Ingenue

by Jillian Larkin

  She’d given his name to Spark only a few days before, with express instructions not to let Jerome know that she had gotten him the job. What sacrifices had Jerome made so that she could have this beautiful ring?

  She was tempted to slip it on, to see what it would look like on her finger, against her skin. It was the moment she’d been waiting for, uncertain it would ever even happen.

  Yet here was the ring.

  And Jerome was gone.

  LORRAINE

  “I think that spot is clean, Raine,” Spark said with a smirk.

  Lorraine looked up from the bar, startled, and put down the rag. She’d been staring at Hank’s backside and wiping down the bar for a good five minutes. “It is now.”

  The last couple of the evening had left an hour earlier—a tired-looking flapper on the arm of an overweight but rich-looking man, stray feathers from the girl’s headdress falling in her wake.

  Lorraine had stayed to help Hank close the club. She wiped down the bar while he washed and stacked the night’s glasses, hosed down and scrubbed the rubber floor mats, and helped the busboys mop the barroom floor. Hank was new, after all, and had never closed before. He might not know what to do and might need to ask Lorraine a question.

  And from this vantage point, Lorraine had an excellent view of Hank’s sculpted muscles tensing as he pushed the mop. There wasn’t an ounce of flab anywhere on the man. He’d stripped off the blazer he’d been wearing, and now he was working in a white shirt and suspendered trousers. Hot sauce! Lorraine felt like making a mess more often just so she could watch him clean it up.

  She tore her eyes away to glare at Spark. “Go do something useful.”

  Spark pointed at Hank and said, “Listen, I can finish up here. Why don’t you go enjoy the rest of the morning with the big six over there?”

  Lorraine was suspicious. Spark had never done anything genuinely nice for her. “Are you sure?”

  “Go on—I just had a cup of coffee so I’ll be awake for a while yet. You look about ready for bed. Maybe Hank can help you out with that.” Spark winked clumsily. “Get it?”

  “Spark, you are an absolute toad,” Lorraine said, but then caught herself smiling.

  “Boys!” Spark called to the men, who were wringing out the mops and setting them back in the buckets. “Floor looks good, you can all call it a night!”

  A few of the men shouted out goodbyes and walked to the storage room to get their things. Lorraine was delighted when Hank hung back from the others.

  “Hi, Lorraine,” he said. His dark hair had been fixed with pomade at the start of the night, but now it was disordered in the sexiest possible way. A bead of sweat rolled down his golden neck and under his collar, making Lorraine want to rip the shirt right off him.

  “Will you be here awhile yet?” he asked.

  “Actually, I’m all done. I just have to get my purse from the office.”

  “Great!” Hank replied. “I’ll grab my hat and meet you out front.”

  Lorraine nodded mutely. It made sense that she and Hank would walk home together, considering they lived in the same building. But he wouldn’t have looked so happy about it unless he was interested in her, too, right?

  In the office, she checked her reflection in the mirror over the desk. She wiped her smudged eye makeup until the smudges looked sort of intentional. At least her dress still looked amazing. Hank’s sudden entrance into her life had inspired several purchases of some of Paris’s latest fashions. This dress had sweet little butterfly sleeves and was made of sheer silk velvet with a floral pattern. A cloth belt was cinched with a rhinestone buckle at the back. She freshened her lipstick—a delicate pink to match her ensemble.

  Why wouldn’t he be interested in her? She was the cat’s pajamas! Nay, the cat’s negligee!

  Hank looked around at the empty streets and darkened windows as they walked. “This is one of the things I officially love about New York. You’re free to roam the sidewalks at any time of day or night. Back in Los Angeles, I had to take the trolley whenever I wanted to go somewhere.”

  Lorraine winced as her heels chafed her feet. A trolley sounded pretty good to her right about now.

  He casually slung an arm over her shoulders. “Nice, eh? No one else around, no cars or wagons rolling by—it’s like the city belongs to us alone.”

  Between his arm around her and his use of the word us, Lorraine was having trouble not shouting “I love you, too!” into the night air.

  She looked up at the sky. The sun wouldn’t come up for another hour or two, but it wasn’t pitch-black out—the dark was a deep purple. Aside from their footsteps on the pavement, the street was silent. When she walked home alone, the early morning had always seemed desperately lonely. But with Hank along, this early-morning twilight time seemed exhilarating and full of possibility, as if they could do whatever they wanted and no one would be around to stop them.

  “It is kind of nice,” she replied at last.

  When they reached a subway station on Broadway, Hank stopped. “I’m not tired,” he proclaimed, a warm smile stretching out across his face. “Are you?”

  Honestly? It had been a busy night and she’d barely had five minutes to rest her aching feet. But Hank’s copper-brown eyes were like a stiff shot of coffee. This beautiful man didn’t want to waste his morning sleeping—he wanted to spend it with her.

  “I’m completely awake,” she replied.

  “Good,” he said. “Then I say we go up to Central Park and go out on the lagoon. Afterward, we can get breakfast at this delicatessen my friend Eddie always raves about.”

  “The boats will be locked up for the night, Hank.”

  “Passion always finds a way,” he said.

  Hank was such a risk-taker. How exciting! “You really think so?”

  He caught her hand and winked, pulling her down the stairs to the subway platform. “I think you, Miss Dyer, can do anything you put your mind to.”

  Lorraine stared at the tall chain-link fence around the boathouse and the lagoon. The gate was chained and padlocked. “This may be a problem.”

  Lorraine hadn’t really loved running through Central Park toward the lagoon in her expensive dress. For one thing, she wasn’t the sort of girl who ran. Running was for people who didn’t mind sweating. And for another thing, she’d had to shuck off her heels and run in her stocking feet, and she didn’t even want to imagine what wet things she’d stepped in. But after a few minutes of galloping through the soft darkness hand in hand with Hank, she forgot to be bothered. For the first time in months, she was having fun.

  Hank shrugged, pulling off his derby and flinging it over the fence. “See? That doesn’t look so hard.” He wound his fingers into the chain-link and began to climb. Once he reached the top, he swung over and landed gracefully on his feet.

  He looked at Lorraine through the mesh. “Are you coming?”

  The moment of truth.

  She tossed her purse over. Then she took a deep breath, slipped on her shoes—no way was she leaving them here; they cost a week’s wages—and wedged a toe into the chain-link. Then the other foot, and up a little farther.

  This wasn’t so bad! It was like climbing the trellis outside her window when she was thirteen and her mother wouldn’t let her go see Terrell Spitznagle, even though Lorraine had explained that she was in love with him. Though come to think of it, Terrell was now fat and balding and about as interesting as a clump of moss on a rock, so maybe her mother had been on to something.

  “Come on, slowpoke!” Hank called. “I’d like to make it onto the water before the sun comes up!”

  “Excuse me, you are not wearing heels,” she replied through gritted teeth.

  “True, I left those at home tonight,” Hank said, laughing.

  Lorraine had reached the top. It was a delicate maneuver, swinging a leg over a fence in a dress. A boy wore pants, sure—that was easy. But for a girl, there were issues of modesty as well the whole impracticality of rolli
ng a skirt up far beyond the knee.

  “Umm,” she said, and dropped her leg over the other side, her weight pulling her over, and then it was too late: The hem of her dress was caught on a loose bit of metal.

  “Hank!” she yelled, trying not to panic. “I can’t get my dress off!”

  “The best thing you can do is jump,” he said, looking up at her. “I’ll catch you.”

  Ugh. She anchored her feet in the fence, then sprang away and fell. She grimaced at the distinct sound of fabric ripping. Oh no! Her beautiful lilac Lucien Lelong was ruined.

  But then she was in Hank’s arms. He’d caught her effortlessly.

  He smiled as he looked at her. “See? That wasn’t so bad.”

  She couldn’t help it—she burst into laughter. “Not so bad? I could’ve broken my neck! And I ruined my dress.”

  He inspected the damage as he sat her on the ground. Half the hem of the dress had ripped off, exposing the bottom of her white slip. The torn fabric hung limp against her calf.

  Hank picked up the frayed edge. As he reached for it, his fingers grazed her leg—they were so warm, warmer than she’d expected, and yet they made her shiver with anticipation. It had been so long since a man had touched her. Since anyone had touched her, really. Even her mother hadn’t hugged her when she’d left town.

  Hank toyed for a moment with the fabric he held, then dropped it, instead of ripping it further and ravishing Lorraine against a tree as she’d hoped. His thin but delicious lips formed a playful grin. “I think it looks better this way. You’ll start a new fashion trend for sure.” He handed over her purse.

  Lorraine was sad about the dress, but a few moments in Hank’s arms had made it seem less important. “It’s just a dress, right?” she said, and hoped he didn’t hear the quaver in her voice.

  She had been to Central Park on visits to New York with her parents, but she’d never seen the park like this. Now that they were over the fence, she could see the moonlight shining off the lagoon. From here it was easy to see the starry sky, framed by the bushy tree branches along the water. She stared up in wonder. “So pretty,” she whispered.

  “This way,” Hank said, already heading off to the old wooden boathouse. There they ran into another padlock, on the two front doors. Hank began rummaging around in his trouser pockets. “Don’t worry, I can take care of this.”

  “Sure you can, Houdini.” Lorraine swatted mosquitoes away from her bare arms.

  Hank turned away, and she heard clicking noises. A few moments later, the padlock opened and he dropped it to the ground.

  Lorraine stared at the piece of metal in his hand. “Why were you carrying that lock pick?”

  He tipped his hat. “Why? In case a beautiful young lady needs help breaking into a boathouse for some late-night rowing.”

  Lorraine loved it when a man came prepared. And had he just called her beautiful? This was swiftly becoming the best date she had ever been on, and the date hadn’t even technically started yet!

  Hank dragged open the double doors, which creaked like a dying cat in the silent night.

  He bowed his head and gestured to the open doorway. “After you.”

  Lorraine couldn’t see much in the inky dark of the boathouse, though her eyes adjusted quickly to the light peeking in through the slatted wooden walls. Flimsy-looking rowboats rested in the water. Everything smelled like mildew. No wonder she’d never come for a boat ride. This was disgusting.

  Hank tugged a rope and the doors onto the lagoon swung open. He plucked two oars off the wall and hopped inside one of the boats. As he untied it from its moorings, he said, “You going to stand there all night? Or are you coming along?”

  He held out his hand, and Lorraine took it. His hand was bigger and harder than hers, as it should be, and she loved the feeling of her palm against his. Once she was seated, he took an oar in each hand, dropped the shafts into the oarlocks, and rowed them out onto the lagoon.

  He rowed hard for a bit and then stopped. The chorus of creaks that accompanied his rowing vanished as he let the boat drift, and all Lorraine could hear were crickets chirping and the gentle lapping of the water.

  Lorraine realized her cheeks were sore from grinning. It was beautiful out here, and cool. And … tranquil—that was the word. As late night bled into early morning and the sky lightened overhead, she felt something she hadn’t felt in ages. Peace. Contentment. It was all very strange.

  Hank had left his blazer by the fence, and in the growing light she could see his muscles bulge under his thin chambray shirt. How had he gotten into such terrific shape? Lorraine had never seen a bartender who looked anything but unhealthy. She wondered whether the booze bottles were any heavier out in Los Angeles.

  “What are you thinking about?” Hank asked, breaking the silence.

  Lorraine laughed awkwardly. “Oh, just how beautiful it is out here.” She leaned forward a little. “I’ve never done anything like this before.”

  “No? Manager of a speakeasy—I would’ve thought this would be a tame night for you.”

  “Tame would be a good word to describe my other nights,” she replied. Then she realized how boring that made her sound. “Not that I don’t do anything, of course. Just, you know, I don’t usually steal boats … at five in the morning. But I should more often, because it’s fun, really fun.” Oh God, she sounded like a halfwit. Here she was feeling more … like a regular person, and she suddenly couldn’t talk. What was wrong with her?

  She pulled her flask out of her purse and screwed off the top. Liquid courage was exactly what she needed. Before taking a sip, she offered the flask to Hank. “Toast to a successful caper?”

  Hank shook his head. “No thanks. I try not to take my work home with me.”

  Lorraine laughed again. “Me neither!” she lied, leaning over the edge of the boat to pour the contents of her flask into the water. She tried not to grimace at the waste of good gin. “There,” she said once it was all gone. “Some little fishies are gonna have a party!”

  Hank gave a brief chuckle. “Too bad you don’t have any lime to toss their way.”

  Lorraine’s eyes brightened. “Lime, did you say?” She reached into her purse and pulled out half a lime she had wrapped up to take home with her.

  Hank’s jaw dropped. “Do you always keep lime in your purse?”

  Lorraine shrugged and tipped an invisible hat. Then she squeezed the lime into the water. “Of course! In case a beautiful young man breaks into a boathouse for some late-night rowing, and then I offer him a drink but he refuses, and so I pour my liquor into the water.”

  Hank gave her a look that was difficult to describe, but she was sure the gist of it was: I’m impressed by you, Lorraine.

  “Touché,” he said. “You’re a wonder.”

  Which was such a nice thing to hear that she just giggled in response.

  “So tell me about yourself, Lorraine. When did you move to New York?”

  She thought for a moment. It felt like a lifetime, but in truth—“It’s been about a month or so.”

  “You’re almost as new here as I am!” His face sobered. “So you got the job at the speakeasy pretty quickly, huh?”

  Technically, she’d had the job long before she arrived in New York. “Yep.”

  “You know, you’re way too young and beautiful to be running a second-rate gin joint like the Opera House. A sophisticated dame like you should be in college, or getting married, or having a swell time somewhere, not working in one of those seedy places.”

  The compliments were just too many and too perfect—it was too much fun, as if he’d been reading Lorraine’s diary. “Beautiful,” “sophisticated,” “admired by everyone”—well, he still might say that last one.

  Instead, he asked, “How did you get this job?” which wasn’t any fun at all.

  “Oh, I just kind of stumbled on it. I needed to do something with myself before I start college this fall at Barnard.”

  “You said you’re fr
om Chicago?”

  She nodded. “I lived there my whole life. Went to a fancy bluenose school—such a stuffy old yawn—and did the whole debutante thing.” She reached over the edge of the boat to skim her fingers through the water. “This one girl at school and I were best friends. But she literally stabbed me in the back.”

  His eyes widened. “Literally?”

  “Well, not literally,” she said. “Figuratively.”

  Hank relaxed. “What did she do?”

  “She was supposed to marry this pompous blue blood. But she started sneaking out to speakeasies, got a gig as a singer, and had an affair with a black piano player. When her fiancé found out, he showed up and humiliated her and ran her out of the club. It was awful.”

  “That sounds rough.”

  “The worst part was that she blamed me. Gloria assumed I was the one who told Bastian.” Lorraine stopped talking when she realized she’d been using Gloria’s name. She was under strict orders from Carlito not to talk about Gloria, ever. Nor, for that matter, Bastian. Nor the Green Mill. But she was pretty sure Hank didn’t count—what harm could he do to Carlito? He was just a bartender.

  Hank reached out to touch her arm. An electric thrill ran up her spine. “That must have really hurt,” he said. “That she could believe you’d do that to her after years of friendship.”

  Lorraine exhaled slowly, hoping he wouldn’t take his hand away. “It did.”

  “What happened to Gloria?”

  Lorraine knew she shouldn’t say anything more. But it felt so nice that a man was finally showing some interest in her, not as a plaything, but as a person. When was the last time a man had done that?

  So she just went for broke. Suddenly she was telling him about Gloria’s engagement party, how she had drunkenly exposed Clara.

  Hank’s eyes were melancholy by the time she finished. “Oh, Lorraine,” he said softly. “I’m so sorry you had to go through all that.”

  How long had she been talking? She had no idea. The sun was already rising, and the sky had begun shading into a deep and luminous blue. Finally, after years of her being ignored, someone cared what Lorraine had to say. Take that, Marcus Eastman!