“Since I decided to grow up and start acting like a man instead of a boy.”
When I laughed, it seemed to echo in the cab. “How very evolved of you.”
As I opened my door and slid out, Boone cleared his throat. “I shouldn’t be long, but don’t worry about waiting up for me.” He cleared his throat again. “You know, if you were thinking about doing that . . . which I’m sure you probably weren’t . . . and yeah, shutting up now.” Rubbing the back of his head, he clamped his mouth closed in a dramatic fashion.
Right after I closed the door and was about to head up the porch steps, I stopped. I couldn’t take another step. Not until I did something. Turning around, I stuck my head through the open passenger window. “Hey, Boone?”
He was already watching me. “Yeah?”
“I’m someone who gives a shit about you.” I bit my lip, dropping my gaze. “You know, just in case you needed a verbal confirmation.”
If another phallic-shaped sucker or candy or Jell-O shooter got thrown my way, I was going to self-detonate. And I was taking out the rest of the sucker-licking bitches with me.
Avalee stumbled in my direction, throwing herself onto the pink leather couch beside me. She was the first person who’d been brave enough to take a seat next to the girl who’d been called so many variations of party pooper and prude, I wondered if these girls really had spent as much time in college hitting the books as they had banging the quarterback.
“Can you at least pretend you’re having a good time?” Avalee giggled, curling up to me by throwing an arm and leg around me. She was a fun drunk. A touchy-feely one, but a fun one nonetheless.
I circled my finger around my face, trying not to wince when the next song blared through the club. Apparently the DJ was under the impression the Top 40 list was the be-all end-all of music. “This is me pretending. See? Pretending to have fun face.” I circled my face again and cocked an eyebrow at my grinning-like-a-fool little sister.
“Come on, this is a bachelorette party. If you can’t lighten up at one of these, you’re truly doomed to a sad and miserable existence.” Avalee waved at the party table, which had so many penis-shaped balloons attached to it, it was a miracle the table wasn’t floating. Situated front and center was the—who would have guessed?—giant penis cake.
Our mom wasn’t here tonight, and thank god because she would have keeled over from a heart attack if she set sight on a tenth of the gifts Charlotte had opened tonight—or a hundredth of the provocative photos that had been snapped of her demonstrating her oral skills pertaining to a certain piece of male anatomy.
“Sad and miserable existence”—I held out my arms—“take me, I am yours.”
Avalee giggled again, tickling my sides.
“Would you stop pawing all over me? You’ve got a fiancé for that.” I shoved her hands away even though I was fighting a laugh. My sides had always been ticklish, and I’d be damned if I gave any indication I’d enjoyed any part of this hellish night.
“You want to help me cut the cake?” she asked, trying to sit up. She collapsed right back beside me on the couch.
It was a good thing the maid of honor—aka Avalee—had had the foresight to rent one of those chauffeured party buses—which I’d refused to ride in because gross—because the only person who wasn’t ten sheets to the wind was me. After the comments I’d had fired my way all night, I wasn’t feeling exactly eager to make sure these girls made it home in one piece.
“Do I want to hack into a penis-shaped red velvet cake with beige frosting, complete with pieces of black licorice rope as an especially graphic accent to a certain round area on said cake . . .?” I tapped my chin. “Let me think. Why yes, yes, I do.”
Avalee gave a little squeal, clapping as she attempted to sit up again. I had to help her or it would have been a long night.
“See? You’re not doomed to a totally sad and miserable existence. There’s still a streak of reckless abandon buried inside there somewhere.”
I grabbed Avalee’s elbow to steer her toward the cake table. She was directionally-impaired at the present moment. “I just don’t trust you wouldn’t cut your fingers off if I didn’t help.”
She blew out a huff of protest, waving at me like I was crazy.
“Why don’t you wrangle up the wannabe pole dancers before they hurt themselves and tell them penis cake’s being served? That ought to bring them running.” I pointed the cake knife at Charlotte and the other girls, who were obviously trying to set bachelorette party records for debauchery and general hedonism. From my estimates, they were well on their way to making history.
Avalee answered with a couple of thumbs-up before heading in more of a zig-zag type direction for them, slipping past the sheer pink curtains lining our personal party cabana. I didn’t see the point of paying the extra few grand to rent out a “private” space when the curtains were so sheer anyone in the club could have seen who was inside and what was going on. Maybe that was the point though. To be seen, but to keep up the pretense that a person didn’t want to be seen.
Either way, it was a waste of money, especially since I’d been the only one who’d spent any real time camped out inside the cabana.
As I glanced at the cake, I grimaced. It was the most repulsive thing I’d ever seen. Who had Charlotte found in town who was willing to disgrace themselves to this level of low? I couldn’t imagine my family’s go-to caterer, who made an art of food, agreeing to something like this, but who knew? The Abbott dollar had a solid exchange rate in this part of the country.
“Here they are!” Avalee announced proudly, swaying her hips to the off-beat as she dragged a few of the girls past the curtains.
Now they had glow-in-the-dark penis necklaces. Was there no end to the number of items one could purchase in the shape of a Johnson?
“Yay,” I said flatly, waving a pretend pom-pom. “Who wants penis cake?”
Every hand flew into the air, followed by shouts requesting which part of the anatomy they wanted their piece sliced from. Since I was the only one sober enough to be holding a knife, they were getting what I gave them—the shaft.
Go figure a group of women who behaved like dessert was to them what garlic was to Dracula, were acting famished for a slice of good old-fashioned cock cake. Just couldn’t wait to get it in their mouths, I guess.
“Have you heard from Boone yet?” Charlotte said as she stumbled up to the table. Her eyes were glazed over and her lipstick was smeared. I didn’t want to know why.
“No,” I said, chopping into the ridiculously long shaft of the cake. “Why?”
She winked at one of the girls beside her. If it was meant to be subtle, she missed the mark. “Just wondering.”
“Since your fiancé pretty much forced-slash-kidnapped him into going to his bachelor party, I at least hope he’s enjoying a nice big slice of clitoris.” I took another hack at the shaft before freeing a piece so large, it could have fed an entire agency of runway models for a month. I dropped it onto a plate and held it out for Charlotte. “Enjoy the shaft.”
“I don’t know about the cake, but I’m sure he’s about to enjoy something . . . though enjoy might not be the right word for it.” Another wink was exchanged, this one less subtle than the first.
I rolled my eyes, then covered my mouth and gave them a show. “Oh no. Not a stripper. Please say the guys didn’t hire a stripper for their bachelor party.” My eyes went wide. “But Boone’s innocent eyes! Why, he’s never seen a naked woman before. I can’t stand for it. I won’t allow it. I must go save him.”
Charlotte and her friends were all tipping their heads at me, half of them looking like they believed my act.
Flattening my face, my eyes went back to normal, along with my voice. “Yeah, not worried. Or jealous if that’s the emotion you were trying to conjure out of me.” I hacked off another chunk of cake, the same size as the piece I’d just flung at Charlotte. Maybe if I fed them enough cake, we could all look like a bunch of sau
sages in our gowns on the wedding day. “I don’t care who shakes their fake boobies in his face or how much glitter is left on his crotch from her thong. I think our relationship can survive the lap dance waters.”
Charlotte stabbed her fork into her chunk of cake, twirling it around until she’d successfully pierced her slice of shaft. “Well, you might not mind whose fake titties are in his face tonight, but he might mind.”
The girls around Charlotte giggled, which sounded more like a chorus of cackles with the way it mixed with the next Top 40 song blasting through the club.
“Especially when it’s his sister’s fake titties doing the shaking.”
I froze, the knife mid-slice. The club was hot from all of the bodies, but an icy chill ran through my veins. “His sister?”
Other than mine, Avalee’s face was the only one locked in shock. The rest of the girls had expressions more resembling the smug one plastered on Charlotte’s face. They’d known. All of them. That was the whole reason Ford hadn’t taken Boone’s first fifty nos tonight. The only reason he’d wanted Boone to tag along so badly was because . . .
My stomach turned in on itself.
“Wren,” I said, not realizing I’d lifted the knife until Avalee came up and nudged me. I didn’t lower it. “She’s the stripper?”
“And if she’s prompt”—Charlotte checked the screen of her phone—“the glue on her pasties is probably drying as we speak.”
A dollop of frosting plopped onto the floor from the knife. I found myself wishing it was Charlotte’s blood instead.
“Why?” I asked, my voice quivering.
Charlotte shrugged, still laughing. “Why not?” She checked her phone again, probably waiting for the photo evidence Ford would no doubt send her. “Can you imagine the look on Boone’s face?” She shook her head, scrolling through something on her phone. “Actually, you won’t have to, because I’ll have the photos soon.”
Charlotte and the other girls kept laughing, shaking their heads at me like I was missing out on the humor of a great joke. I wanted to go all chop suey on every last one of them, so instead, I took my violence out on the cake.
After hacking off another serious piece of cake, I had to balance it on two plates to make it fit. Throwing the knife aside, I picked up the plates about to collapse from the weight of the cake and shoved them into Charlotte’s hands. I might have shoved the cake a bit harder than necessary, but getting frosting all over the top of her dress had been part of my plan.
“God, Clara Belle.” Charlotte gaped at the plates of cake in her hands and frosting splattered across her dress. “Do us a favor and start doubling up on your meds.”
“What can I say, Charlotte?” I grabbed my purse from beneath the table and flashed my arms at the chunk of cake she was still gaping at. “You’ve got balls. A serious set of big, hairy, ugly ones.”
I didn’t hang around to derive any satisfaction from the rage that no doubt crossed her face, because I knew I didn’t have a second to spare. From the sounds of it, I’d probably be too late anyway, but I had to try. I had to at least try to save him from what was coming.
I flew out of the club, freeing my phone from my purse and dialing Boone’s number the moment I broke through the outside doors. It went straight to voice mail. I tried again. Same thing.
After shrieking with frustration, I exchanged my phone for my keys buried in my purse and hustled into the parking lot. The party bus was parked front and center, just waiting to pick up the party where it had left off inside, but when I’d witnessed that thing rolling up my parents’ driveway, I’d uttered something to the effect of Hell no and told the girls I’d catch up with them at the club.
Unless someone did a comprehensive sanitation of the inside of that bus after every party, I wasn’t stepping inside without a biohazard suit, and something told me The Party Bus wasn’t exactly known for its cleanliness.
My dad had let me take his old Chrysler to the club—because he hadn’t known. I would have asked, but he was out twilight golfing and my mom was nowhere to be found. Besides, I wasn’t planning on drinking tonight and having my own mode of transportation meant I could escape whenever I wanted.
Whatever level of reprimand I’d receive, it would be well worth it.
Once I was inside the Chrysler, I fired up the engine and peeled out of the parking lot. I hit ignore when Avalee’s call came in on my phone, and I tried Boone again before firing off a quick text. His phone was off or disconnected. Either way, getting ahold of him was clearly out when it came to warning Boone.
That might have been why I felt okay breaking a few speed laws as I gunned down the highway toward Ford’s family’s lake cabin. The guys were supposedly going to be spending the night drinking and having a bonfire and night fishing and basically acting like Neanderthals. Of course I’d expected a stripper would be involved somehow, but I’d never arrived at the possibility that she would be one of the party guests’ sisters.
My fingers curled around the steering wheel so hard I felt as if I could rip it straight off. From childhood into adolescence, Ford had always derived a great deal of pleasure from tormenting Boone, but despite what I’d seen over the past few days, I would have assumed his venom would have wilted in adulthood. It had never made sense for Ford to pay Boone so much attention anyway, with the way Ford seemed oblivious to those he deemed “beneath him,” but Boone, for whatever reason, had been the exception.
And here we were, years later and so-called adults, and I was refereeing the same kind of shit I had as a kid. If Boone didn’t strangle Ford for this stunt, I was planning on it. Actually, I was looking forward to it.
By going twenty over, I got to Ford’s cabin in just under twenty minutes. A record, and not to mention a miracle I’d made it without getting pulled over and ticketed.
The cabin sat on the edge of Clear Lake was more an estate than what a person envisioned when they thought of a lake cabin. Three stories, two thousand square feet per floor, and complete with a tennis court out back, this was not how one “roughed it” at the lake for a weekend.
A few cars were staggered in the driveway, all of them in the six-figure category save for one: a beat-up Honda I’d walked by countless times when visiting the Cavanaughs’ place.
I hadn’t known Wren had grown up to be a stripper until recently, but I guess it wasn’t a great surprise. Boone’s little sister had been tough and bullheaded like him, but she hadn’t had the hope and optimism Boone had always carried to some degree. She’d been a troubled child who grew into an unruly youth. With what Boone suggested had happened to her at the hands of Dolly’s boyfriends, her behavior made more sense now.
I’d been too young and perhaps too close to the situation to see it then, but the blinders of youth and love were off.
I skidded to a stop right behind the bumper of Ford’s Jaguar. The urge to ram into it became so overwhelming, I forced myself to take a few deep breaths before I turned off the Chrysler and slid out of the car. If I’d had a baseball bat, that would be one thing, but I couldn’t damage my dad’s prized possession in the name of revenge on his future son-in-law. Tempting though it was.
The night was cooler out here, less sticky with heat, and the lake was flat and still. The night was quiet and calm. That all ended the moment I tore toward the front door, running as fast as my short, embarrassingly out-of-shape legs would take me.
As I rounded the front of the house, gunning for the front door, and prepared to drag Boone out of there if I had to, I heard shouts coming from the back of the cabin, where I’d just been. I paused, waiting to hear the voices again. When I did, my heart sank. One of the voices was Boone’s. The other was a woman’s.
I was too late. Too late to save Boone from being the butt of another cheap joke dealt from Ford’s hands. Too late to save him from the humiliation of discovering his sister was the entertainment for the night. Too late to save him from being treated like a second-class citizen all over again by a bunch of g
uys who were a long fall from being first-rate themselves.
Spinning around, I sprinted back in the direction I’d just come, the shouts becoming louder. The Cavanaughs weren’t known for their propensity for peaceful resolutions—they were better known for their tempers doing the talking. Or in this case, the hollering.
I found Boone and Wren around back. Boone had his sister tucked beneath one of his arms with a blanket draped around her, guiding her toward her old Honda. I slowed to a walk and approached them from the side, ignoring the feeling that my heart was about to malfunction. Neither of them noticed me.
“You said you were going to stop,” Boone’s voice bellowed into the still night as he continued steering Wren to her car. The blanket was so tightly drawn around her body, she looked like a nun in a habit. “You promised me no more of this shit when you had to call me after the last one got out of control.”
Wren struggled against Boone, but she was as short as I was and had always been rail-thin. She might as well have been trying to move the Hoover Dam with a team of mules. “I didn’t call you, Boone. You showed up all on your own at that one, dragging me out in the exact same way.”
“And it was a damn good thing I did show up, because what would have happened if I hadn’t?”
They’d made it to Wren’s car. Boone managed to throw open the driver’s side door and still maintain his hold on her.
“I would have made the other two hundred dollars I was planning on making that night, and there would have been a jack-off line out the bathroom after I left.” Wren shoved at Boone’s side, squirming against him. “God, Boone. When are you going to stop acting like I’m a kid?”
“When you stop behaving like one,” he growled.
“This is my job. This is how I make my living. This is me being an adult and leaving the kid part behind. Why can’t you see that?” When Wren shoved him again, she caught him just enough off guard he staggered a bit. “Thanks to your Save the Little Sister routine again, you cost me another thousand bucks tonight. That’s one thousand singles I had plans for.”