Anchor Line (16 page)

 
           “Yeah. It’s not like you had a ton of shit.” Conrad answered. “I even hooked up your TV in the living room and made sure that the cable box worked too.”

             
“Wow moving buddy, you are the shit.” Addie giggled as she ran from the room when Conrad gave her a mock look annoyance at the nickname.

             
“We’ll have enough of that.” Conrad shook his head following her into the kitchen. “Hungry?”

             
“Famished.” Addie answered while looking around the kitchen.

             
“What do you want to eat?”

             
              “Mmm, Thai.” Addie answered grabbing her purse and keys. “Can you drop me off to get my car?”

             
“No.”

             
“What?” Addie followed Conrad to the front door. “Why not?”

             
Conrad opened the door and stepped through, waiting for Addie.

             
“Um, hello?” Addie said.

             
Shrugging, Conrad explained, “I want to keep you captive a little longer.” And with that he walked down the stairs to his truck as Addie locked up the apartment.

             
“How long do you plan on keeping my captive?” Addie asked as she closed the door to the truck.

             
“Holy fuck...do you always ask this many questions?”

             
“Yes.” Addie smiled.

             
“Just go with it sugar.”

             
Dinner was just a quick ride to the same Thai place that they’d gone to only the night before. He took tonic that she ordered the same thing she did last night and a Shirley Temple while they sat and waited at the bar. It was the little things about her that he was falling for. And that couldn’t happen. He wanted simple, not messy. But it was Addie’s comments and the way that she talked incessantly that he was falling for. She kept him on his toes, not knowing what was going to come out of her mouth from one minute to the next.  He wanted her. He wanted her bad. And for her, he’d try a conventional relationship if she asked him to.              

             
It was this revelation that hit him as Addie was explaining her training that was coming up this next week that he’d be in the field when a soft hand slid up over his shoulder and stopped there. He was watching Addie’s fingers slide up and down the glass through the condensation and stopped. When he looked up into her face to see that she’d stopped talking as well, he smelled the perfume that was surrounding him and it was suddenly nauseating.

             
“Waiting for me long lover? You look so bored. Sorry I kept you.” The voice purred into his ear.

             
“Is that so?” He answered, still looking at Addie’s shocked face.

             
“Sorry honey. This one’s mine. Go get your own.” The woman said pointedly.

             
Addie stared at the beautiful blonde that had a hand possessively on Conrad’s left shoulder. She had brown eyes with the longest eyelashes she’d ever seen. Her lips were covered in a glossy red, makeup done to perfection, as was her waist length hair. She was wearing a red wrap dress that covered her obviously fake tits. Addie’s eyes went down the woman’s long legs to her black heels, then back up into the woman’s eyes.

             
“Well, I wouldn’t have made him wait if he was mine.” Addie said standing up.

             
The leggy blonde in red didn't say anything. Instead she just looked Addie up and down and snorted. Her hand moved over Conrad’s shoulder, down his side to stop at his hip as she took the few steps to turn his stool and stand in front of him, effectively cutting off Addie’s view to Conrad. Even without the heels, the blonde was still taller than she was.

             
“So baby.” Blondie purred, “How long have you been waiting?”

             
Conrad laughed. But, before he could say that he was with Addie, blondie slid between his legs and wrapped her arms around his neck and laid one on him. Addie stood there with her mouth open for a second, but not more, as she watched Conrad’s hands slide to the woman’s hips, but she didn’t wait long enough to see if he was going to continue to engage blondie, or push her away.

             
She grabbed her purse and ran out the door into the busy parking lot. Luckily, she saw a bunch of Soldiers pile out of a minivan taxi, so she ran down and just as the last guy was going to slide the door closed, she grabbed his hand and he let go. Sliding the door closed, breathing heavy, she looked back at the main doors to the Thai Palace and didn’t see Conrad, so she gave the driver her old address to get her car and sat back in the grungy tan fabric of the taxi.

             
The ride to her old apartment was a quick one. Tossing the driver a twenty, she didn’t ask for change, so she slipped out and looked around the parking lot knowing that if Conrad was a smart guy, she’d come here first to get her car and that’s where he’d come. Not seeing him, she decided to go in the apartment and once inside, locked and bolted the door and ran to each of the windows and made sure that all of the blinds were closed on the windows. Tossing her purse on the floor next to the kitchen doorway, she grabbed her phone and put it on vibrate, then realized that she didn’t give Conrad her number. Either way, she didn’t want her phone ringing if he was going to come over to find her.

             
Turning some of the lights on so that it looked like her father might have done it when they left, she went into the kitchen and bagged up the little bit of refrigerated stuff from there into a few grocery bags and put them by her purse, then wiped down the cabinets and then the floors in the kitchen and washroom. Then she went through each bathroom and wiped everything down and cleaned out the tubs and toilets. Walking down the hallway from the master bedroom she heard the pounding begin on her door.

             
“Addie!”

             
Shit!

             
“Addie, I know you’re home. Open the fucking door!”

             
He’s mad. Good.

             
The pounding started again. “Addie!”

             
After a minute or what seemed like an hour, the pounding didn’t start up again, so she started to make her way down the hallway when she heard knocking on the glass on the sliding glass door, then the handle being worked from the outside. She prayed that it was locked. Waiting, she heard the knocking on the master bedroom window. Then the window in the guest bedroom. She leaned against the wall in the hall not moving. Then the front door again.

             
BOOM BOOM BOOM!

             
“Hey man, I think she moved.”

             
It was her neighbor across the hall. Thank God!

             
She ran to the front door and looked out peep hole and saw Conrad and the neighbor in the doorway to the apartment across from hers.

             
“I saw the lights on and thought that she might be home and have her iPod on or something.” Conrad explained.

             
“I saw the moving truck here earlier. But her car has been here all day man.” The neighbor said. “She’s Sergeant Major Marshall’s kid, maybe she went to their house.”

             
“Yeah man. Appreciate it.” Conrad gave a tight lipped smile and looked at Addie’s door one more time as the neighbor closed the door. The look on his face was defeat. Straight up defeat.

             
She didn’t move until he moved away from the hallway. Then she walked to the end of the short hallway until she heard the door of his truck and it started up. Knowing that her shadow wouldn’t project on the vertical blinds, she walked to the guest bedroom, as no lights were on there and on the far left side of the window, there was a small gap that she could see through because they weren’t centered correctly. She saw his truck still there, but the lights weren’t on, so she couldn’t see him inside of it. Watching for a few minutes. She felt like she was in a standoff until finally, he started the truck and turned on the lights. She saw as his phone lit up and put it to his ear.

             
Probably one of his bodacious, big boobed, blondes. Fuck. That.

             
Walking back into the master bedroom, she looked around the master bedroom. Knowing the only thing that she needed to do was vacuum, she walked into the bathroom with her hand paused on the light switch. Screw it. He was leaving to a booty call anyway, so she turned the light off. Making her way down the hall, she turned the light off in the guest bathroom too. Then picked up her purse and the two plastic grocery bag handles and keys and turned off the kitchen light. Still, she paused at the front door. Surrounded by the darkness of her old apartment. She looked out the peephole one more time, not seeing anyone, she unbolted the door and walked through it. After locking it, she walked out to her car and tossed the bags and her purse on the passenger seat.

             
Her car started right up, so she threw it in reverse and backed out of the lot and headed toward her new apartment. She drove by the strip mall where the Thai Palace was and she slowed a bit looking in the parking lot. Not seeing his truck, she took the farthest entrance into the large parking lot and went in to get her some dinner.

             
“Ah, Addie!” Gee said with a forlorn look. “You left so suddenly. You ok?”

             
“I’m good Gee.” She couldn’t help the frown on her face.

             
“I see you leave when I was coming out of kitchen. Conrad said you no feel good.” He said in his thick accent.

             
“Yeah. I’m feeling fine. That wasn’t the problem.” Addie sat down on a stool at the bar.

             
“Oh, you mean Anastasia.” Gee nodded his head. “Conrad no like her. She trouble. Big trouble.”

             
Of course the blonde would have a name like Anastasia. “Really?”

             
“Oh yeah. Hold on, I get you Shirley Temple and get you dinner. You stay.” Gee put his hand out to stay her, so she dropped her purse on the stool next to hers and folded her hands on the bar and looked around.

             
It wasn’t terribly busy for a Saturday. She recognized a few guys from helping them at work, but she didn’t see Conrad or Anastasia. She looked up as Gee slid her drink in front of her then disappeared in the kitchen for a few minutes. He came back with a plastic bag that held a few round containers and set them in front of her. Then made a Shirley Temple to go and was putting a lid on her styrofoam cup as he set it in front of her.

             
“On the house.” He smiled brightly.

             
“But...”

             
Gee put up his hands. “No. Dao said to take care of you. So, dinner is on house. You don’t worry about Conrad. He push Anastasia away. He was very mad.”

             
“Really?” Hope sprang up in her voice and on her face.

             
“Really.” Gee smiled. “Go home. Eat. Tomorrow be betta.” He patted her hands and smiled brighter, nodding his head.

             
Addie gave him a smile and drank the rest of her drink, picked up her dinner and to-go cup and got in her car. Driving home, she tried to sort out why it hurt so bad that saw Conrad’s hands grip Anastasia’s hips. But then, she didn’t stick around to see what he’d done either. All she saw, was that the beautiful blonde seemed acquainted with Conrad and didn’t have a problem staking a claim to him. She really couldn’t fault anyone but herself for how she felt. But, if she was honest with herself, she felt like she couldn’t compete with the women that Conrad had in supply.

             
Pulling into her apartment complex, she pulling into a parking spot and  looked around in the immediate vicinity for Conrad’s truck. Not seeing it, she slung her purse over her shoulder, grabbed the bags in one hand and her drink and keys in the other. She hit the locks and pushed the door closed with her hip. Making it up to her apartment, she had her apartment key ready and unlocked the door. Pushing inside, she walked down the hallway and dropped everything on the counter, then switched on the kitchen lights.

             
Feeling satisfied in her surroundings, she smiled as she turned around to put the condiments from her old fridge into her new one and opened her bag from Thai Palace to find Gee and Dao had made her favorite meal. She pushed the straw in the lid and was about to dig in when she saw a shadow and looked up in the hallway and saw him.

             
Conrad.

             
“How...what the...” Addie couldn’t form a coherent sentence. She was so stunned that he was standing there in her apartment.