by JD Nixon
Stung by her comments and feeling out of place in this room of partying women, I thought about leaving, stopped only by my promise to Brett to look after Liz. And a friendly hand on my arm.
“She has a point, you know. Time to let your hair down for once, Tessie,” cajoled Gretel, beautiful in a tight, sleeveless sparkling gold dress. “It is a party, remember. Time to have some fun.” She handed me a glass of champagne.
I didn’t take it. “Red Bycraft,” I said simply.
“He won’t have a chance in this room with all of us here,” she smiled. “We’ll tear him to pieces if he even tries to get in.”
Having to control and attempt to teach junior Bycrafts day after day had quickly cured her of any romantic feelings she’d felt towards the Bycraft men on her arrival in town, no matter how good-looking they were. Gretel was definitely an ally and had been from the moment we’d met. I’d gone to the school to give my first talk on road safety not long after my return to town. I’d been heckled by some of her small pupils, some no more than seven or eight years old. She’d politely reprimanded them, only to be heckled herself in response. We’d gone for a coffee after school, sharing our Bycraft horror stories, something that had bonded us as friends forever.
I smiled back at her gratefully and accepted the glass, taking a cautious sip.
“Race you,” Gretel dared, sculling her glass.
I hesitated for a second, not really the drinking type, but also not liking a dare to go unanswered. I sculled mine too. She won that round.
And the next.
When she brought the third champagne over, I searched for a reason to abstain, feeling a little unsteady in my heels. Luckily, our attention was distracted by Lizzie’s maid-of-honour calling everyone to the front of the room. Stumbling a little in her own sky-high heels, this barely five-feet-tall ball of energy informed us that it was time for some games. She forced us to play a couple of extremely vulgar games that had us all shrieking with laughter. Giggling so much that champagne shot out of my nostrils (not a pleasant or elegant experience), I had to close the door on both a curious Abe and a worried Sarge during a game of ‘Pin Percy on the Pornstar’ to give us some privacy. My own turn at the game left ‘Percy’ dangling from the pornstar’s right earlobe like a unusual and disturbing earring.
The DJ pretended he needed to go to the bathroom, but was gone for a good twenty minutes by my reckoning, probably nervously hoping the raucous games had finished by the time he returned.
By then I’d had another glass of champagne and felt unbelievably loose. I stopped mother-henning Lizzie and really started enjoying myself. The next time the Sarge braved the room again, I bounced over and beamed up at him.
He stared back, stony-faced. “How much have you had to drink so far?”
“Nothing,” I lied, swaying in front of him in my high heels. His hand shot out to grab my arm to steady me.
“You’re lying to me, Tessie.”
I cursed his superior detecting skills. “Maybe a little.”
“Or a lot?”
Gretel, always seeking an opportunity to be near him, almost tripped over her own feet in her haste to join us, thankfully distracting him from his scrutiny of me.
“I think I’m going to need a personal escort home tonight, Finn,” she hinted, fluttering her eyelashes up at him.
“If you’re all going to continue drinking, I’ll have to give you all a lift home,” he said, with no small amount of disapproval. I made moves to rejoin the fun when his hand latched on to my arm, spinning me around again.
“What?” I demanded, irritated.
“No more tonight. You’re not used to drinking a lot. You’ve had enough.”
“Leave me alone,” I said, shrugging off his hand. “I don’t need you breathing down my neck all night. I just want to have some fun for once.”
“Stop being so stubborn and listen to some sense,” he argued.
“I don’t remember asking you to be my guardian angel,” I retorted. “I can look after myself, so go away. You’re not needed.”
He stared down at me for a long minute, frowning. Then he left, slamming the door behind him.
Feeling instantly remorseful about what I’d said, I took a few steps towards the door intending to chase after him to apologise, only to find myself restrained by Lizzie. She demanded I take part in a particularly embarrassing game that was just about to start. I hesitated, but returned to the party.
My altercation with the Sarge diminished my enjoyment of the evening and though I joined in with the others, I’d lost my enthusiasm. But as Gretel pressed a couple more champagnes into my hands and I drank them, that bad feeling began to fade away.
At eleven, the DJ finished his gig and started packing up despite our groans, complaints and insults. To our shame, the other women and I pelted him with leftover food as he fled the room in panic, forcing Abe to come to his rescue to escort him to safety.
“Let’s go to the public bar!” someone suggested.
After a general cheer of agreement, we trooped over to the public bar. Most of us detoured to the ladies for a pitstop first, fighting each other for vantage point at the mirror to fix our makeup and hair. Gretel elbowed me out of the way as she hogged the mirror, adjusting the bodice of her dress downwards so that even more of her cleavage was on display. She pulled out her lipstick and applied it thickly and perhaps not quite accurately.
“When’s Finn coming back?” she asked me, a noticeable touch of petulance in her voice, scrubbing the lippie off her teeth with her finger.
“I don’t know and I don’t care,” I replied airily, fluffing my hair up.
“Well, I do. I bet if I could get him alone for ten minutes I could make him forget about that stupid fiancee of his forever.” She kissed the air at her reflection.
My dark grey eyes met her pretty blue-green ones in the mirror. My sceptical glance didn’t improve her mood.
“Why aren’t you completely in love with him by now?” she demanded, coating her lashes with another unneeded layer of mascara, making it appear as if her eyeballs were being hugged by tarantulas. “I would be if I worked with him every day.”
“You are completely in love with him and you don’t work with him every day,” I pointed out with impeccable logic.
“Yeah, that’s true. So why aren’t you?”
I shrugged and adjusted the straps of my dress which had fallen down. I was in imminent danger of a wardrobe malfunction. “I have Jakey. Why would I even think about other men?”
“I guess. Jakey is divine, but he’s a Bycraft so there’s no future there. You do like Finn, don’t you?”
“Of course I do! He’s a great guy.” I checked my teeth and had one last look in the mirror before heading for the door. “Most of the time that is, except when he being a boring old party-pooper.”
As the only late night watering hole in town, the public bar was hopping and we entered the room laughing loudly, drawing everyone’s attention. A series of wolf whistles chorused from a group in the corner in response to our arrival. I suspected the group consisted of the ‘cute men’ that Foxy had enthused over earlier.
I scoped the room as I always did, but didn’t see anything other than decent citizens out for a good time on a Sunday night, not even one Bycraft in sight. I personally received a cheer of welcome from a group of Jake’s work colleagues. I chatted to them for a while before deciding I needed a break from socialising. I took a stool at the bar, propping up my head with my elbow. I smiled at the barman, a local boy I knew well.
“Are you old enough to work here, Deepak?” I asked him as he came over to serve me.
“I am, Officer Tess. I turned eighteen two days ago,” he smiled. “I only just got this job yesterday.”
“Good for you,” I said absently, looking over towards a ruckus at the far side of the bar where Foxy Dubois appeared to have fallen over her own feet and was lying on the carpet, unable to get up. “Deepak, I think it’s time to ask
Abe to take Foxy home. You better give him a call.”
He obediently rang Abe who was bar-keeping in the lounge bar across the foyer. He was quick to respond, gently hauling a resistant and protesting Foxy to her feet.
“You’ve had enough for tonight, Foxy,” he said firmly but kindly, his hand clenched around her upper arm. She gave him a blast of profane four-letter words that merely rolled off his broad shoulders. He’d heard it all before from her a million times.
“Buh I wanna ‘nother drinky, arshehole,” she slurred, swinging her fist at him. It missed him by miles of course, but it wasn’t a good sign. Foxy had turned belligerent, which only happened rarely. Usually she was overly affectionate when she drank and no man was safe for fifty kilometres. Something had upset her tonight.
A noisy burst of laughter from the other side of the room drew my attention. It was my hens and they’d been joined by the group of men who’d been sitting in the corner. That explained Foxy’s bad mood – her position as ‘women of interest’ with the tourists had been upset by the arrival of the partying women.
“I can’t serve you anymore, Foxy,” Abe patiently explained to her, pulling her to the door, his hand still clamped around her arm. “Otherwise I’ll lose my licence.”
“It’sh alwaysh about you, innit? What ‘bout me?”
“Come on, Foxy,” implored Abe, struggling mightily with the squirming woman. “Behave yourself or I’m going to have to ban you from the pub for a while. Like I had to last time. Remember?”
She wasn’t listening to him, too intent on escaping his clutches to mind any threat he gave. It was quite the spectacle to watch her thrash around in Abe’s arms, him being such a big guy and obviously afraid of hurting her by manhandling her. I wouldn’t have been so gentle with her because I knew she was a lot tougher than she looked, but I didn’t make any move to intervene. Abe had a tongue in his head, and if he wanted help, he’d ask for it. Besides, it was my night off so I wasn’t volunteering to help. He could ring the Sarge.
Abe half-nudged, half-pushed Foxy towards the bar door so he could escape with her out the back way where his van was parked. How he proposed to get her into the van and buckled up safely, let alone get her to stay in her seat, was a mystery. Perhaps that’s why he wore that troubled expression on his normally placid face, an expression twisting into agony when Foxy sunk her teeth into his strong and well-muscled forearm.
Instinctively, he let her go and she bolted back into the crowd, weaving nimbly between the clientele, heading for the hen’s party group.
“Foxy!” bellowed Abe in a show-stopping voice. It didn’t stop her. I caught a glimpse of her face as she scurried past and it had stubborn determination written all over it. Her target was one of the visiting men, currently dancing with Gretel, both of them less than steady on their feet. Even from the bar where I sat I could see the wedding ring on his finger and personally thought that Foxy and Gretel should stay right away from him because of that. But I also acknowledged that was rich moralising from someone who was happily sleeping with a married man herself, never mind the vastly different circumstances.
When Foxy barged up to the swaying couple and shoved Gretel in the chest, shouting abusive comments about her being a man-stealer, I slipped off my barstool with weary resignation. Of course it was asking too much of fate to expect to be able to enjoy one night off work. I rushed over to the fray unwillingly, not feeling all that stable on my feet myself, but trying to project a clear-headed, authoritative appearance. Foxy pushed Gretel into the crowd of off-duty prison officers, consequently forcing them to spill their drinks over each other in an awful domino-effect of misfortune.
Everybody was now peeved.
Chapter 18
I had no patience for niceties. I grabbed Foxy around the neck in a headlock and hauled her backwards away from Gretel, who held her hands up in front of her face in fear at Foxy’s ferocious attack. Wearing such high heels and not exactly sober, I staggered backwards with Foxy’s weight crashing into my body. I would have fallen over if not for the fact that I landed hard against somebody, right into their arms.
“Relax, I’ve got you,” said an unfamiliar male voice in my ear, arms closing around me.
“No, you haven’t,” I shot back, springing away from his touch with a jolt. He was lucky I couldn’t reach my knife.
Foxy took advantage of that distraction to twist around in my headlock. She punched me with weak ineffectiveness in the stomach and pursed her lips with only one purpose in mind.
“Don’t you dare, Foxy,” I warned her, attempting to spin her around again so she wasn’t facing me. We danced back and forth, locked in skirmish. She had greater strength than her appearance suggested, used to looking after herself during her days as a dancer and unofficial escort. It had been a while since I’d had to tussle with her and I think she’d been working out or something. Or maybe it was the alcohol affecting me.
She puckered her lips with unmistakable intent.
“Foxy . . .” I warned again sternly. “Don’t you do it, or you’ll be spending the night in the lockup. I mean it.”
She ignored me, launching a huge gob of spit on my face that landed on my cheek. It trickled down, warm and globulous.
“Now you’ve done it, you stupid woman,” I shouted at her in disgust. I wiped the spit away with my arm and hooked my foot around her ankles, pushing her backwards as I did. She toppled over and I grasped her quickly to stop her hitting the ground, spinning her around and smushing her face into the carpet. I sat on her back while I rummaged through my tiny evening bag to pull out a pair of quick restraint handcuffs, clamping her wrists together behind her back. I hauled her to her feet and marched her over to the nearest wall, pushing her face first up against it.
“You right, Tessie?” asked Abe, hovering around anxiously, trying to keep the nosy crowd at bay.
“No,” I snapped. “I’m extremely pissed off. My whole evening’s been ruined by this drunk dumbarse.”
I searched through my bag again until I found the phone the Sarge had given me. Despite our earlier tiff, he answered immediately, rather alarmed. I had to reassure him twice that I was okay before he was even able to listen to me. When I told him we had a situation with Foxy, he delivered a huge sigh into the receiver and hung up without even saying goodbye. He was on his way.
The pub was just down the road from the police station, so less than five minutes later, the Sarge took over from me. I insisted that Foxy be put in the lockup until she apologised to both Gretel and me. He disagreed, preferring to take her straight home, not wanting the bother of staying at the station to watch over her. I knew I was being selfish by demanding she be put in the lockup, but she had surely spoiled my evening, and I was fuming about it. I wanted her to be punished and if that ruined the Sarge’s evening as well, then I was beyond caring.
He glared at me the entire time he nudged Foxy towards the patrol car. I followed close behind, glaring right back.
“Take the cuffs off, Sergeant Maguire,” Foxy sobbed, her aggressiveness entirely evaporated. “They’re cutting into my wrists. Tessie put them on too tight.”
“When you’re in the lockup, Foxy,” he said in his cold cop voice.
“Please don’t put me in the lockup, Sergeant Maguire,” she snorted, her mascara running down her face, creasing into her foundation and making her look every day of her forty-odd years.
“Just apologise and I’ll take you home,” he promised in a weary tone.
“I’ll apologise to Tessie but not to that other bitch,” she refused obstinately, staring fiercely at Gretel who, along with half the pub, had followed the action outside. “She stole my man.”
“He’s not your man,” Gretel contributed with much scorn, not helping the situation.
The man at the centre of the stoush, sort of good-looking but slightly overweight and desperately hiding his thinning locks, strutted forward. He smirked back at his mates with not a small measure of conceit. I didn�
�t miss the discreet thumbs-up he gave them as well.
“Ladies, ladies. No need to fight over me. There’s plenty of old Davey to go round, believe me. I’m in town for a few more nights,” he soothed, rubbing Foxy’s back and sliding his arm around Gretel’s shoulders.
“I bet your wife would love to know what you’re up to on this trip, Davey,” I scorned.
His mouth gaped open and closed in surprise. “Hey now, no need to be so hostile.” He released the other two women to slip his arm around my waist. He leaned in close to whisper in my ear, “I’ll dump the other two for you anytime, beautiful. You’re an absolute knockout.”
I stiffened at his touch, my hand reaching automatically for my knife. “Back away from me, buddy. Right now.”
“You better listen to her if you know what’s good for you, mate,” warned the Sarge. Abe, standing at the door with his arms crossed, nodded in solemn agreement.
The man released me and turned on the Sarge, his upper lip lifted in a sneer. “And just who the hell do you think you are to be telling me what to do, mate?”
“The patrol car hasn’t given you any clues, genius?” I asked sarcastically.
The man ignored me. He continued to address a slightly amused Sarge, who stood legs apart, one hand on his hip, the other holding on to Foxy’s upper arm.
“Old Davey here knows what women want all right, don’t you worry about that. I’ve probably had more women than you’ve had hot dinners. And this one here,” he waved his thumb over his shoulder in my general direction, “isn’t just asking for it in that teeny little dress, she’s begging for it.”
“You’ll be the one begging in a minute, arsehole,” I threatened, my palm caressing the feel of my sheath through the thin material of my dress.
“Tess!” snapped the Sarge. “Put your knife away now.”
I held up both hands to show my innocence. “Sarge, I wouldn’t dream of wasting it on this creep, I promise.”