Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 139147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 139147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
She stretched out her lips in an Eek! face.
Fuck!
I gave it all to her. “I also told him I didn’t belong to him and never would.”
“Yikes,” she whispered.
“He was being a dick,” I defended myself.
“I’m reading from this you didn’t get a chance to liquor him up and tell him about Clarice and the whole thing.”
I sighed.
After I did that, I pointed out the obvious. “No, Luna, I didn’t get the chance to liquor him up and tell him about Clarice and the whole thing.”
“You probably should have done that.”
I turned to the corner of the bar where we were standing at the entry to the bar back, dropped my head to it and started pounding.
She pulled me away from the bar.
When I looked at her, she suggested, “Maybe he just walked away to cool off.”
“And took his bag with him?”
Her face got sad.
I turned to pound my head on the bar again.
Luna pulled me away again. “Give him time to do that. Cool off, I mean. And then call him and work it out.”
I was breathing, but even so, my lungs still weren’t getting enough oxygen, and my stomach was knotted up so tight, I thought I might hurl.
“He took his bag with him,” I whispered.
She got close. “This is the thing, Raye. It started hot and heavy and you guys spent a ton of time together. But you haven’t known him very long. This is your first fight. It’s gonna take time for you two to feel each other out and get the lay of the land. He likes you a whole lot, honey. He might call you, but even if he doesn’t, you need to give it a little time and call him. Talk, listen, keep your cool, have a mind to the kind of man he is, while standing your ground about the kind of woman you are, and work this out. I believe in you guys. This is just a blip. Okay?”
I wanted to believe that, so I said, “Okay.”
“Right, you good?” she asked.
I nodded.
Or at least I was good for now.
She changed the subject.
“So, the other thing I had to tell you was that Clarice, or someone, emailed back. I have an address for Betsy. I say we go tonight, sometime after five, so she’ll be home from work.”
I needed something else to think about, so I nodded.
“You done with your most recent drama?” Byron asked from across the bar.
Luna whirled. “Dirty chai, coming right up!”
I looked to Tito’s table.
He wasn’t there.
But the succulent I brought him yesterday was pride of place, smack in the middle of the table.
I saw movement out the window and turned my attention there.
I located Tito outside, spraying Lucia’s herb garden from a hose. It was a Hawaiian shirt and board shorts day, but he’d mixed up the crazy with a flak cap and some puka shells at his neck. I couldn’t see what was on his feet. But he’d made an attempt to it tone down by donning a pair of tortoiseshell wayfarers.
This attempt failed, of course, but points for trying.
I snuck back to my locker and grabbed the book Tito put on top.
Rock Chick Renegade.
I turned it to the back and read the blurb.
It was Vance and Jules’s story.
Cap’s story.
Right.
I planned my day.
Work first. Visit with Betsy next. Go home and start the book after that. And as soon as I knew he’d be home, maybe around nine, I’d call Cap, and we’d figure it out, that would be last.
Or, at least I hoped we’d figure it out.
But for my mental health and the well-being of my heart I was gonna go with that.
For now.
FOURTEEN
LET’S ROLL
Luna and I used the time between our shift ending and going to see Betsy to sit out in front of Eat Up Drive In, snarfing down an early dinner of sandwiches (Luna, Main Chick, me, braised BBQ short rib) and discussing what Clarice and Cap knowing each other back in the day in Denver might mean.
Unsurprisingly, we came up with no answers, so we decided I should confront her with that.
As such, we called to make another appointment with her.
Her assistant told us, considering it was the end of the business day (which it was, it was two to five, oops!), she’d need time to consult Clarice’s diary, and she’d get back to us on that.
We moved on to debating if we should recruit Harlow and Jessie into our thing, and we decided that we were too new to it, we shouldn’t involve them just yet.
So it was going to be Luna and me hitting The Slide strip club as soon as we could. And that would be after I had dinner with Dad and knew what my plans were for his visit to Phoenix (he was leaving on Sunday), and after I smoothed things out with Cap (or, God, I hoped I did).