Rock Chick 05 Revenge (13 page)

“Please go.”

The grin didn’t fade but he did let me go to move away about two inches. Then he dug in his pocket, pulled something out and shoved it in the front pocket of my Levi’s.

His eyes came to mine and he said, “See you tonight. You get drunk, you call me. I’ll come get you.”

I didn’t answer, I just glared at him. He ignored the glare, touched my nose with his finger and then he was gone.

Oh my. I’ve got goose bumps, that was INTENSE,
Good Ava told me.

I think I had an orgasm,
Bad Ava shared.

I slid down the wall and put my head on my knees.

Yep, I was right, my life just got pretty fucking complicated.

Chapter Six

What I Don’t Get

Once I got off my ass, I called Sissy and told her about the state of her living room (and her pottery) and told her not to come home. Whatever Dom was caught up in, I wanted her to be far, far away from it.

Then because she was my bestest best friend, I told her about Luke. Every last detail about every second from the minute I walked into the Nightingale Investigations offices to the minute he walked out of my house, including being there during the shooting, which made her scream a little bit.

“Wow,” Sissy said when I was done, sounding like she’d just run the hundred yard dash.

Wow didn’t cover it.

“You don’t have to worry, Sis,” I told her. “I get the impression from Luke’s loft and Porsche and what I saw of the Nightingale Investigations offices, people pay a high premium for their services. They’ll find Dom
and
get the dirt on him. You just stay safe with your Mom.”

“Okay,” Sissy said then she paused and went on. “Ava?”

“Yeah, honey?”
 

In a very quiet voice, she whispered, “Luke called you a knockout.”

I hadn’t let that penetrate until the moment Sissy repeated it to me.
 

“Holy crap,” I whispered back.

“I think you may want to rethink your vow to hate men forever,” Sissy advised.

Not gonna happen.

“Yeah, and maybe Sandra Whoever-She-Was rethought her vow to give up on men when she got hooked up with Luke and filled his fridge with healthy food thinking thoughts of a long and happy life together. Now she’s crying her eyes out and eating her way through a three pound bag of M&Ms.”

Sissy remembered what Luke looked like as a teenager. Sissy knew Sandra Whoever-She-Was was
definitely
crying her eyes out with a three pound bag of M&Ms.

“You have a point,” she conceded. “We’ll see how this goes.”

I didn’t say anything because I knew how this was going to go, this wasn’t going to go
anywhere
.

I got off the phone with Sissy and dug in my pocket to see what Luke gave me. His remote, a key and a business card with his name on it and his home and cell numbers written in black ink on the back.

I picked up the phone, called his office and shoved the card in my back pocket.

“Nightingale Investigations,” Shirleen answered.

“Hey Shirleen, this is Ava Barlow, from yesterday?”

“Girl, how’re you doin’ today? Heard you spent the night with Luke.”

I sat, stunned speechless, and stared at my computer.

Then I said, “Matt’s got a big mouth.”

“They all got big mouths, girl, learn that quick. These boys talk more than a pack of women. I lost fifty bucks on you.”

I was stunned speechless again, this time it didn’t last as long.

“What?”

“See, Lee nailed Indy the first night they were together. Not
nailed
her nailed her but she was in his bed. Eddie, with Jet, it took a few days. Hank and Roxie, like, a day. Vance, like three, but Jules was a virgin and he had to interrupt the festivities once to go out and shoot someone.”

I was blinking rapidly and feeling kind of faint at the amount and sensitivity of information Shirleen was imparting, not to mention what it might mean to me.

“So we had a pool. Everyone threw down money on when they thought Luke would nail you. Mace won five hundred dollars.”

Ho-ly
crap
.

“So,” she went on. “Did he
nail
you nail you or did you two just sleep?”

For some reason, I answered her unbelievably nosy question. “We just slept.”

“New pool!” she shouted.

Oh my God.

Wyoming all of a sudden looked even better.

“Shirleen,” I cut to the chase because I was beginning to feel sick. “I’m calling to set up an account. Luke and Vance are doing some work for me and I need you to invoice –”

“Oh girl, I don’t
think
so. Luke already told me you’d try something like this. He says you two got something worked out and we don’t want to step on
that
do we?”

“Yes, we do,” I told her. At least
I
wanted to step on it. I wanted to stomp all over it.

She laughed in my ear, loud and happy. “This is gonna be fun. First one of these I been in on, on the ground floor.” I could almost hear her rubbing her hands together.

“That means you’re mine,” she declared I thought bizarrely. “See, Ally got Indy ‘cause no one knew them then. Daisy got Jet. Everyone took care of Roxie ‘cause that was some
serious
shit that went down. May got Jules because they knew each other beforehand but we all kicked in, seein’ as she was a virgin and all. Though, I wasn’t in on the cherry poppin’ discussion, I’ve seen the tape.”

The tape?

“Anyhoots,” she went on. “See you at The Hornet tonight. I can’t
wait
.”

Then she hung up.

I put down the phone kind of in a daze and picked it up immediately and called Sissy.

* * * * *

I got about an hour of work done before I started my preparation for the next nightmare of the day.

I decided to go heavy on the makeup and the silver. I spent ages on my hair, pulling it back away from my face smooth in parts, other parts in twists and even other parts in braids and clipped it at the back of my head with a huge silver barrette leaving the back long. I also decided to wear my kickass, rock ‘n’ roll, deep-green, fitted, long-sleeved tee that had such a wide neckline, it fell off my shoulder. This meant, since I didn’t have a strapless bra (and no way I’d go braless sporting c-cup boobs), I had to wear my baby pink, satin bustier-slash-teddy-like contraption with snaps at the crotch. It fit like a glove, had beige triangles of lace at the hipbones and cups at the brassiere area and some soft boning that moved with my body. I’d bought it to wear with a strapless dress I wore to the New Year’s Eve party Dom, Sissy, Noah and I went to the year before last and it was the only time I wore it. Noah loved it, thought it was hot. For my evening at The Hornet (and the rest of forever), it had only a utilitarian purpose. I kept on my faded jeans, ran a long, silver scarf through my belt loops, buckled on a pair of matte-silver strappy sandals and called a taxi.

By the time I got there, I was ten minutes late.

I walked into The Hornet and it was packed. It was a warm Friday in late March, so Denverites were ready to roll to summer. The bar area was shoulder to shoulder, the seating area was entirely filled and neither area had a seat with Indy’s and Ally’s asses sitting on them.

I went to the back room where the pool tables were and immediately to my left I saw them. Indy, Ally and eight other people, including Tod and Stevie, Indy’s neighbors who I’d met several times before (gay, partners, totally fucking cool), Shirleen and the other black lady from the offices yesterday, not to mention the black-haired, violet-eyed Glamour Girl.

Holy cramoly.

“Ava!” Indy called and everyone’s gaze swung to me.

“Hey,” I said weakly, deciding that, yes, this was the next nightmare of my day.

I was introduced to the rest, a honey-blonde with green eyes and a fantastic smile (Jet); a dark blonde with blue eyes and a great outfit (Roxie); a platinum blonde that looked so much like Dolly Parton I thought she
was
Dolly for a minute (including the cleavage and a denim jacket with so many silver studs and rhinestones she lit up the dim room, her name was Daisy); the other black lady, older than the girls, with a Jacqueline Kennedy hairdo (May); and Glamour Girl (Jules).
 

Indy, by the way, was a tall, built, fantastic redhead and Ally was tall, lean and gorgeous with shiny, dark brown hair.
 

“Sit down, sit down. Let’s get to it. Someone get this girl a drink.” Shirleen had a seat saved for me, right next to her, right smack in the center of the long table. She was patting it and grinning at me huge.

“I’ll get you a drink,” Stevie mumbled getting up. “What’ll you have?”

“Cranberry juice and vodka. Let me give you some money,” I told him.

“Girlie, sit! Gay men don’t get to buy women drinks very often. Live it up,” Tod shouted.

Stevie moved off, I sat and Shirleen yelled after Stevie. “Hurry with that drink, you don’t want to miss anything.” Then her eyes moved back to me. “All right, girl, tell us
all
about it.”

“Maybe we should tell our stories first,” Jet suggested.

“I’m thinking that’s a good idea,” Indy put in.

I was happy to be off the hot seat even if it was for five minutes so I nodded.

It wasn’t for five minutes. It was for a helluva lot longer (two full drinks longer).

Indy told me her story. As she did, I was glad when Stevie brought my drink because Indy’s story included the car bombs (yes, bomb
s
, plural).

Even though Luke gave me the scary-ass flavor of Jet, Roxie and Jules’s stories, he didn’t get into the half of it (not even a quarter of it). What he missed out was the part that included Eddie making Jet move in with him during her drama (and she never moved out). Hank and her uncle conspiring to move Roxie in with Hank after her drama (and she did). And lastly, Jules doubling up on toiletries in about ten days between her place and Vance’s place (she was still doubled up as they had her place in the city and his cabin in the mountains).

Every single one of them had been nailed and then
nailed
within a week.

“I need another drink,” I whispered when Jules was done.

May patted my arm and Stevie disappeared for more drinks.

“Now,
your
turn,” Shirleen said.

Instead of launching into my story, I turned to Jules who’d been the last one to share and said, “I know you got shot and I’m sorry about that but I think what you did was brave.”

Jules stared at me.

Indy, Ally, Tod and Stevie were already my friends and Shirleen had claimed me (whatever that meant). I could tell right off that Jet, Roxie, Daisy and May were cool. Jules I hadn’t cracked. Jules wasn’t looking at me with kind eyes. She was looking at me with assessing ones. I didn’t know what to make of her.

When she didn’t speak, I looked away. “Sorry, not my place to say.”

“What I did was stupid,” she said to me and my eyes moved back to her.

“Maybe, but it was brave too and you saved someone’s life. So even if it was stupid, he’s still here and so are you. I think brave outweighs stupid in the end, don’t you?”

May was smiling at me with a warmth I felt from across the table and, on a quick glance, I noticed everyone else was too. My eyes settled on Jules and I was pleased to note she was smiling too.

Stevie set my drink in front of me and I took a gulp, looked around again and saw the expectant faces. There was nothing for it. I took a deep breath and started from the beginning. Two drinks later, I was done.

I told them the whole shebang, leaving nothing out. Not my weight; not my Dad; not my sisters and mother; not my years-long crush on Luke; not him punching out the boys who called me Fatty, Fatty Four-Eyes; not him sitting next to me on the stoop after my Dad left; not our embrace at his Dad’s funeral; not my promise and breaking it with my non-return of Luke’s calls; not Rick, Dave and Noah; not Dom; not Sandra Whoever-She-Was; not Luke cuffing me to him and his bed – not a thing.

Everyone stared at me when I was done.

“Oowee, these boys don’t play games,” Shirleen announced, sitting back and fanning herself with her hand.

“Holy crap,” Indy mumbled.

“He even makes Lee’s pursuit look old-fashioned and Lee used cuffs on you too,” Ally said, moving her stare to Indy.

“What ‘cha gonna do now, Sugar?” Daisy asked.

“Yeah, are you going to Luke’s place tonight or your own?” Roxie put in.

I looked at Roxie. “My place,” I said without hesitation.

Everyone drew in breaths.

“Oh Lordy,” Stevie whispered.

“Here we go again,” Jet said.

“No, really, it isn’t like that,” I told them.