My brows rose in shock. He knew who I was. He knew what Dennis did. “You’ve known this whole time?”
He nodded once. Stepping toward me, he put his hands on his hips and sighed. “This has always been a good business, ya know? Dennis did well here.” He nodded his head as he looked around. “But it was always missing something.” Then his gaze turned to me again. “I think you were the missing link.”
“Come on, Sap,” Paul shouted from outside. “Time to fly.”
“We can talk about it later if you’d like to.”
I gave a soft smile, unable to find words. My throat wasn’t tight with emotion. I wasn’t on the verge of tears. I was just . . . speechless. So I said nothing before he turned and left. Paul drove to the airpark with Sap and the group of women followed in their car, where they would meet Bowman and one of our other divers and I began closing up shop. Typically, the clients would come back to the office to collect their photos or videos, but I asked if I could mail them theirs. It was too hot to deal with that today. An hour later, as I was just about to leave, the phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Clara,” Paul rasped through ragged breaths.
“Yeah?”
“It’s Sap. He’s had a heart attack or something. The ambulance is taking him to the hospital now.”
My heart dropped. “Shit,” I gasped. “Is everyone else okay?”
“Yeah. It happened right before we took off. It’s lucky we weren’t in the air.”
I closed my eyes for a moment thanking whatever higher being there was for keeping everyone else safe. Then I asked that Sap be okay.
“I’ll meet you there.”
The funeral was lovely and as low-key as possible. The way Sap would have wanted it. There were only ten people that attended and to honor our departed friend and coworker, we hired a pilot for the day and sent the plane up with all of our divers and did a farewell dive to honor him. Paul attached Sap’s American flag he received for his military service to his parachute and it drifted beautifully as it glided toward the ground. We closed the office for a few days, needing to find a new pilot and rearrange the schedule. Sap would definitely be missed.
I worked, but Paul and Marcus stayed home. They took losing Sap hard. It hadn’t been long since he had passed so I understood they probably needed some time to mourn. I could not stand Marcus. At all. He was the thorn in my side then. But I decided to try my hand at showing him compassion. I went home and made two chicken and broccoli casseroles, wrapped them tightly in foil, and packed them in my car.
I didn’t even turn the car off when I pulled in front of Marcus’ place. I sat the pan on the mini porch by the door, knocked loudly, and rushed back to my car. I wasn’t trying to be a bitch. I just couldn’t take it if he acted like an asshole to me when I was trying to be nice. If he threw the food away after I left, I wouldn’t know and wouldn’t have to hate him for it. As I pulled out, I looked in the rearview mirror and saw him open his front door and step out on the porch, looking right at my car. Then looking down, he bent and picked the dish up, inspecting it, before looking to my car again. His expression said nothing. Was he touched by my gesture? Did he hate it? I didn’t know. When he turned and went back inside with the dish, I let out a long breath. No matter what—I tried. I did the right thing and if he decided to ignore my gesture, that was on him.
I had never been to Paul’s house before and I wasn’t surprised to find he lived in a small, simple house about thirty minutes from the office. The house was plain, which made sense for him. Why have a giant, nice house when you may just take off at any given moment with no idea when you’d return?
A part of me wanted to do the knock and run at Paul’s, too. That’s what I should have done. But I wanted to see him. I felt pathetic for it, but I did. So I told myself I would hand him the meal I’d made, but I would not go inside. No matter what. Bracing myself, I knocked on the door, anxious as all hell. We really hadn’t talked since he returned and believe me, I had plenty to say. But I bit my tongue. This was a time of mourning. My grievances with Paul could wait.
When he answered the door, I went mute.
Son of a bitch.
He was in nothing but his boxers.
I clutched the casserole in my arms and forced myself to blink. He squinted as if he had just woken and his hair was slightly mussed. But his body . . . I hated him. It was amazing. I had seen him with his shirt off before, but seeing him so bare in his boxers was different. It was so intimate. And suddenly I felt very vulnerable.
“Hi,” he rasped in a sleepy voice. Ugh, even his just-woke-up voice was sexy.
I licked my dry lips. “H-hi,” I stuttered. “I brought you some food.”
His gaze darted to the dish then to my eyes. “You did?”