Talk This Way. Dakota Cassidy

reminded her she was behind on her mama’s bill, she was already on ice so thin you could see through it.

      Oakdale was a privately owned nursing facility, one of the best in the country. It was exclusive and provided not just permanent residence, but temporary situations for short-term rehabilitation. And it cost a small fortune.

      Medicaid had shot down the idea of a stay at Oakdale, but with her mother’s diabetes impeding her healing process, and the fact that she couldn’t be with her around the clock, Cat wasn’t willing to take any more chances with her recuperation. They’d sold her mother’s home for a small profit, and decided to worry about where they’d live once she was healthy again.

      After a whole lot of sweet-talking, and all of her meager savings, Cat had managed to secure a spot for her mother, and she wasn’t letting go. Even if she had to hook for cash to keep it.

      She could admit she wasn’t very good at keeping jobs. Just ask her twelve or so former employers of the last several years. But this one? She needed this one more than any job she’d ever had in her entire life.

      “Words are very important. On this we agree, Miss Butler. It’s the type of words we disagree on. Couldn’t you have at least brought her something tame? Maybe some Dr. Seuss?”

      Cat secretly smiled remembering Flynn McGrady’s mother, Della, forcing the words from her immobile lips while sitting in the middle of the crowded rec center. “Oh, c’mon. Green Eggs and Ham isn’t nearly as rich with expression as ‘Spank me harder!’ Now that was a statement chock with emotion, crystal clear and perfectly executed. Relax, already.”

      He visibly cringed, the tips of his ears turning red. “I can’t believe they let you mingle with the other patients.”

      Cat bristled, though, she had to admit, if her mother said something so racy, she’d probably cringe, too. “I can’t believe you’re not over-the-moon that your mama spoke for the first time today since she had her stroke.”

      He fiddled with the corners of the paper napkin on his table, his nimble fingers folding the edges neatly. “You’re taking credit for her ongoing recovery now?”

      “I’m takin’ credit for lightening up an otherwise depressing situation. Nothing more.”

      Flynn looked up at her, all deep blue eyes and thick, gravelly voice. “And you think hanging posters of romance novels with half-naked men on her walls is uplifting?”

      Cat arched an eyebrow meant to shower him in haughty attitude. “Well, maybe not to the insecure male. But other than you and your blusterin’, there have been no complaints, especially from Della. You must have known she loved romance novels before her stroke. That there wasn’t a single one of her beloved books for her to read when you brought her to Oakdale astounds me.”

      “We didn’t know she could still read.”

      Her cheeks sucked inward while Arlo hovered and her damn phone vibrated in her pocket. Probably Oakdale again, wondering where her payment was.

      Yet, she couldn’t let this go. Flynn had made all sorts of stink when his mother had chirped those words, as if Cat had brought Della something illicit from the naughty store.

      She’d only given her what made her happy, and for the first time in the three months since Cat had met Della at Oakdale, when Cat handed her a copy of The Sheik’s Alien Twin Babies’ Nanny or some title she couldn’t remember, Della’s lips had lifted in a lopsided smile. She’d looked right at Cat, her once dull, defeated eyes full of what she was convinced was hope.

      So too daggone bad on her cranky, ill-mannered, hotter-’n’-sin son. No racing heartbeat and sweaty palms was going to deter her from encouraging Della.

      “You didn’t exactly check, either. All I did was surround her with the things she loved before her stroke. I asked your cousin Emmaline...Amos, is it?”

      Flynn nodded his dark head with a grating sigh. “That’s her.”

      “She’s lovely, and sweet, and helpful. Em, as she asked me to call her, told me everything she knew that might make your mama happy when she was passing through Atlanta and dropped in to pay Della a visit. Maybe, instead of always ordering everyone around, if you stopped and paid attention once in a while, you’d know in her recovery, your mama needs the things that used to comfort her. Romance novels bein’ high on the list.”

      You’re going too far, Catherine Butler....

      Flynn’s eyebrows rose. “Now you’re questioning my intentions for my mother’s rehabilitation?”

      Stop now, Cat. Stop before you draw attention to yourself simply because you never know when to hush your mouth. It’s his mother, for mercy’s sake. It’s not like he never visits her or spends all of his time ogling pretty nurses when he does. He’s just disagreeing with your unconventional methods.

      Cat sucked in some fresh air and focused on not losing job number thirteen. “No. Now I’m questioning what your order is.”

      “Is there a problem here, Mr. McGrady?” Arlo sidled up alongside her, his beefy body and moon-shaped face infiltrating her view. “We’ve had some complaints about Cat, so if she’s givin’ you some kind o’ trouble, you speak up. I like to see my customers leave here satisfied.”

      Cat stiffened. That wasn’t true. No one had complained. Wait. Maybe one customer had, but he’d been horrible to the new mother, who had been frazzled and tired, and trying desperately to soothe her crying baby.

      So she’d slipped and spilled coffee on his fancy new suit? Accidents happened. She’d offered to pay to have it cleaned. He’d declined and called her a clumsy bitch, but he’d left and after that, everything was right as rain.

      Arlo put his equally beefy hands on his hips, just waiting. “Mr. McGrady?”

      Hush now, Cat. How many times do I have to remind you, sometimes you have to catch flies with honey ’cos the vinegar will send you to the unemployment line?

      Her mother’s words. Words to live by, surely.

      “There’s no trouble here, Arlo,” Cat insisted.

      “No trouble at all, Arlo,” Flynn repeated, staring Arlo down with his intense eyes and granite expression.

      Arlo pursed his thick lips, obviously unconvinced. “You sure now? Don’t cover up for her. She can be pretty sassy with that mouth o’ hers, always disruptin’ folk, buckin’ authority like she knows how to run this place.”

      Cat’s mouth fell open. She never bucked anything. In fact, she’d probably been the quietest she’d been in her entire life during her employment with Arlo.

      Could she be accused of being overly passionate about the unfairness of overcharging seniors for weak, watered-down coffee? Or defending a new mother just trying to catch her breath without the jeers and eye-rolling of an insensitive, rude caveman?

      Yes. But that was hardly bucking the system. Mostly she’d been nonbucking.

      Still, what happened next was due only to the fact that she’d always had trouble heeding her mother’s infamous words.

      She had no honey left in her pot to catch a fly with.

      It was all just vinegar.

      There went unlucky job number thirteen hot on the heels of an incoming call from the Oakdale administrator, Casper Reynolds.

      * * *

      Shit.

      The last thing he’d meant to do when he’d wandered into the coffee shop was get the only person at the nursing home who’d been able to coax his mother into responding to anything in three solid months fired.

      Nothing he’d said could change that tyrant Arlo’s mind, either. He’d bargained, offered to pay her salary for six months and threatened to report him to the labor board, but all with no luck.

      Arlo