Stumbling over to the jukebox, she fished in her pocket for a couple of bills and, after smoothing them out on the edge of the machine, slid them into the cash slot. And even though Red Delilah’s was the dive-iest of dive bars, she was pleased to find it sported one of those fancy jukeboxes that connected to the internet so she could pick any song her little ol’ heart desired.
And what did her little ol’ heart desire?
Why, Chaka Khan, of course.
Just stand aside, Bridgett Jones!
She paid the extra fee to have her song jump the others lined up in the music queue, and spun away from the jukebox, swinging her hips and waving her arms in the air as the driving beat blasted from the huge speakers that hung from the every corner of the bar.
“I’m every woman,” she belted at the top of her lungs and motioned for Becky to join her out on the dance floor, er…she glanced down at her feet and the crushed peanut shells beneath them. So maybe this wasn’t a dance floor, but it was a mostly clear space, and that’s all she needed to get her groove on.
Becky vigorously shook her head, and Eve quickly decided she was having none of it. Chaka absolutely demanded dancing.
She ran over and tried dragging Becky off the barstool, which turned out to be far more difficult than she ever dreamed. The woman was small, but she was strong.
“You might as well go dance,” the redheaded bartender told Becky, “because I’m not serving you another drink for at least an hour.”
Becky gave her a scowl which blatantly said, ya big party pooper, and opened her mouth to reply, but Eve interjected, “Come on. Can’t you hear that? Chaka’s on the jukebox!”
“Listen to your friend,” the bartender advised. “She’s wise beyond her years.”
Uh-huh. Except a wise woman would have laid off the shots three pours ago.
“But I don’t want to dance,” Becky grumbled petulantly as she grabbed on to the edge of the bar, stubbornly anchoring herself there as Eve tried to pry her fingers away.
“We have to dance,” Eve insisted. “That’s why God gave us parts that jiggle.”
“What’s gotten into you?” Becky demanded, one eyelid drooping lower than the other.
“Whiskey.”
“Oh yeah.” Chuckling drunkenly, Becky hopped from the stool, and together the two of them stumbled out to the “dance floor.” For the next few minutes they danced, sang and laughed at the catcalls they received from the peanut gallery like they hadn’t a care in the world. Becky had to shoo away some guy named Buzzard when he came to grind up against Eve, his big beer belly pushing into her back until he almost knocked her over in his fervor.
Just when the song was about to end and she was digging in her pocket for more money to reload the tune, Becky suddenly raised her hands to her eyes, her shoulders trembling.
Thar she blows!
Okay, so they were finally going to get down to the business of what had brought them here, to this seedy bar in a bad part of town in the middle of a Tuesday afternoon.
When Becky called earlier, voice strangely tight, begging Eve to meet her here, she’d dropped everything. Because Becky didn’t ask for help unless the situation was dire, and although Becky’d been all smiles and laughing demands for shots up until this point, Eve knew it was only a matter of time before whatever was tearing her friend apart on the inside broke through to the surface.
It appeared the breakthrough was in full effect.
Finally.
Whew. One more shot and she was sure she’d find herself flat out on the peanut shell-strewn floor. And talk about one place in the world a girl would not want to end up. Especially if she didn’t fancy catching a terminal case of ptomaine or hepatitis.
“Shh.” She wrapped a comforting arm around Becky’s trembling back and started herding her toward the rear of the bar and the booth pressed far into a shadowy corner.
“I…I promised myself I,” hiccup, “wasn’t g-going to do this h-here,” Becky sobbed.
“It’s okay,” Eve assured her and tried to keep them both upright as they unsteadily wove their way around tables and chairs and the occasional five-gallon paint bucket filled with salted peanuts. “We’re almost home free.”
Just as she said it, they reached their destination, and she pushed Becky onto the red vinyl seat of the corner booth before throwing her purse on the table. Sliding in opposite, she was happy to be sitting because the blasted room suddenly decided it was a grand idea to do a slow tilt.
She should not have taken that last shot—or the previous four. She had to grab on to the table to keep from sliding under it.
“I can’t be-believe I’m crying in the middle of Red Delilah’s,” Becky sniffed as she looked around for something on which to wipe her nose. Finding nothing, she used the back of her hand, and Eve figured a good friend would make her way up to the bar and ask for a napkin, but right now she was doing her level best just to remain sitting upright.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said, frowning when the second word came out sounding more like dushn’t. “Nobody’s paying us any attention except for maybe that guy.” She hooked her thumb at the man sitting in the booth opposite them. He was wearing a baseball cap that obscured his eyes and most of his face.
Becky swung her bleary gaze over, and something changed in her face, her eyes sharpened. “Hey, you—”
Just as she said it, the guy got up, grabbed his beer and ambled off in the direction of the men’s room.
“Hey!” Becky yelled at his broad back, and Eve shushed her.
“What are you doing? Leave that poor man alone.”
“I think I know ’im,” Becky said, shaking her head. “He’s ex-CIA, and he’s been hangin’ around here and…oh, what does it matter?” She moaned before planting her forehead on the table in front of her.
Ex-CIA? Mr. Baseball Cap? He certainly didn’t look like any government agent Eve’d ever seen. Where was the black suit? The dark shades? Of course, she’d recently learned a man’s appearance meant nothing when it came to his job, because Billy was apparently some sort of government agent and he looked more like a poster boy for the WWE so, like the saying went, there’s really no telling a book by its cover.
Billy. Oh, dang. She wasn’t going to think about him, because then they’d both be bawling their eyes out.
She reached across the table to pat Becky’s shoulder. “So, come on, spill. Why’d you invite me here?”
“We did it last night.”
“Huh?”
“It, it, it! Me and Frank.”
“Oohhhh.” Eve was strangely sober all of a sudden, or maybe she was just strangely somber. It was hard to tell…
“Yep. Oohhhh is right.”
Eve couldn’t imagine. The man was so big and…scary-looking and…big. “So, uh, how was it?”
Becky glanced up, her brown eyes bloodshot, her eyeliner smeared until she resembled a drunk raccoon. “Wonderful…awful!” She groaned again and replanted her forehead on the table.
“Well, which was it? Wonderful or awful?”
“The sex was wonderful, beyond wonderful,” she mumbled into the scarred surface of the table. “It was transhen-transcendent really.”
Transcendent sex. Another thing Eve couldn’t imagine. “So, then, explain the awful part.”
“The awful part happened this morning!” Becky wailed. “When I met the woman I thought was just a friend with benefits! But she’s not that. She’s so much more, and I think he must love her because they have a little boy together! Oh, God!” She buried her nose in the crook of her arm to stifle the sound of her hard sobs.
What? “Back up. Back way, way up. He’s in love with another woman?”
Becky nodded into her arm, sniffling loudly.
“Well then, I don’t understand what the heck he
was doing having sex with you.”
“I sedush-seduced him, Eve,” Becky admitted tearfully, raising her head and blinking so quickly Eve knew she was having trouble focusing. “He came to my room to talk to me about some stupid reporter and I…I stripped.”
“What?”
“Yep.” Becky wiped her nose with the back of her hand again. “I just whipped off my sh-shirt and shorts and stood there in my birthday s-suit, all but daring him to walk away.”
“You stripped in front of him?”
“That’s what I just said.”
“I know. I know, it’s just…” Eve shook her head, having a hard time imagining anybody, even Becky, being that audacious. Wow. “Uh, okay. So you stripped in front of him, all but daring him to walk away, and I guess he…I guess he didn’t?”
“Nope.”
Yes, because what man would? Becky was lovely and, despite her chosen career, infinitely feminine. Plus she had that rebellious streak and a couple of tattoos, so she pretty much embodied that quintessential combination of good girl and bad girl that all men found irresistible…
“But he’s in love with someone else? Did you know about her?”
“Sort of.”
“What? What does that mean?”
“It means I knew he was seeing someone. He’s…he’s,” Becky hiccupped again and made a face of frustration at her body’s inability to control itself, “he’s been seeing her for a few years. But I figured it c-couldn’t be that serious. I figured maybe it was just a friends-with-benefits type deal, and hey, if that’s the case, why couldn’t that friend be me, you know? But then, as we were all waiting to see him after he came out of his shoulder surgery, I met her and she’s…she’s…” Becky buried her head in the crook of her arm again, muffling her voice. “She’s really beautiful, Eve. And nice. And funny. And did I mention he must love her because they have a s-son together? But I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t know or I never would’ve…How could I have known? He was supposed to list them with JSOC back when he was still with the Teams, but he didn’t!” When she looked up, her expression was devastated.
“What do you mean he was supposed to list them—”
“Doesn’t matter.” Becky cut her off. “What matters is that he has a son. And the little guy looks just like him, just like him.” In her mind’s eye, Eve saw a little boy with linebacker shoulders and a bevy of scars. “Well, he looks like Frank must’ve looked at about three or four. All rough and tumble with these huge, soulful gray eyes…”
“Geez Louise, Becky.”
“I know! And to make matter w-worse, come to find out Frank thought he was going to die today so…yep, that explains everything.”
“What?” Was it Eve’s imagination or had she been using that word a lot during this conversation?
“According to Michelle, that’s her name by the way, Michelle, just like that Beatles song, ‘Michelle ma Belle,’ and she is, Eve.”
“You aren’t making a lick of sense.”
“Belle. Pretty. She’s so pretty.”
“Becky, that hardly has anything to do with anything at this point.” Eve wasn’t sure if it was her level of drunkenness or Becky’s level of drunkenness, but this was one of the most difficult conversations she’d ever tried to follow. “Why did Frank think he was going to die today?”
“Oh yeah, uh…because he did once before.”
“Did what once before?”
“Die. Are you paying any attention to what I’m saying?”
“I’m trying.” Lord knows she was trying but—
“I guess he’s got some weird allergy or something, and he’s had a bad reaction to anesthesia before and ended up flatlining only to be brought back, so he convinced himself he wasn’t going to live through this surgery, which is why he…why we…oh, sweet Jesus!” Becky covered her face with her hands, choking on a sob.
Cheese and rice, and Eve thought her love life was a disaster…
“I’m going to have to quit, “ Becky said after a few minutes. “I can’t see him every day, know he’s sleeping down the hall from me and—” Her voice broke, but this time she didn’t give in to her grief, didn’t let another teardrop fall.
Leave it to Becky to only allow herself about ten minutes to fall to pieces before she started cementing herself together again. The woman gave new meaning to the phrase, “tough as nails.”
“But, you love that job.”
“I know, but I just…I can’t do it.”
Eve wasn’t sure she wanted the answer to this next question, but she asked it anyway. “Do you love him?”
When Becky met her gaze, Eve figured she had her answer right then and there.
“I love him,” Becky admitted and sighed so heavily she appeared to deflate like a circus tent after the show. “I’ve loved him for over three years, but it doesn’t matter. I know that now. There’s no way it’s ever going to work.”
Eve couldn’t help but agree. She didn’t know Frank Knight very well, but she figured she knew enough of him to know he wasn’t the kind of man to leave his son and the woman he loved behind while he took up with his hot, young boss. Or was he her boss? It was all very confusing. But regardless of who ran what, Eve was still surprised he’d given in to Becky’s seduction. He just didn’t seem the type, especially given everything Becky’d told her about him.
Of course, when faced with death, people did strange things…
“I’m going to the bathroom,” Becky suddenly announced.
“I’ll come with y—”
“No,” Becky waved her off when she started to stand. “I’m fine. I don’t need a witness as I pee, puke, and try to repair what’s left of my make-up. Especially considering I have no idea in what order those activities will occur.”
Eve nodded and watched her best friend sway toward the long gloomy hallway that led to the restrooms and back door.
Poor Becky, she thought, her heart breaking for her friend.
Mr. Baseball Cap turned to eye Becky’s progress from his new position at the bar, and Eve sat up straighter, trying to make out his partially concealed features.
CIA? Really?
Good grief, was no one what they appeared to be nowadays?
She watched him curiously for a few minutes before she made the decision to go over and introduce herself—she’d never met a real, live CIA agent, ex or otherwise. She clumsily stood from the booth, and her movement caught his attention. For a second, something hot and calculating entered his eyes. Whatever it was, it kept her rooted to the spot, a startled hand fluttering up to her throat. Then a brief smile touched his lips, and she wondered if the lights from the bar had been playing tricks on her, making his amiable, handsome face appear hard and deadly.
She took a step in his direction, but before she could manage a second one, something down the hall snagged his gaze. He jumped from the barstool, dropping his beer in the process. In the blink of an eye, he barreled toward the darkened hall and the dingy restrooms.
For a second, she just stood there, staring in stupefied surprise at the shattered beer bottle and the foaming liquid spilling onto the wooden floor, watching as two peanut shells caught in the beer and briefly turned into little brown sailboats, merrily floating their way across the dusty slats. Then her mind caught up with her eyesight and she raced after Mr. Baseball Cap, ignoring the spinning room and the strange lassitude making her legs a pair of anvils dragging behind her.
She skidded around the corner in enough time to see Mr. Baseball Cap smash through the back door. The high pitched squeal of a car peeling out in the alley blasted into the bar, momentarily drowning out the sound of the jukebox.
What in the world?
She pushed open the door to the women’s restroom. “Becky?” she called, an uneasy feeling swirling around in th
e pit of her stomach—it had nothing to do with the whiskey. “Where are you?”
No answer.
She peered into the three stalls. All empty save for a plethora of colorful graffiti. Spinning toward the bathroom door, she pushed it open just as Mr. Baseball Cap came thundering back down the hall.
“Call for help!” he hissed as he ran past her. “Some black guy with a bandaged hand just grabbed your friend and stuffed her in the trunk of his car. It’s a black BMW sedan.”
“Wha—”
Mr. Baseball Cap didn’t stop to explain any more. He just burst through the front door. A mere heartbeat later, she heard the sound of a big engine firing up. The shrieking wail of burning rubber followed in the next breath.
Stumbling down the hall and over to the booth and her purse, she fumbled with her phone and didn’t stop to wonder why the digits she dialed weren’t nine-one-one.
Chapter Seventeen
“You love her, don’t you?”
“What?” Frank turned toward Shell, wondering if his pain meds were causing him to have auditory hallucinations. He wouldn’t be surprised. In fact, he’d never be surprised again given he sustained the biggest whammy of his life when he actually woke up in the recovery room a few hours ago.
He’d made it through surgery. He still had trouble believing it. He’d been so sure he probably wouldn’t that he—
“Becky. That young woman you have working for you. You love her, don’t you?”
He quickly glanced at the door through which Wild Bill and Rock disappeared mere moments earlier to make a coffee run—the rest of the Knights having returned to the compound long ago. Then he peered at little Franklin who was curled up in an armchair, taking his afternoon nap. Carefully adjusting himself on the narrow hospital bed, he ventured, “What makes you think that?”
“Because hers was the first name you uttered when you came out of anesthesia.” When he shot her a startled look, she explained, “The nurse told us.”
Goddamnit, whatever happened to doctor/patient confidentiality? Did that have no bearing on nurses? If not, someone should really inform patients of that very salient little fact. Shit!
In Rides Trouble: Black Knights Inc. Page 22