Counterfeit Love

"It was casually mentioned to my mother who casually mentioned it to me. Me coming here? This was my decision."

"And what did you come here to say? Or learn?" I asked, crushing out my cigarette, reaching for my half-empty beer.

"Came here to see what sort of man you are," he said, casting an intense glance in my direction. "What kind of man are you, Finch McAwley?"

"Not sure I know how to answer that," I admitted, shrugging.

"Yeah, not an easy one," he agreed, looking off again, falling into silence.

"Are you going to tell me to stay away from Chris?" I asked when I couldn't take the silence anymore.

"Way I see it, it's not my place to make decisions for her about her life," he told me after thinking it through. "She's a grown woman. She can make her own choices. But I care about her, so I'm here."

"You're here," I repeated. "To see what kind of man I am."

"Something like that."

"How long might that take?" I asked.

"It takes how long it takes," he told me cryptically.

"So, should I grab more beer? Or order takeout? Cancel my plans for the week?"

To that, his gaze slid to me again, lips twitching slightly.

"You start talking, it'll go faster."

"Chris is a friend," I told him.

"Good. She could use a friend."

"She has Ferryn."

"That's family," he said. "It's different."

"She helped me pick out furniture. We had some food together."

"You beat Jake's ass for bullying her..."

"Got a low tolerance for bullies."

"She nursed you up."

"She's a good person. And think maybe she didn't want to be seen in public with me bleeding down my face. Might fuck with her carefully crafted image."

"She likes things just so."

"She's got good taste. My complete lack of it drives her up a wall. She told me she had nightmares about how my couch and pillows don't match," I added, chuckling a bit at the idea that it was likely true.

"And you picked mismatching ones in front of her just to fuck with her."

"Something like that," I agreed.

"You're a button-pusher."

"Some buttons, yeah. Some people need some buttons pressed. Shows 'em that things don't explode when it happens."

Malcolm's eyes searched my face, trying to suss out if I was fucking with him, feeding him lines. Deciding I was being honest, his gaze slid away again, raising his beer, nodding to me.

"Christienne, she's got a lot of buttons."

"I've noticed," I agreed. Then, deciding to do a little searching myself, I said, "Some do connect to explosions, though."

"Yep," he agreed, giving me a bit more insight into her.

I won't lie; it felt wrong to get information about her from other people. But, then again, I was starting to think that there was history in Chris's life that made her so careful, so guarded, so set in her ways. And I couldn't imagine that history was all light and fluffy. She'd been through some shit. And getting a little confirmation instead of acting on suspicions--I thought it might help me in the future in handling Chris.

Because, make no mistake, I planned on handling her. In many of the interpretations of those words.

"What do you do for a living, McAwley?"

"I'm in production."

"How long a stretch did you do?" he asked, jerking his chin toward the tattoo on my hand.

"Six years," I admitted.

"You learn your lesson?"

"I learned that the next time I need to beat the shit out of someone, I do it somewhere that others won't call the cops on me."

"Fair enough," he said, shrugging. I got the feeling a man like this had needed to do some face-busting himself on more than a few occasions. Even if he was only around Chris's age. Maybe even a little younger. The beard made it harder to tell.

"Why did you move up here?" he asked.

My accent always would give me away. Even if the years out of my home state had sharpened up the soft edges a bit.

"Needed a change of scenery. Got some bad memories back down there too. Felt it was time to start over."

"Why did Chris get you this place?"

"She didn't approve of my last place."

"The shithole Vance keeps a place in?"

"That's the one."

"If you could afford this, why were you there?"

"Gotta admit. Unlike our girl, I'm not one for research. And gotta factor in that money stretches differently where I'm from. It seemed like a deal, but I couldn't have known it was as bad as it turned out to be. I would have moved on my own eventually, but it was a place to crash while I got to know the area."

"Chris once printed out accident reports--pictures included--that came with the model of my old truck until I finally caved and bought something she deemed safe enough."

It was hard to imagine anyone bossing this guy around, but maybe he was like me. Maybe he found it charming. Maybe he didn't so much give in as accommodate.