Whiskey Sour (3 page)

I narrowed my eyes and remembered exactly why Nick had no say in my life anymore. We’d had a rough relationship since we met three months ago. We’d been hot enough to set each other on fire. For a while. Then I caught him with another woman, and I was hot enough to do something drastic. This was the first I’d seen of him in weeks.

“You have no right to get mad over anything,” I said, slapping my hand against his chest, the towel forgotten. “You made it perfectly clear that we’re not in a relationship any more, and you have no say in my life.”

He growled low in his throat and I could feel the rumble from his chest against my hand.

“I have every right to be mad. You fucking shot me in the ass with a tranquilizer gun.”

His teeth were gr
inding together so hard I was surprised he could get the words past his lips, and a tiny vein bulged in his temple.

The anger I’d been trying to repress the last few months was coming to the surface in a hurry, and I didn’t do the quiet voice when I got angry. I became a firestorm of waving arms and
Arsenio Hall whoops, and I channeled every antebellum ancestor I’d ever had, so my accent grew thick as honey.

“It’s n
ot like I shot you with bullets. You’re overreacting. Though you’re damned lucky I didn’t have a real gun on me or I might have. You were with another woman. At a motel. In the middle of the day. What the hell else was I supposed to think? All I know is that one minute you had me naked and panting, and you were finally about to be inside of me, and the next thing I know, your cell phone is going off and you’re running out of my apartment like your pants were on fire. And then twelve hours later I see you at a motel talking to a woman who was trying her best to get you to turn your head and cough. What was I supposed to think?”

“She was an informant.” Exasperation tinged his voice. “I’ve already tried to explain this to you, but you’re too stubborn to listen. And that doesn’t excuse the fact that you shot me with an elephant tranquilizer.”

“Are we done here?” I asked, pushing against him so I could slide off the counter.

My knees gave out and Nick caught me around the waist, holding me close to his body until I got my balance. I sucked in a breath at the contact and closed my eyes to savor the feel of our bodies touching. I looked up and saw his eyes smolder with pleasure as he brought me closer, so we were completely aligned. The towel had dropped to the ground and my nipples hardened to pebbles as they pressed against his chest. His mouth hovered just an inch away from mine so our breaths mingled, and I wanted nothing more than to take a bite of his full lower lip.

The chemistry between us was definitely still there. Too bad I had lousy taste in men. If we started kissing now it would be hard to stop, and as much as I wanted to taste him, we had too many unsettled issues between us. I pushed away from him and bent down to grab the towel, wrapping it around me securely.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, not meeting his eyes this time. I felt his sigh and wanted to give one of my own. We were a mess.

“I brought you some clothes. Kate said to burn the ones you were wearing. You must have smelled pretty bad. The entire lobby reeks of disinfectant.”

“It wasn’t one of my finer moments. Thanks for the clothes.
You can go now.”

He smiled and heat shot straight to my loins. “Don’t think you’re going to get rid of me so easily,” he said. “We’re going to be seeing a lot of each other over the next few weeks. I’m the
lead detective assigned to work with the FBI on the case Kate mentioned to you. It made it easier since I already act as media liaison through the department.”

Nick’s a detective for the Savannah PD, and last I’d heard he was working homicide. He
’d been assigned as media liaison because he had the patience of a saint and the looks of a movie star. I couldn’t imagine what type of case would involve a homicide detective, the FBI and a P.I. agency, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

I propped my fist on my hip and glared at Nick. “
Un-unh,” I said, shaking my head. “There’s no way I’m working with you. You’d probably get distracted by all your
informants
trying to stick their tongues down your throat, and then I’d get arrested for killing you.”

Nick fisted my towel in his hand and pulled me toward him, making my breath catch at the dangerous look in his eyes. He was either going to throttle me or kiss me, I wasn’t sure which.

His lips touched mine gently, though I could feel the anger vibrating through his body, and his tongue caressed mine as if he were tasting his last meal. By the time he pulled away I was breathing like a steam engine and I was pretty sure the towel had disintegrated from the heat my body was giving off. My female parts were screaming,
this one
, and my heart wasn’t too far behind. Luckily my brain had better sense. My heart had already been trampled on and was in no mood to repeat the process.

“
I like it when you’re jealous. And despite you shooting me up with tranquilizers, the only person I want to stick my tongue into is you.”

My eyes almost crossed at the imagery that one statement brought to mind. I knew from experience that Nick’s tongue was a miracle.

“Looks like I still know how to shut you up,” he said. His eyes gleamed with unconcealed humor and his dimples fluttered briefly as he opened the bathroom door to make his escape.

I grabbed a hairbrush from one of the cubicles and launched it at his head. It thudded against the door as he slammed it shut, and I could hear his laughter from the other side.

“You sure know how to brighten a man’s day,” he yelled through the door.

I tried my best to get the stupid grin off my face, but damned if he didn’t make me feel the same way. All of a sudden, I was really looking forward to the new job Kate had for me to do. I was going through Nick Dempsey withdrawal. That man had been driving me crazy for months, and if I had to wait even another day to feel him naked against me it was a day too long.

I looked at myself in the mirror and barely contained a screech of horror. My face was the color of an overripe tomato and my dark hair was drying in tangled tufts. My eyes were bloodshot and my pupils so dilated I could barely see the small ring of brown.

So maybe I’d have to wait two days to ge
t him naked. I could be patient.

B
y the time I’d gotten dressed and out of the bathroom, Kate had been called away from the office. She’d left a note on her door for me to come back early the next morning so she could brief me before the meeting. I was clueless as to why she’d want someone with my limited abilities for this particular assignment—unless they needed cannon fodder—which was highly probable.

My hometown of
Whiskey Bayou was a ten-minute drive south of Savannah. By the time I passed the
Now Entering Whiskey Bayou, The First Drink’s On Us
sign just on the outside of town, my seatbelt felt like it was strangling me and my fingers were gripping the wheel so tight my knuckles were white.

Don’t get me wrong
, the town is picturesque in a Pleasantville meets Deliverance kind of way, but it was an adjustment. And I was still adjusting after thirty years of living there.

It was an island of sorts and built on boggy ground, so the buildings shifted and looked as drunk as the town founders had been. The Walker Whiskey Distillery squatted short and fat in the center of to
wn, run down and vacant for more than forty years. The bank, gas station, sheriff’s department, and other assorted businesses sat around the square, paying homage to the sinking historical albatross of the distillery, stuck in 1942 forever.

Going home always
made me want to drive into the marsh. Especially since I was now living with my mother. A couple of months back, my apartment building had been condemned and bulldozed to the ground. I’d finally decided I could afford a tiny one-bedroom apartment in Savannah when I got the news that Veronica Wade, my archenemy and supreme bitch of the universe, had decided to sue me because one of her breast implants had popped during a fight we’d gotten into. It had been a doozy of a fight, and we’d gotten a first page write up in the Whiskey Bayou Gazette. I’d also gotten stun-gunned on the ass, so I preferred not to think about the fight too often.

I’d like to say
I was ashamed of myself, but that would be a lie. It had felt damned good to take out years of hostility and abuse by getting physical. Veronica had been the bane of my existence for more than twenty-five years. She’d been the one who stole my lunch money, and she’d been the one who’d put super glue on my oboe reed. I liked to think that karma had my back this time around with the whole implant explosion. Except for the lawsuit.

Fortunately, there had been
enough cops around as witnesses that her suit had been dismissed in court, but I’d still had to pay all the court and legal fees. Which was why I was driving a twenty-year-old Volvo that had a hole in the passenger side floor instead of my sweet little 350Z. The car was only one of the numerous setbacks I’d had over the past few months.

I was a ninth grade history teac
her, I was thirty years old, and I was living with my mother. That translated to
deadbeat loser
in the eyes of most people. And if the gossip mill was right, I was about to be an unemployed deadbeat loser. Which was why I had no choice now but to kamikaze my way through the cases Kate kept handing me.

I’d managed to live with this
down in the dumps feeling hanging over me for the last six weeks—a combination of desperation and wondering when the axe was going to fall and lop off my head. I was getting an ulcer, though I’d somehow managed to survive my current trials and tribulations without jamming a fork in my eye. But the urge to self-mutilate was becoming stronger every time I pulled into the driveway of my mother’s house. I was going to have to find another place to live. Soon. And maybe change my name and hair color. I’ve always wanted to be a blonde.

I waved at Mrs. Meador as she swept the walk
in front of The Good Luck Café—a thankless job since the clapboard sidewalk never seemed to be free of mud and sand. I wound through the crooked streets of Whiskey Bayou and turned left off of Main Street onto Shot Glass Drive, and then I took another left on Tumbler Street until I came to my mother’s house.

It was a small, cottage-
style house made of gray stone with a dark shingled roof, and it was the last house on a dead-end street of similar houses. The front door was painted bright red, and magenta and yellow flowers sprang up out of the planter boxes beneath all the windows.

It was a cute house, and it probably would have been a nice place to grow up if there’d been more than one bathroom.
As it was, the thoughts of my childhood home brought back memories of pounding fists on doors and screaming matches between me and my sister.

My mom’s Dodge Charger, an exact replica of the General Lee from the Dukes of Hazzard
that she’d bought off eBay with the insurance money from my dad’s death, was missing from the driveway. She was a huge fan of the show, and she said driving the car through Whiskey Bayou was a great way to keep the old people out of her way because the engine sounded like it came from a monster truck or Hell’s Angels, and you could hear it coming a mile away.

I
breathed a huge sigh of relief that I’d gotten lucky and had beaten her home. I didn’t need her to see me in my current condition. Not that she’d lecture me or anything about being careful. My mom was a free spirit and didn’t often think of things like safety or taking preventative measures. More likely she’d give me suggestions on how to do better and insist on accompanying me on my next job. It’s happened before. And as much as I hated to admit it, I had a sinking suspicion that I was a lot like my mom.

What I didn’t expect to see was the bright yellow
Volkswagen Beetle parked in front of the house. I was starting to wonder if I’d done something to piss off God, because it really felt like I couldn’t catch a break. I mean, there was that one incident where I’d almost had sex in a church crypt, but I’d felt really bad about it afterwards, so I figured I’d been forgiven. Apparently not.

The Beetle could only belong to one person—Rosemarie Valentine.

Rosemarie taught choir in the room next to mine at James Madison High. It wasn’t easy teaching about the Battle of Little Big Horn over the constant sound of Rosemarie’s warbling contralto. I kept a bowl of earplugs by my door on test days and frequently wished I could keep Jack Daniels in my desk drawer. She was a nice woman, but being with her was like herding toddlers or small dogs. I lacked the energy.

The Beetle’s engine shut off and the door wa
s flung open, birthing Rosemarie from its interior with a lot of groans and flailing arms and legs. Her curly blonde hair was somewhat wilted by the heat and only added about three inches to the circumference of her head instead of the normal five. Rosemarie wasn’t a small woman, and I could almost feel the Beetle giving a sigh of relief at her exit.

I
shook my head and blinked my eyes as I got my first full view of Rosemarie’s outfit. It was a one-piece short suit made of terrycloth—something I normally didn’t see on anyone but two year olds or Snooki. This one was bright orange and strapless, and the only thing holding it together was well sewn seams and a prayer. My mouth dropped open in shock as the elastic band trying to contain Rosemarie’s breasts gave up the good fight and snapped down to expose a pair of the whitest mounds of flesh I’d ever seen.

The elastic snapped so hard I was surprised her breasts didn’t bounce up and put an eye out, but Rosemarie shoved those puppies back in with all the determination of a woman at an
All you can cram in a paper bag for $5
garage sale.

I finally found the courage to get out of the car, my muscles protesting and my movements slower than normal—not that that was saying much.
I noticed Rosemarie pulling a giant basket of fruit from the car and my curiosity at her arrival went up a notch. All she needed was a Carmen Miranda style hat and she could have been the spokesperson for Chiquita Banana.

“Yooh
oo, Addison,” Rosemarie warbled, as if she had to catch my attention for me to see her. “How are you holding up, dear?”

I looked down at my borrowed black athletic shorts and lime green tank top, t
he stark white bandage on my leg and my bare feet and said, “I’ve been better.”

“Well, just keep your chin up. Everything will work out okay. You’ve got your friends to see you through.”

I was beginning to wonder if someone had died and I’d just forgotten as we made our way to the red front door. It was unlocked, because Whiskey Bayou was still the kind of town where the older generation still felt safe leaving their doors unlocked, even though I knew some of the kids I taught would probably end up in prison in the next few years.

I usher
ed us into the air-conditioned house, immediately falling to the orange and brown velour sofa with mutant flowers my mom had bought when she and my dad first married. I was pretty much out of southern hospitality at this point, but Rosemarie just acted like nothing was out of the ordinary and set the fruit basket on the coffee table.

“What’s with the fruit basket?” I asked.

“All of the teachers took up a donation, and this is the best fruit basket money can buy. I read the statistics about how those who lived in poverty were most likely to get scurvy, and I thought this would help with your health.”

She beamed at me, obviously trying to keep things upbeat, the two perfect dots of pink rouge on her cheeks quivering from the strain. A sinking feeling of dread began to curl in the pit of my stomach and I slowly sat up on the couch.

“Why would all of you think I’m at the poverty level? What’s going on here?”

I mean, technically I probably was
at the poverty level with all the debt and fees I’d had to pay recently, but everyone knew it wasn’t polite to tell someone they were considered poverty stricken to their face. That was something done behind a person’s back.

Rosemarie gasped and her cornflower blue eyes practically bulged out of their sockets. “Don’t tell me they haven’t told you yet,” she said, pressing a hand dramatically to her breast. “
Those cowards. They know there’s going to be backlash because you had quite a crowd of parents and students there to support you at the school board meeting last night. You are a good teacher after all. You just sometimes make poor decisions. And really only the once. Or maybe twice,” Rosemarie amended, finally winding down.

“They fired me?” I asked, the reality of what that meant finally sinking in. “I didn’t really think they would.”

I was chilled from the inside out, and I shivered violently, unable to decide if I wanted to break down into tears or throw up. I think my bodily functions were confused because it turned out I could do neither, so I just laid back down on the couch and stared at the ceiling.

Of course
, they’d had grounds for letting me go. I knew that as soon as I’d made the mistake of taking a job as a stripper at the Foxy Lady. It didn’t matter that I’d only had the job for thirty-two minutes or that I was really bad at it. I’d been in desperate need of money and I’d made a bad decision. Not one of the better moments in my life. And I’d qualified my reasoning by telling myself that me making a little extra money on the side was no different than Marylou Waldrip, who taught economics, giving piano lessons after school, or Peter Newberry, the football coach, working at the Piggly Wiggly when his wife left him high and dry.

I’d even made it a point to go into Savannah for the job. I never could have imagined that I’d see my principal
in the audience during my brief career in exotic dancing. And to compound the problem, I’d found him dead in the parking lot shortly after. Luck hadn’t been on my side, and I knew I’d have to face the consequences of my actions. I just never expected things to go this far.

“Now you can’t let something like this get you down,” Rosemarie said
, too cheerfully. “You’ve got to look at this as an opportunity. This is your chance to be whatever it is you’ve always wanted to be.”

I watched as she dug around in her giant
orange Vera Bradley purse until she came out with a pen and pad.

“We’re going to make a list of everything you’ve ever wanted to do, and then we’ll find you a job. No offense, but you’re not likely to find a man now that you’re living with your mother, and you’re getting to that age that’s the point of no return as far as getting married.”

I realized the low growling sound was coming from me and made an effort to relax. Rosemarie was only trying to help. It wasn’t her fault she had the subtlety of a neutron bomb.

“Okay, I’m ready,” she said, clicking her pen.
“Tell me everything you’ve ever wanted to do in your life.”

“
Well,” I said thoughtfully, “I wanted to be a rock star when I was fifteen because I had a crush on Billy Lee Gentry and I was sure he was going to make it in the big time, but I found out early on I didn’t do well with leather pants,” I said, remembering the sound my thighs made every time I tried to walk. “Not to mention it’s never a good idea to wear leather this far south. The chafing isn’t pleasant.”

“Not to mention you can’t sing a lick,” Rosemarie said, making notes on her pad.

I narrowed my eyes, and the only thing keeping me from launching myself at her was the fact that she was right.