He was still grinning.
“I see I gotta loosen you up,” he told me, his eyes dancing but they were warm and intense.
Oh no.
I knew that look.
“Hector –” I started but he didn’t listen. Instead, he kissed me.
In about a nanosecond, he loosened me up all right. So much, we were full on necking when the elevator doors opened.
“Yowza, get a room!” I heard Ally call.
I pulled free of Hector’s arms, looked into Luke and Ava’s cool LoDo loft and felt my face go flush as my eyes bugged out.
Everyone was there including two guys I’d never seen before. There were margarita glasses scattered amongst bowls of chips and guacamole with the bizarre addition of loads of tubes, tubs, brushes, combs, sprays, bottles, jars, mirrors and hair dryers.
The Rock Chicks were all in various stages of… I didn’t know what. Their makeup was way over the top, their hair teased out to maximum volume and they were all dressed like, well, there was no nice way to put it… skanks.
“We’ve decided to go groupie!” Ava announced happily.
“Not groupie, Eighties Rock Video Bimbo,” Indy corrected her (like there was a difference).
Eighties Rock Video Bimbo?
Were they nuts?
Regardless of this alarming announcement which would make anyone in their right mind turn and flee, Hector moved me into the loft and Luke got close to us.
“You got a choice, babe,” Luke said and my eyes turned to him when I realized he was talking to me. “You can stay here and get skanked or you can go out tonight with Hector and me. We’ll probably get shot at but I’m thinkin’ it’s the better choice.”
My mouth dropped open and my heart started beating harder before I realized he was teasing me.
Still, teasing or not, I turned to Hector and said, “I don’t want you to get shot at.”
Hector was grinning. “I’m not gonna get shot at.”
I was not deterred. “You get in a situation where you even think you’re going to get shot at, you exit said situation, pronto,” I demanded.
“Oowee, listen to Little Miss Bossy,” Shirleen called.
I cut my eyes to Shirleen and she laughed at the ice rays I sent darting in her direction.
Yes, laughed!
Whatever.
I had bigger fish to fry.
I looked back at Hector. “Promise me.”
“Sadie –”
“Promise!” I snapped.
“Shit, you’re cute,” Hector said rather than promising.
I narrowed my eyes. “I’m not cute and I’m not being funny. Now, promise.”
He curled me to his front and his mouth touched mine.
When he lifted his mouth from mine he murmured, “Promise.”
“Well,” I breathed, “thank you.”
He smiled.
I stared.
“I remember those happy days when it was all soft kisses and promises,” Ava said and I turned out of Hector’s arms and caught Luke giving Ava a brows raised look that made his own, unique promise and his look was nearly as hot as the ones Hector gave me. My eyes moved to Ava and I saw her face had gone soft but her teeth were biting her lip and I knew she knew she was in trouble but the good kind.
“All right, enough of this, Hot Boys, out. Rock Chicks, T-minus thirty minutes to Stella and The Gypsies, we got work to do,” one of the guys I didn’t know said and I recognized his voice. It was Tod and, out of Burgundy Rose drag, he was tall, slim and had a crew cut.
“Hi, Tod,” I called, pulled away from Hector and walked a few steps into the loft.
“Hi, girlie.” Tod smiled. “This is my other half, Stevie.” He gestured to the handsome Hispanic man who was mixing a pitcher of margaritas and smiling at me. “Stevie, this is Sadie.”
“Hey, Sadie. Welcome to the madhouse,” Stevie said and I couldn’t help it, he was so right, I smiled at him and gave him a wave.
“Babe, we’re goin’,” Luke told Ava and without hesitation she moved to him and I watched as he took her in his arms and put his lips to hers but he didn’t kiss her. I couldn’t hear but he whispered something to her, his mouth moving against hers and whatever he said made her smile and melt into him.
I felt jealousy, pure and acid, burning through me before Hector cut off my line of sight.
“You come to me when you’re done,” Hector ordered as his hand went to the side my neck, and up, fingers sliding into my hair.
I looked up at him, the jealousy still burning but my stomach pitched all the same.
“Okay.”
“I don’t know how long this thing will take Luke and me but I probably won’t make it tonight. Lee, Eddie and Hank are designated drivers. They’re goin’ to the gig. Tex and Duke both said they were goin’ too. If Mace isn’t workin’, he’s always at Stella’s gigs and tonight is one of those nights. You stay close to one of them, close enough to touch ‘em. All night. Got me?”
I nodded.
His face dipped to mine and he murmured, voice so soft, I barely heard him, “Now, kiss me good-bye.”
I blinked, the jealous acid drifted away and the stomach pitch turned to a belly melt.
“What?” I whispered.
“Kiss me,” he repeated.
Regardless of my melted belly, the Ice Princess had finished her cocktail and decided to take over. “I think we’ve already made enough of a spectacle of ourselves.”
His eyes went warm and intense. “All right, mamita, I’ll kiss you.”
Then he did, hot and hungry and just as quickly as it started, his mouth broke from mine and he was gone.
I stared, my body swaying without his close as the elevator doors closed on him and Luke. Hector stared at me too, his face soft and knowing then the doors shut him from sight.
“All righty then,” Ava called. “Sadie, get over here, we’ve got work to do.”
Slowly, I turned and everyone was smiling at me.
Oh my.
* * * * *
“I wanna be you!” I shouted, drunk on margaritas mixed with Fat Tires as Stella and her band stood in a Rock Chick huddle during one of her breaks.
Her eyes turned to me. “Funny, until you came in tonight, looking all groupie slut, I wanted to be you. I love the way you dress.” Her eyes did a full body sweep and she gave me a meaningful, but smiley, look.
I knew what she was talking about. Seconds after Hector and Luke left, Daisy informed me that she, Roxie, Tod and Stevie had gone shopping. Since I was shorter and smaller than the rest of the girls, I couldn’t share clothes so they’d bought me my Eighties Rock Video Bimbo outfit. It came complete with a torn up black T-Shirt with “Stella and The Blue Moon Gypsies” across the breasts (so torn, it was falling off one of my shoulders, exposing my thin black bra strap and the two “o’s” in “moon’ were blue moons), a shorter-than-short (or even decent) denim mini-skirt with a ragged hem, a wide, black belt with a heavy, oval buckle with a rose stamped on it (they’d heard about Hector’s tattoo, of course) and a pair of black motorcycle boots.
Yes, motorcycle boots.
Yes, Seth Townsend’s perfect Ice Princess daughter was tramping around Denver in motorcycle boots.
Replete with square toes and silver hoops connecting straps that went up from the soles and around the ankle.
The boots were aces.
My hair was teased out to uber-volume, all waves and ringlets going up, out and down and my makeup was so beyond heavy, I felt it on my face like it weighed a ton.
And I didn’t care.
I didn’t care that I looked like a bimbo groupie from hell.
Because I loved rock ‘n’ roll!
“I love rock ‘n’ roll!” I shouted at Stella.
“Join the club, sister,” Ally shouted to me, laughing.
“Good Lord,” Shirleen muttered and Daisy giggled.
“Will you teach me to play guitar?” I asked Stella, knowing I was pushing it. S
he was a big star, well, in Denver anyway, if the crowd was anything to go by. And she had a recording contract. They were going on the road soon to promote their new album.
“Sure,” Stella replied on a smile.
“I’ll pay,” I promised.
Her smile got bigger. “Friends and family discount,” she said then leaned in and whispered, “which means free.”
“Cut your teeth on Guitar Hero, it’s the only way to go,” Annette, who I’d met when the Rock Chicks came to my gallery weeks ago and who also ran a head shop across the street from Fortnum’s, advised.
“Guitar Hero!” Buzz, Stella’s bass guitarist snapped, sounding (and looking) affronted. “Fuck Guitar Hero!”
“Guitar Hero’s the shit,” Annette shot back.
“Guitar Hero’s for pussies,” Buzz returned then looked at me with a smile. “I’ll teach you guitar,” he offered.
“I’ll teach you drums. Drums are where it’s at.” Pong, Stella’s drummer, moved in.
“Fuck the drums, I’ll teach you the sax. You blow a horn, you know cool.” Hugo, Stella’s saxophonist got close.
“Yay!” I shouted and clapped, too excited to turn any of them down.
An arm went around my waist and I found my body moved back several feet from the band. I looked up and saw Eddie had hold of me.
“Maybe you can decide to learn to be a rock star when you aren’t shitfaced,” Eddie suggested, eyes on the band.
“Okay,” I agreed readily even though I’d already decided I was going to be a rock star.
Forget Veronica Mars.
I wanted rock ‘n’ roll!
Eddie’s eyes moved to me, he looked at me a second and I saw him smile, dimple and everything.
“I like your dimple,” I told him.
His eyes flashed then they got all glittery (which was hot!) and, just like his brother, his body started shaking with laughter.
Finally, his eyes moved to Jet.
“You wanna take over here?” he asked her.
Jet looked at Eddie then her gaze moved to Daisy then Ava then to me.
“Let’s go to the restroom,” she announced and didn’t wait for me to reply. She just took my hand and dragged me to the restroom.
When we got into the restroom, no one used the facilities. Just like the girls on Sex and the City, they all turned to the mirrors and started fixing their lip gloss.
I’d always wanted to go to the restroom with my girlfriends and fix my lip gloss.
And here I was, doing it!
Wasn’t that great?
“I love Eddie. He’s my favorite of Hector’s siblings,” I informed Jet magnanimously, turning to a mirror and digging my lip gloss out of my pocket (Indy had taught me how to go purse-less at a rock gig, lip gloss, ID, money and credit card in front pocket, cell phone in back).
“I’ll let him know.” Jet smiled at me.
“You have a beautiful smile,” I told her, “You’re really pretty but when you smile, I swear to God, you’re so beautiful, you make my heart squeeze.”
I saw Jet blink like this surprised her (and how bizarre was that, she had to know she had a beautiful smile, if she didn’t she was blind) but I was too happy to be putting on lip gloss in the restroom with my girlfriends to take too much notice.
“Eddie likes you too,” Ava told me and I saw through the mirror her eyes were on Jet.
“Aces!” I cried, excited that Eddie liked me, heck, excited that anyone would like me.
Daisy giggled her Christmas bells giggle.
Jet got closer to me. “He’s a little worried about you though.”
I finished with my lip gloss and looked at her as I shoved it back in my pocket (this was hard, my skirt was tight).
“Worried?”
“Yeah,” she replied and I realized with some surprise that she was being serious.
“Why on earth is he worried?” I asked, forgetting, for one shining moment, that my life was one devastating trauma after the other.
“He doesn’t know, can’t put his finger on it,” Jet explained. “He talked to me about it and he wanted us to make sure you’re okay.”
Daisy and Ava got closer and I looked at them. They all looked serious now and my happy buzz slipped a notch.
“You know, sugar, I been through what you been through,” Daisy told me.
My confused eyes moved to her.
“You have?”
She got closer. “Was workin’ at Smithie’s, it’s a strip joint. Marcus part-owned it back then. I didn’t know him but I saw him come in every once in awhile. After a show, one of the customers raped me behind Smithie’s. It wasn’t as bad as what you went through but it was bad.”
At this announcement, I felt my face pale as my happy buzz vaporized.
Daisy went on, “Smithie and Marcus found out and they flipped. Smithie doubled up on bouncers and made it policy that all the girls were escorted to their cars after we closed. And Marcus, well… that’s when Marcus and me got together, kind of. It wasn’t like he asked me out but, every day after it happened he sent me bouquets of daisies. Every day. For weeks. Until my house was so filled with pretty flowers that it was hard to keep my mind on ugly thoughts.”
I stared at her, my heart hurting for her then I whispered, “I knew I liked Marcus.”
She smiled at me, reached out, caught my hand and held it tight.
“When he decided the time was right, he came at me. It was tough on me and I made it tough on him but he never gave up, he kept comin’ until I gave in. And I’m glad he did.”
“You have to know,” Ava put in before I could process what Daisy said. “That what it is with these guys is different than what it is with other guys. It’s different than what it is with the kind of guy who would hurt you, either what that man did to you or how other men can tear you down. They come on strong because they are strong not because they’re jerks or anything.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I said, “Okay.”
“Hector’s a good guy,” Jet told me and I looked at her.
It hit my drunken brain what they were saying and I felt my shields go up automatically.
“I know,” I replied.
“You have to let him in.” Daisy squeezed my hand.
Oh no.
Just.
No.
They didn’t get it. They probably couldn’t. They weren’t me.
There were two sides to this coin. The one side was me and the fact that Hector was likely too good for me. The other side was life as I knew it, that I couldn’t trust anyone and that nothing worked out for me, it couldn’t, I was who I was and I deserved whatever Hector had in store for me, using me then leaving me behind.
Maybe a girl who’d had friends, whose mother hadn’t been murdered while protecting her, whose father hadn’t kept her imprisoned in a beautiful mansion her whole life, a girl who hadn’t been brutally raped, could trust, could understand.
But that girl wasn’t me.
I couldn’t tell them any of that.
I wanted to.
But I couldn’t.
Because they wouldn’t get it.
“We’re okay,” Pretend Sadie promised on a smile.
They all stared at me.
“No, really,” I said.
“You’re holdin’ somethin’ back,” Daisy accused.
“No, I’m not,” I lied. I was drunk but not drunk enough to share. I’d done enough sharing. Sharing was only going to get me in deeper and I was deep enough as it was.
Ava looked at Daisy then at me. “You’ll want to run, to keep yourself safe. I know the feeling, we all do. Listen to the voices of experience and move beyond this faster than we did. It’s worth it, I promise.” I nodded but she got closer. “Seriously, Sadie, it’s worth it. I promise,” she repeated and I knew she knew that, the way Luke held her that night. And I was glad she had that, she was sweet.
But that was never going to happen for me.
I wanted it, mor
e than anything in the world, to know Hector was putting his arms around me. But he wasn’t. There was no “me”. He was either putting his arms around “His Sadie”, a creature that didn’t exist, or his latest conquest.
Simple as that.
These were good women, they’d never been taught that lesson.
And I hoped they never learned.
I pulled in my lips and pretended to think about it.
Then I nodded.
“I don’t –” Daisy started, staring at me closely.
“Let her alone,” Jet cut her off.
“But –” Daisy went on.
“Give her time to think,” Jet interrupted again and looked at me. “You need to talk, anytime, day, night, whenever, you call one of us. We’re here, Sadie. Always.”
I pulled my lips in and didn’t have to pretend or force the tears that were shining in my eyes at what she said. I was wishing this could be real, could be my life but I knew it couldn’t.
Unable to speak, I just nodded again.
“We’re done here,” Jet told Ava and Daisy.
“We’re not done,” Daisy pushed.
“We’re done,” Ava announced firmly.
Daisy dropped my hand but only to cross her arms on her chest.
“I’ll be watchin’ you,” she warned.
I decided to set this firmly aside and go back to the enjoying the drunken portion of the night.
“Okay,” I told her like I could care less.
Jet smiled at Ava.
Daisy narrowed her eyes at me.
We heard Stella’s voice and I knew the band was going to start again.
“Rock ‘n’ roll!” I shouted, whirled and used that as my excuse for escape.
I threw open the door, flew out of the restroom, got two steps into the hall and slammed into something solid.
Hands came to my upper arms, I looked up and all my breath left me in a rush.
“Jerry?” I whispered, not believing my eyes or my fucking terrible luck.
I mean, seriously!
Why me?
Out of the frying pan and into the fire!
I looked again but my eyes did not deceive me. It was Jerry, one of the henchmen in my father’s gentleman army. Tall, blond-haired, blue-eyed, good-looking and, normally, mostly silent. He’d disappeared the minute the DEA moved in and I hadn’t seen him since.
“Sadie,” Jerry replied.