for the little guy to wake from the drugs, and when he does, we can already see the change in his demeanor. He already seems more like a happy, healthy pup.
Travis gives the owners a call after cleaning himself up, and I get to work on cleaning the room. I do a thorough scrub down, then I mop. After doing that, I wipe everything down one last time. By the time I’m finished, my lower back is aching, my feet are throbbing, and I’m in dire need of a break.
I practically fall into an empty chair in the break room. Tossing my head back, I close my eyes and let my mind go blank, soaking up the silence. If I do this any longer, I’ll risk drifting off to sleep, but I can’t seem to bring myself to sit up straight and stay awake.
“You did really well in there.”
I jerk in the chair, my eyes flying open at the sound of Travis’s voice. It takes me a few seconds to process, and when I do, I blush a little at his praise.
“Thank you for letting me do that.”
He waves me off. “You need the experience, if you’re ever going to master it, right?”
I grin. “Right.”
“So, how are you doing? Heard you had an important issue earlier? Family emergency?”
“Oh, no. It wasn’t like that. I had a meeting with a social worker.” At the furrow of his brows, I wave him off. “It’s a long story. But no, thankfully, everything with my family is okay. They came to visit me not too long ago, so it was good to see them, even if it was for a short amount of time.”
“Where are they from?”
“Long Beach. That’s where I used to live.”
He whistles. “Wow. That’s right. I forgot your file mentioned you worked near Long Beach. What do your parents do out there?”
“My dad’s a psychologist, and my mom is a sex therapist.” As I say it, my face turns beet red, and Travis takes notice. He chuckles at my obvious discomfort.
“We have more in common than I thought. My mom is a psychiatrist.”
My brows jump. “That’s amazing. And I never said we didn’t have anything in common.” I roll my eyes.
“I know, I’m poking fun at you. You make it too easy.”
I head over to the water system to get a cup of water, suddenly feeling awkward, and needing to put distance between us. As I’m filling the plastic cup, I hear his next question, loud and clear, and my stomach flutters just thinking about it.
“What’s going on with your neighbor? He still giving you a hard time?”
I take a hearty swig of the water, as I lower myself back into the seat. “No. We’ve seemed to have found some common ground. I feel like… I don’t know, I think I misjudged him before, you know? He hasn’t had an easy life.”
Travis’s lighthearted demeanor seems to dissipate. His features tense, the lines around his eyes growing tight. His shift in attitude has me pausing, a frown taking over my face.
“That doesn’t mean anything. We’ve all had hard lives. That doesn’t give anyone the right to treat you like shit,” he practically spits. I get where he’s coming from, and for the most part, he’s right. If Rome hadn’t apologized, I’d agree with him, but he did apologize, and more than that, he explained things to me.
It’s not that I pity him. I feel for him. I feel like I understand him a little better than I did before. He makes sense to me. He’s not so much of an enigma anymore. I have the sudden urge to defend him to Travis. He doesn’t get it, so obviously he’s going to jump to conclusions.
“It’s not like that. He’s a good person, and I misjudged him.”
He scoffs, a brief flicker of hatred passing over his features. “I guess he’s gotten to you already, hasn’t he?”
I jerk back in surprise. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’re a nice girl. Guys like that are good at lying and manipulating to get people to feel sorry for them, just so they can justify their actions.”
I press my lips together in a grim line because I don’t want to argue. It’s obvious Travis doesn’t get it. And hell, maybe I am being dumb or too forgiving, but that’s my choice. If I want to leave the bad blood between us in the past, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
I finish off my water and