Lips set in a mutinous, angry line, Rebecca pressed the doorbell. Still dressed in the same clothes from that afternoon, the porch light of Mr. Jones house cast her face in shadows.
"Rebecca." Mr. Jones said, surprised to see her. "It's late."
"Yeah, I know." She muttered, nervously shifting the weight of her very full backpack to the other shoulder. "Can I come in?"
Wordlessly, Mr. Jones stepped back, allowing her to step into his dimly lit foyer.
"I, uh, finished my paper." Rebecca said, holding out a rumpled piece of paper, eyes on the ground.
"Good girl." Mr. Jones said, tactfully ignore the state of the paper. "Thank you."
Pleased, she glanced up once. Mr. Jones gasped as the light revealing a nasty black eye.
"What the hell!" Mr. Jones exploded, grabbing her chin. "Who did this to you?" he demanded, reaching out to flip on the overhead light.
Uncomfortable, Rebecca jerked her chin out of his grip, and glared at the floor. "My dad." She muttered, jerking her shoulder uncomfortably. "Duh."
Uttering an oath under his breath, Mr. Jones gently wrapped his hand around her arm and pulled her into his kitchen.
"Hey, it's okay." Rebecca said, shocked to realize Mr. Jones was making an ice pack. "Mary let me ice it down at her house."
Mr. Jones took a few deep breaths, trying to get his temper under control. "Why did your father hit you?"
"Um, because he's bigger than me?" Rebecca said slowly with a sarcastic roll of her eyes. "This is nothing; I've had worse."
Mr. Jones pressed his lips together angrily, wanting desperately to hit a man who would treat his own child like that. Gently, he reached out and pulled her in for a hug.
"The thing is," Rebecca mumbled into the hard muscles of his chest, "I kind of need a place to stay until I can get a job. He kinda, um ... well, he kicked me out."
Mr. Jones growled deep in his chest. "Hey, it's okay!" Rebecca protested. "I've been 18 now for two months so it's not like I didn't see this coming. I was just hoping to have somewhere to go when it happened." She babbled nervously. "I went over to Mary's, but her folks are so strapped financially, I just hated to bug them. And the nursing home won't let me stay with my grandma."
Mr. Jones rubbed a hand over her back, thinking over his options. "You can stay for now, but I need you to keep where you are quiet until next week, when this class is over. We'll revisit the situation then, okay?"
Rebecca nodded, and relaxed against his chest.
"Have you had dinner?" Mr. Jones asked, reluctantly releasing her.
"Yeah, I got a burger with some money Grandma gave me."
"I was watching the news, if you'd like to join me in the living room. Or, are you tired, would you like to go to bed?"
"Can I use your shower?" Rebecca asked, leaning down to pick up her backpack from where she had set it down.
"It's at the end of the hallway." Mr. Jones said, pointing. "Towels are in the cupboard."
"Cool."
Mr. Jones watched her walk down the hall, then went back into the living room to sit back down on the couch. The television droned in the background, but his mind was not on the news anymore. It was on the sexy woman in the shower.
"Down, boy." He muttered with a stern look at his crotch. "Now's not a good time."
Mr. Jones continued to fight with his 'other brain' while Rebecca finished her shower, so much so that she startled him when she walked into the room.
"Mr. Jones?" she asked, then giggled when he jumped.
"Oh, for Pete's sake." Mr. Jones said crankily. "After everything, I think you can call me Gabe."
"Gabe?" she said, testing out his first name. "Weird. I'm so used to you being Mr. Jones."
Sighing, Gabe stood up and turned off the light, turning to face her. All the blood drained from his head to his cock, when he realized she wore nothing but a tiny towel.
Rebecca giggled nervously when Gabe just gaped at her. "Can I borrow a t shirt to sleep in?"
Determinedly, Gabe shook his head, trying to force his brain to work well enough to form a coherent answer. "Um, sure. They're in my room."
"Would you show me?" she whispered, tilting her head flirtatiously.