Down and Dirty

by Crystal Green

  “Oh. Oh, wow.” She shook her head. “That’s some real Godfather stuff right there. Were you going to offer me hush money to cover up the brewing scandal so your brother’s precious reputation wouldn’t get dinged by a thief like me?”

  He took all of her anger, deserving it. “I was actually going to talk to you about signing a nondisclosure agreement that pertains to your time with him.” Especially the passing out cold and then the flaccid penis part. “You’d be able to keep that money he gave you without a fuss. To be blunt, it wouldn’t be to your benefit to reveal that night with him to the public, Liz, so let’s sit down and talk.”

  How businesslike did he sound, especially after what’d happened with them?

  Nothing could’ve been worse than the look she was giving him. It wasn’t just anger, either, but a slicing disappointment that was so much worse.

  He was feeling that, too—disappointment in himself. But Bennett Hughes was used to coming and going with women, so why should this be any different?

  Her eyes, those violet eyes . . . they were killing him.

  “How did last night fit into your scheme?” Liz asked in a shaky whisper, the anger dissipating into something like hurt. “Do I come off as so pathetically needy that you knew you could wrap me around your finger and get me to do whatever you wanted?”

  He owed her the truth, something to make her feel better, because if there was one thing Bennett Hughes was, it was someone who didn’t like to be despised.

  “Last night,” he said, “didn’t exactly go according to plan.”

  As soon as he said it, something in his mind surged, as if it was trying to break to the front of his thoughts. What was it?

  While Liz’s expression fell, a flash crossed Ben’s memories: the limo, Liz in his arms, kissing him, naked and open and overwhelming. Then another flash—a white room that was out of focus, Liz with a veil on her head . . .

  A veil?

  Now she brought her hidden arm from under the pillow she was holding against her, and he saw what’d been kept from his view the whole time she’d had that arm stretched over her head: a Rolex gleaming on her wrist.

  And a cheap ring with a pair of dice on it that hadn’t been on her finger twelve hours ago.

  “Why do I get the feeling,” Liz asked, “that your night definitely didn’t go according to plan?”

  8

  Questions whipped around Liz like a cluster of screaming birds.

  He didn’t remember the quickie wedding? He’d lied to her about who he was? Plus, he was the freaking brother of a man who’d carelessly cut her out of his life not so long ago . . . ?

  The biggest question of all was this: Bennett Goddamned Hughes? She hadn’t paid much attention to his full name last night during the marriage license business—who could’ve known she was marrying this Hughes, a man with a last name that wasn’t all that uncommon? But now that she had some context, she’d been vaguely aware that Jameson’s brother was a tabloid prince. She’d never paid enough mind to Bennett’s public antics to nail down exactly who he was yesterday, but his notorious lifestyle and his Jameson-lite mannerisms had gradually chipped away at her brain¸ ending here.

  In this.

  Liz didn’t know whether to laugh or cry about all of it. No, wait—she knew exactly what she was going to do, because her throat was already scratchy, wringing itself out until she was afraid everything in her would emerge in a burst of tears.

  But were they angry tears or just . . . ouch?

  The sad part was that one side of her could rationally justify the lengths Ben had gone to for his brother—if she’d had a sibling, she would’ve done anything for them, too. She would’ve done the same for Mom, if the woman had given Liz even a hint that affection would’ve been welcomed. As it was, Liz would go to the mat for her friends.

  But the part that made her angry—no, hurt her—was that Ben had thought nothing of having sex with her to get to the truth about Jameson’s money. And that he was about to make her feel rejected for the millionth time in her life.

  They’d been drunk last night, but he’d been just as high-spirited and willing as she was to do something crazy after they’d had sex. Had he blocked it all out, though? Because he seemed utterly surprised right now, standing with the bedsheet wrapped around his waist, his muscled chest and rippling abs teasing her as he stared at the chintzy ring on her finger.

  She made sure her voice wouldn’t shake again before she spoke. “So what part of your plans went haywire? Can you at least tell me that?”

  “I’d planned to talk with you earlier in the night about everything, even before we . . .” He shook his head, putting a hand to his temple and closing his eyes. When he opened them, Liz could see that he was remembering more now that his brain had been jarred by the shock of her ring.

  Somehow, even through the sob that was threatening her, she kept her dignity. “After we had sex and then more drinks, you got pretty loose. I didn’t realize how loose at the time, but you started saying how much you adored me and didn’t want the night to end. I joked that maybe we should have Te’o find us a drive-through chapel or something, and you . . .”

  Shoot. She couldn’t finish. The rocks in her throat wouldn’t let her. No matter how optimistic she’d been, it turned out that, for him, having sex had been nothing but a routine. For her, it’d been a revelation. God, every time she came so close to finding a little bit of affection from someone, it always blew up in her face. . . .

  Apologies filled his gaze, his voice soft. “I remember now, Liz. I said I’d marry you in a New York minute.”

  She nodded, staring at that cheap ring, rubbing it with her thumb.

  He kept going. “It seemed like such a good idea, a way to say a giant fuck-you to my family. . . .”

  Trying not to flinch, she held the pillow to her chest even harder, wishing she didn’t want to bury her face in it. She couldn’t look at him without agonizing, still wanting, even after everything that’d happened.

  Glutton for punishment, she thought. Wonderful.

  “I really am sorry,” he said, “but a lot of ideas seem great when you’re toasted, and I don’t usually drink that much—especially when it comes to poison like that goddamned peach cocktail on an empty stomach.”

  “I didn’t finish that drink, and I didn’t have all that much after we . . . you know.”

  What she actually meant to say floated off like ghosts of thwarted possibility. After we made love.

  When neither of them acknowledged those words, her stomach sank. It wasn’t the booze that’d given her all those emotions she was still feeling even now, as he staggered through the process of dumping her. But had the booze put all those emotions in his eyes last night? Or had she just read him wrong, like she usually did with guys? She feared she knew the answer, but she didn’t want to accept it.

  Yet last night had to have been real. Besides, there were people out in the world who got married right away in Vegas chapels—some of them even stayed together, like the headlining showgirl she’d known who’d met a rancher and had never looked back.

  It really did happen for some lucky ones, so why not her? Because Liz would’ve staked her life on the fact that she’d found the same miracle herself.

  Ben had stopped talking, and when she glanced up, he looked sorrier than ever, gripping that sheet to his waist.

  Motioning to her ring, he asked, “I suppose we bought that at the chapel, along with a veil for you.”

  She saw the white gauze partway under the bed, where she’d tossed it last night. Her vision was blurry, though, and it wasn’t from a hangover.

  “Yes,” she said. “We thought the dice were funny, but you said you had something up in your room you wanted to give me instead, and it was better than a Cracker Jack ring. Then you gave me the watch.”

  She held up her hand, the silver Rolex looking so dull in the bare light eeking through the curtains. Last night, before she’d fallen asleep in Ben’s arms,
she’d thought how shiny that watch was. He’d told her that it was special.

  Ben seemed like he’d swallowed a bitter pill, and he clenched his jaw. Then he said, “I gave Te’o money at the end of the night, but it wasn’t just his regular tip or enough cash to clean up the champagne spills. . . .”

  “He did a lot for us, even coached us on not acting drunk with any of the officials at the Marriage License Bureau by the chapel.” A sudden laugh that barely hid a sob overcame her, but she recovered. “I was so over the moon that I didn’t pay much attention to how out of it you must’ve been, because you hid it well. And I didn’t really notice your last name. Hughes. Just like Jameson.”

  He looked like he wanted to beat the crap out of himself for not handling her better. Ben’s Big Mistake. It seemed she’d always be that in someone’s book.

  But, dammit, why was there still a tremble of hope in Liz that he’d come around from the shock and realize that they’d connected yesterday and that had to mean something?

  She drew on every speck of confidence she had left and put it all out there before he told her to get the hell out of his room, just like Jameson had done. But she had a feeling about Ben. Was he the type to totally drop a girl or the type to make up for his mistakes with her?

  God, why couldn’t she be angrier with him about all this? Maybe because she’d had the good luck to marry a billionaire?

  That hadn’t mattered to her yesterday, though. . . .

  “When I woke up in the middle of the night,” she said, standing up from the bed, keeping the pillow in front of her, “I realized I had a ring on my finger, and when I looked over at you, sleeping away, I was stunned. I mean, marriage, right?”

  He nodded, beginning to seem relieved that she was on the same page he was.

  “But,” she said, “the way I felt while I watched you . . . I’ve never felt that before. All I’ve been looking for lately is solid ground, Ben, and I found it yesterday. Found it like a ton of bricks falling on me.”

  She couldn’t go on—not without knowing what was racing through his mind. Yet he’d gone blank, like he couldn’t believe she was saying this. Truth was, she couldn’t, either. Was she nuts?

  Maybe for him. Or maybe she was too forgiving in general, and that’s why Anita had told her to protect her heart.

  Too late. Rushing on, Liz said, “You lied to me about who you were—or weren’t, actually. You had sex with me under false pretenses, but—”

  “Liz. You know those are both good reasons for annulling a marriage, right along with intoxication.”

  It felt like the wind had been knocked out of her.

  “Shit,” he said, wiping a hand down his face. “I’m really fumbling this. Let’s start again. I had my questions about you yesterday, and I was trying to get to the bottom of them for Jameson, but I’m pretty sure you’re not the woman he painted you to be.”

  “You’re just pretty sure?”

  “That’s not what I meant.” He planted his hands on his hips. “I’m trying to say that you won me over because you were so . . .”

  “Yes?” she asked, holding her breath.

  He looked at her, and she could sense that he was in turmoil. He knew he’d done bad. But wasn’t that good?

  She went on. “I knew exactly what I wanted last night, and I wasn’t going to stop until I got it. That doesn’t mean I’m some criminal who stole your brother’s money. You won me over as much as I must’ve won you, even temporarily.”

  He kept staring at her, and she wasn’t sure if it was because he thought she was whacked in the head or if, by some glorious chance, he understood that love could come as quickly as it did in songs. Why would people write about it that way if it was impossible?

  As she kept waiting for him to respond, her confidence began to shatter, block by block, imploding, taking her down in pieces.

  “Liz,” he finally said, “you know we can’t stay married.”

  Right. But what had she been expecting? That miracle she’d been looking for all these years?

  He ran his hand through his hair, walking toward his pile of clothes that he’d dropped to the floor before they’d made it to the bed last night. He scooped them up and began walking to the bathroom.

  “Before I go back to Rough and Tumble today, we’ve got some talking to do. Mostly talking from me.”

  “Okay.” Numb. Absolutely, totally, beyond-wasted numb. She couldn’t even ask why he was going to that small ghost town on the edge of Vegas.

  He glanced over his shoulder with one more deeply apologetic expression before he closed the door behind him.

  Liz shut her eyes. She didn’t know how long she stood there by the bed, not moving, the pillow against her, the air clogging her ears.

  Dumped yet again.

  So what was she going to do, wait around for more?

  The tears came in one thrust of sadness so sharp that she covered her mouth. She couldn’t let him see her like this, wouldn’t wait around to be humiliated any more than she had to be.

  Instead, she threw on her clothes and left before her accidental husband reappeared to inflict any more damage.

  ***

  Kat never slept very well.

  That was the cost of doing business, though. Owning the saloon had turned her mind into a calculator that ran numbers over and over after she closed out the bar each night. And, every morning, after she got up with a few hours of shut-eye under her belt, she asked herself why she was putting herself through this when she could sell the R&T and . . .

  Do what? The fact that she even had to ask was exactly why she didn’t sell it. Also, if anyone in her family was still alive, they’d kick her ass for even thinking that way.

  A Jenkins was a Jenkins—and a Jenkins wasn’t a Jenkins without the saloon. It’d been that way ever since the town had started spitting out silver and other metals, only to dry out after eleven years of productivity near the turn of the 1900s.

  This particular morning started off in the same way all the others did for Kat: roll out of bed before sunup, shower, get to the R&T to clean up before Gideon and the occasional other regulars came in for a casual breakfast, then get through the day.

  But this time, there was a kink in Kat’s routine.

  She was sweeping around the fire pit in the courtyard that connected the saloon to the neighboring general store when he showed up.

  The other matter that’d been keeping her awake last night.

  Isaiah Smith appeared at the bars that separated the courtyard from the boardwalk, gripping the iron and leaning forward with a smile so bright, Kat thought he might be a figment of her imagination.

  What most definitely was not a figment was the girly jerk her heart gave at the sight of him under the pastel colors of early morning.

  “Shit,” she said, putting her hand over her chest while holding the broom with the other. “You gave me a start.”

  “Sorry about that.” His eyes were the same belly-jarring pale shade they’d been yesterday. She’d been hoping she’d imagined that, too. “I was taking pictures of the cemetery. The sky just before dawn is eerie enough to make the photos moodier.”

  “Good for you.” Could she get on with her sweeping now?

  He laughed, and she frowned. What was so funny? Was it because she looked dopey, standing here with her chopped-off hair unstyled, unlike a city girl’s? Or was it because she didn’t want the company—especially from someone who liked to bug her this much?

  “It appears,” he said, “that you don’t have anyone here to hand me off to this time if I ask you about town history.”

  He was talking about how she’d left him to Dillinger yesterday. “I’m not the best source for stories. I don’t tell them very well. Ask me to run a bar? Can do. But—”

  “You’re not a natural talker.”

  She glared at him. It was true: when it came to men at least, she wasn’t a gabber like some bartenders were, but he didn’t have to point it out.

&nb
sp; “Sorry again,” Isaiah said, holding up his hands. He was wearing one of those laptop satchels, the strap over his shoulder, along with jeans and an athletic-looking black jacket with a hood. “I wasn’t pointing out anything negative about your talking skills. Talking’s just a big part of my world, and I can’t help but notice how people do it.”

  He wasn’t going away. Might as well oblige him for a bit, once again. “Did you get any more stories yesterday, after you left the saloon?”

  “You noticed I was gone?”

  Kat avoided flirting as much as she could, but Isaiah Smith seemed good at it. Amazing good.

  “I keep track of who goes in and out,” she said.

  “So you do.” He slipped off his laptop strap and set the case on the ground, then hung his arms through the bars while leaning on the ledge. “I turned in early at that hotel-casino nearby, got a good night’s sleep since I knew I’d be up at the crack of light today. But, then again, I’m used to those hours.”

  She’d started sweeping again, but without the usual ferocity.

  He continued. “I used to play ball as an undergrad, and I never lost the discipline.”

  See? He was an athlete. “Football?”

  “That’s what I got a scholarship for, a position in the secondary. Then I went on to try the NFL for a while.”

  She stopped sweeping, giving him a closer look. Yup, he very well might’ve been a strong safety, with the way he could probably maneuver and shift across a field, using that solid body.

  At her inspection, he said, “If you’re about to ask if I was famous—no. I wasn’t good enough.”

  Wow—no ego to him. She had to respect that.

  “I got burned out,” he said, “and decided that since I liked going to school, I would go back. And that’s my life so far.”

  Before he could ask for her own story, she gave him a nod, which was how she usually ended a conversation—that or taking off from it. But now, she realized that Isaiah Smith was rather interesting, far more than the basic tourist who came through Rough & Tumble.

  And when he smiled at her, her pulse spun, a result that definitely was not the norm for Kat. It’d been so long since anything had spun on her or in her. . . .