The oven beeped, signaling that it was hot, and she slid the pizza pan into it. He watched her for a minute, liking how fluid her movements were. She moved like a dancer, each step precise and graceful.
He could have silently watched her until the pizza was ready, but he wondered if she’d be as candid about the rest of her life as she had been about her stab at flipping houses. Maybe he could learn some more about what made her tick. The only way to find out was to do some verbal poking around and see if she’d answer. “What’s the deal with you and Mac? Axel,” he amended.
“He’s a jerk,” she said without hesitation.
“Yep. Not arguing that. I mean, what’s the history?”
“My mother and his father got married. I wasn’t thrilled. Neither was he. We hated each other on sight.”
“How long were they married?”
“Seven—no, eight—interminable months. Interminable for all four parties.”
“Not a long time to develop an undying hatred for someone.”
She leaned against the cabinet on the other side of the bar. “It was plenty long where Axel is concerned. I was thirteen and insufferable, he was eighteen and insufferable. At least I had the excuse of being thirteen. I gather he’s still insufferable.”
“He has his good points. Not many, but some. He isn’t good with people, but he’s damn good at his job. When my life depends on good intel and good equipment, I appreciate the last part.”
She gave a small grunt of acknowledgment. “I guess so.”
“Trust me—I know so. Axel’s father was your mom’s second husband?” He kept his tone casual, wondering how much more she’d divulge.
She had a variety of noises that expressed a lot of feeling, and this time she used a snort. “Second? More like fourth. I think.” Looking at the ceiling, she counted them off on her fingers. “Dad, Wilson, Hugh, Douglas—yes, he was the fourth.”
“Damn. Four marriages and you were just thirteen? That’s rough.” He still kept it casual because he suspected she wouldn’t appreciate sympathy.
“Mom is a serial bride. She’s on number seven now, but she’s getting older so she may hold on to this one for a while—unless she’s divorced him since the last time I heard from her, which has been a while. We aren’t close. Not enemies, just not close. She’s got her own thing going on, and I’m here in West Virginia. She likes big cities.”
The scenario was getting clearer. Bo had had no stability in her life, no one on whom she could rely, so she’d learned to count on herself and no one else. His psychology skills weren’t even at armchair level, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out how disruptive the musical-chair stepfathers had been in a young girl’s life. His own childhood had been steady, thank God.
“After Douglas she was single for a while—long enough for me to finish high school without moving again, though she had a couple of steady boyfriends. After I started college, she married . . . Adam. I think. He didn’t last long, so I never met him. Adam, Alan, something with an A. I’m not sure about number six, either. Number seven is William, and I’ve actually met him. They’ve been together a few years and live in Florida.”
“How often did you change schools?”
“Every time she married, but after Douglas I was in the same school until I graduated. I was able to join the swim team. I love swimming. All of the apartment complexes we lived in had pools, and that’s where I spent my summers.”
Yeah, he could see her as a swimmer, with her aerodynamic build. She’d be the sprint swimmer, while he was an endurance swimmer, able to swim for miles. That is, normally he could swim for miles; now he’d probably drown after twenty yards.
“What about your dad? You close to him?”
“No. He pretty much forgot about me when he left. He remarried, adopted his new wife’s kids, had a couple more of their own, and that’s his family now. I think they’re living in Sacramento, but that was years ago so they may well be somewhere else by now.”
He got the picture. It wasn’t awful, but neither was it pretty: ignored, abandoned, jerked around from place to place. No wonder she had walls.
“What about you?” she asked, slanting him a sideways glance from those dark eyes, turning the tables on him. “Have you been married? What about your family?”
“My dad is dead, from a fall in the kitchen. He hit his head on the corner of the cabinets. That was almost fifteen years ago. My mom remarried year before last, to an okay guy. He loves her and takes care of her, and that’s good enough for me.”
She waited a minute, probably to see if he’d answer her first question. “What about marriage?”
“Never been married, no kids. I came close to getting hitched once, but it didn’t work out. It’s hard on a wife when the husband is in my line of work. I’m out of the country more often than I’m in it.” His heart hadn’t been broken either, because the truth was he could remember his fiancée’s name, but not really how she looked.
“I can see where that would be a problem,” she admitted.
“How about you? Ever been married?”
“Once. I tried it when I was twenty-one, fresh out of college. It lasted less than six months before he cheated.”
“Ouch.” He’d been keeping an eye on the clock and he had a good idea how long frozen pizzas were supposed to heat, having eaten more than a few of them in his life. He slid off the stool. “Sorry I haven’t been paying more attention, but I don’t know where you keep stuff. Point me in the direction of the plates and things and I’ll set the table.”