Page 10 of Baker

I’d solved countless problems staring out at the San Diego skyline, but by no means all of them. The window was my place of refuge, and the men knew it. When I was there, I was off-limits.

As the song ended, my eyes came into focus. At that same instant, a woman on a bicycle rolled to a stop at the bike rack by the corner. After locking her bike to the rack, she removed her sneakers, put them in her purse, and slipped on a pair of dress shoes.

From my vantage point, she looked cute – and had a fabulous ass – but I had yet to see her entire face.

She removed something from her purse, gathered her hair in her hands, and then looked right at me as she pinned it into place.

Oh, my fucking God.

Her hair was a few shades lighter, but there was no denying who she was. My stomach twisted into a knot. Frozen, I stared back at her in sheer disbelief. It had been six months since I’d last seen her, but I never forgot the faces of our club’s victims.

I took a quick step away from the window, blinked my eyes a few times, and then leaned forward.

The sidewalk was empty.

I hoped that my migraines were causing me to hallucinate. I stumbled to my desk, sat down, and pressed the tips of my fingers against my temples.

The odds of it being her were astronomical.

If it was her, I had more problems than I was ready to admit. The first of which was making sure Cash didn’t see her before I figured out a way to get rid of her.

FOUR - Andy

Moving from my apartment in Indio to my cousin’s home in San Diego was embarrassing at first. I now viewed it as a godsend.

To many in Southern California, riding a bicycle was a way of life. Throughout my job search in Indio, it was belittling. Each block I pedaled through, it seemed people turned and stared. Their glares and gestures stood as a constant reminder that I’d been fired, couldn’t find a replacement job, and was one of the city’s population that assembled California’s five percent unemployment rate.

Thrust into the melting pot of San Diego’s Prius and Tesla driving millions, however, I became invisible. I was simply another eco-friendly traveler.

I locked my bike to the rack and debated what to do with my hair. While clipping it into a managerial messy bun, I tilted my head back for one last look at San Diego’s clear blue sky before I entered the building.

Sweet fucking Jesus.

Sex on a stick was peering out of the third story window directly above me. It only took an instant to realize he was tattooed, wore an awesome beard, and was handsome as hell. Paralyzed by the thought of the sexual journey he and I could take together, I stared back at him with an open mouth.

He rubbed his tattooed fingers against his temples and turned away.

As fate would have it, the building he was in adjoined my new place of employ. The series of buildings were joined in a lengthy line of three-story businesses that extended the length of the block. Each had a different address, but they were all part of the same complex.

I filed his likeness in my dildo dossier and wondered if gawking at him would become a permanent part of my morning routine. If not, I’d at least pleasure myself to a mental image of him until my recollection faded to nothing.

Or until one of my cousin’s screaming kids banged on the bathroom door.

I ducked through the doorway and hustled up the two flights of stairs. A steel door with a Manager’s Office sign on it let me know I’d reached my destination. Anxious to start my new job, I eagerly pushed against it, but it didn’t budge.

I thrust my hip into it. It swung open with a bang!

“Jesus!” A nondescript man spun around and looked at me with bulging eyes. “You scared the fuck clean out of me.”

He wore clothes that had suited garden-variety men for decades, had ho-hum brown hair, an average build, wasn’t short, and was by no means tall. I scanned his face for a distinguishable feature and found not one thing that separated him from the masses of middle-aged men I’d met in my life.

He studied me while I tried to decide how and where to categorize him. He was in his late fifties and was wearing faded jeans. A powder blue button-down shirt that fit much tighter in the stomach than it did in the shoulders topped off his ensemble.

I looked at his feet.

Loafers.

I had encountered the male version of me.