truck speakers, and Oliver and Lindsay were too tired and full to behave like teenagers. Instead, Lindsay sat in the middle seat and placed her head on Oliver’s shoulder, which he offered her like a champ.

Gavin got out of the truck and helped Marissa out of her side and walked her to her door. On the porch, their hour-long conversation was condensed into five minutes. Lindsay and Oliver sat tense, watching.

“They broke up and now she’s advertising that she’s his fiancee?” Oliver asked grouchily.

“It appears so.”

“That’s some nerve. Do you feel shaken?” he asked her.

“By what?” Lindsay asked.

“Are you bothered? Weren’t you and too-cool-for-school, Gavin, going to start dating yourselves?” he reminded her.

Lindsay smiled. “The more appropriate question is whether or not Gavin still wants to date me after our tickle fight. That might have been too much for a normal person to endure. However, I’m not normal and I’m not shaken by this. You think I can be bothered by this, their third breakup?”

“You’re not?”

“No, but I am curious. What do you think they’re saying?”

In perfect time to Marissa’s lips, Oliver supplied her voice. “Gavin, I just love you so much. Why can’t we be together?”

Lindsay took over when Gavin started talking and tried to do his voice. “I can’t be with you. I like all women, and I can’t settle down with just one.” Lindsay giggled.

“But not having sex with you is the greatest pleasure I’ve ever known,” Oliver said, and he said it so on point with Marissa’s lip movements that Lindsay died laughing on the spot and missed her cue.

She put her forehead on the seat in front of them and howled. She turned to Oliver. “We need to interrupt them. Wanna chase me around the truck?”

“Didn’t you say you were worried he’d be mad about the tickle fight? And we’re going to do more?”

“I think it’s more important that their breakup takes root than that I get together with him. He’s still my boss. I’m not supposed to be dating him in the first place.”

“I see. I’m game. Can I kiss you?”

“If you can catch me,” she said, getting out.

From the glances that Lindsay had seen of the doorstep where Marissa and Gavin were talking, Marissa was doing everything in her power to get Gavin to come inside with her and he was resisting. He kept pointing to the truck and saying things. Probably things like, “I have to get these two home.”

However, when Lindsay and Oliver started running back and forth around the tiny garden and the front step of the townhouse, Lindsay weaved in between Gavin and Marissa and Oliver clearly had an idea that was even better than kissing Lindsay. As he ran past Marissa for the second time, he pretended to trip and in the next second, he landed an accidental kiss on Marissa’s lips.

He pulled off her and said, “So soft,” before he shot off to run after Lindsay again.

When he got to her she slapped him across the chest. “What are you doing?” she thumped, pretending to be cross. “You can’t just kiss your brother’s fiancee like that. You have to apologize.”

Always in the mood for chaos, Oliver leaned in toward Lindsay. “I’m so sorry.”

“I don’t want an apology,” Lindsay said, playing it up. “I don’t care if you kiss her or not.”

“You don’t?”

“No.”

“Okay. In that case…” he grasped the hand of the flustered Marissa and pulled her toward him for a second, intentional, kiss.

Marissa allowed it for a whole three seconds before she pushed him off, but she was so flabbergasted that she didn’t say anything.

Lindsay stormed over and said, “Well, if you’re going to do that, then I’m going to do this.”

Lindsay grabbed Gavin by the collar and was about to kiss him when Marissa launched herself between them.

“You can’t,” she panted, red in the face and dizzy from so many things happening at once.

Gavin and Oliver stood by tensely and watched what Lindsay would do next.

Marissa’s arms were spread wide, so Lindsay put her hands on Marissa’s shoulders and said to her in a calm, loving way, “I get it. I understand all of this is hard for you. It would be hard for anyone. Oliver was acting crazy just now. We all know there’s nothing going on between you and Oliver. There’s nothing going on between Oliver and me and there’s nothing going on between Gavin and you.”

“That’s not true. He…”

Lindsay cut her off. “Whatever he did that made you think that the two of you had a future, you’re going to need to forget it now. I plan to renew the lease in that apartment and I never want to see you inside my apartment without an invitation again. Do you understand?”

Marissa shook off Lindsay’s hands. “You don’t get to decide any of that,” she barked. “Gavin, tell her that we’re just having a little fight and you’re going to need the keys to the apartment back in a week.”

Gavin stepped forward and stood beside Lindsay. “No. I gave Lindsay that apartment and I’m not asking her to leave. She’s going to renew the lease and there’s no reason for you to ever go there again. You got off easy tonight when we took you to supper and drove you home. This is the last time I want to talk to you, Marissa. It’s over.” He turned to Lindsay and Oliver. “You two, get in the truck. We’re leaving.”

Marissa walked steadily after him citing things he had said that meant that he really loved her, but from Lindsay’s perspective, they were things that meant the opposite. She tried not to listen. It was too hurtful. When they finally drove away, all three of them sat in the front with Lindsay sitting in the middle on the bench. She plugged her ears so she couldn’t hear what Marissa yelled at Gavin. It was too upsetting even for a dramatic actress.