Dream Maker

by Kristen Ashley

  Totally, taking that bullet had a number of pluses.

  “Not my finest hour seein’ as he got to her.”

  “If there’s an A for effort, son, gettin’ shot for your girl is it.”

  Mag said nothing.

  “I fell in love with a boy with a mess a’ hair who was lazy with a razor,” she imparted. “Married him. He spent forty-five years drivin’ me up the wall. He’s been dead the last ten and I miss him every day.”

  After delivering what Mag guessed was her official seal, she looked to Lottie.

  “Where’s the girls for the rest of these buggers?” she asked. “I wanna look ’em over.”

  It seemed Lottie and Gert had been talking, with Lottie doing a lot of sharing.

  “They’re working tonight, Gert,” Lottie told her.

  “Well, we best arrange something,” Gert returned. “Says a lot about a man, his buddy gets shot and the next thing, he’s off throwin’ smoke bombs to rescue his friend’s girl. Boys like that, these girls gotta be right.”

  “I did take that into account when I made my matches,” Lottie noted.

  Gert nodded but she did it in a way she wasn’t actually agreeing.

  “I can tell you got a head on your shoulders, gal, but you don’t got enough life under your belt. This means I’ll be in that bookstore drinkin’ one of your stepdad’s coffees. When I’m there, those girls better be in there so I can check ’em out.”

  “We’ll arrange that,” Lottie agreed.

  Evie stood and announced, “I’m getting everyone drinks. And Gert, what’s going on with dinner? As you can see, your living room is filled with strapping men and they need to get fed.”

  Gert looked to Mag. “Are you actually strapping?”

  Mag grinned at her. “I thought I probably shouldn’t meet my girl’s best friend while packing.”

  He thought it was a decent joke, but Gert looked horrified and turned her attention to Evie.

  “Am I your best friend?” she asked.

  “It’s okay if I’m not yours,” Evie said as answer.

  But this only served to make Gert look even more horrified.

  She turned this on Mag. “See to that, son. I can tell with all this company you’re fillin’ her life up in one way, but a girl needs her girls and those girls should be her own age.”

  “There’s no law that says you have to be my age to be my best friend, Gert,” Evie stated.

  “Yes, there is,” Gert returned.

  Mag aimed his smile at his lap.

  “What am I, chopped liver?” Lottie asked.

  Mag looked up.

  But Lottie’s comment meant Gert turned her attention to Lottie. “You’re an excellent start but a girl’s gotta have a bunch of girls. Ones who like shoppin’ and others that like martinis and all that other stuff. I seen it on Sex and the City.” She lifted up her hand and counted them down on her fingers. “You gotta have the raunchy one and the prissy one and the professional one and the, I don’t know what that curly-haired one was, maybe the messed-up one ’cause, Lord, that girl could do some stupid things.”

  “I don’t like shopping or martinis,” Evie pointed out.

  “Well, girls who like to do whatever you like to do then,” Gert retorted.

  “I like going to Olive Garden with you,” Evie shot back.

  “Evan, you know what I mean,” Gert replied.

  “No, I don’t,” Evie said smartly. “I can have whatever best friend I want.” She turned to Lottie. “No offense to you. You’re awesome and I’m so glad you’re my friend. And stuff happens for a reason. It just does. And all this bad stuff brought me closer to you and Ryn and Hattie and Pepper. And we can go get martinis whenever you want. But I’ll probably drink something else.”

  “I don’t like martinis either,” Lottie shared.

  “Well then, good,” Evie muttered.

  “You were gettin’ everyone drinks?” Gert prompted.

  “Right, what have you got?” Evie asked.

  “Beer. Water. Crystal Light. And prune juice.”

  A chorus of five beers, Mag included, sounded and Lottie ordered a water.

  Evie moved in the direction of the kitchen.

  Mag started to get up to help her, but he stopped when Gert called, “Danny?”

  He didn’t correct her on the name. He just gave her his attention.

  When he did, she looked deep into his eyes.

  “You got the best girl in the world there,” she said.

  “I know,” he replied.

  She gave him a long, measuring look.

  And then she said, “I want some Crystal Light.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Definitely a Consideration

  Evie

  Sunday night (or more aptly, Monday morning), I skedaddled offstage, grabbed my robe, shrugged it on, and when I hit the hall, I paused and gave Boone, who was standing at the end of it, a chin lift.

  He returned it, and I rushed into the dressing room feeling bad.

  This was because Boone was my bodyguard that night and I wanted to be fast so he could get home, but I also wanted to talk to Ryn so she’d stop avoiding Boone and go out on a date with him.

  I was going to work on all the girls, but since I’d had my chat with Auggie, and it was clear Pepper was not (yet) ready to go there, and Hattie seemed a tough row to hoe, I’d decided on Ryn.

  I hit the room and saw the girls all there.

  That was, all of them except Ryn.

  “Where’s Ryn?” I asked.

  “Don’t even,” Pepper answered tetchily.

  Hattie looked at me and mouthed “Bad.”

  “Bad?” I mouthed back.

  She gave me big eyes.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  “She and Boone had a thing,” Pepper told me. “So, even before we got the signal, she left the stage, hustled in here, and I can only assume she escaped, seeing as she wasn’t here when I got in here.”

  I moved deeper into the room. “She and Boone had a thing?”

  “Yeah, after a lap dance,” Pepper replied.

  Oh boy.

  I couldn’t even let Mag watch me strip. Just the idea of him seeing me do a lap dance made me think I’d pass out.

  Not that I did lap dances. I’d tried it once, and it wasn’t any good for me or for the creepy dude who bought it.

  Good money.

  But serious euw.

  “I tried to talk to her, but she told me to butt out,” Pepper continued. “And she wasn’t super cool about it either.”

  When I turned my gaze to Hattie, she was giving me a look and she repeated her mouthed “Bad.”

  Oh boy!

  “Speaking of,” Pepper went on, “are you gonna quit now that you have Mag?”

  “We haven’t been seeing each other for even two weeks,” I told her, heading to my makeup station, and more importantly, my towel.

  “You’re living together,” Pepper noted.

  “Out of necessity,” I reminded her, shrugging off my robe so I could begin to towel off the oil.

  “Not sure I’d move on, I bagged me that one,” Pepper muttered.

  “You’d have one of your own, if you’d just agree to go on a date with him,” I pointed out.

  Pepper decided she was finished talking.

  I gave Hattie a look.

  Hattie gave me a shrug.

  I didn’t push it further, partly because I wanted to get out there so Boone could get me home, and thus he could get home. Partly because I was fired up to have a chat with Ryn, not Pepper. This meant I wasn’t prepared to chat with Pepper and chats like this needed preparation. And partly because I was dying to know what went down with Boone and Ryn, and I could only find that out while interrogating him in his car.

  So, I dashed through toweling down, swiping off as much makeup as I could with a few disposable cleansing towels (which I’d ascertained were biodegradable), pulling a brush through my hair, shoving my tips
in my bag and throwing on clothes.

  I said my farewells, met Boone in the hall, he escorted me out to his black Charger, and we were away home.

  I decided not to take the direct approach, but that wasn’t the only reason I started with “Thanks for playing bodyguard tonight.”

  “Not a problem,” he grunted, like it was a problem.

  Though I sensed the problem was not guarding me.

  It was having a thing with Ryn.

  Even so, I looked to him and said, “It’s been days since I’ve been kidnapped. Not to mention, Danny and me went to my apartment yesterday to check it out. It’s still a mess, but I have a window and the mess was the same mess, not a new one. So hopefully I’m out of the woods and you boys will be off Evie duty soon.”

  He just grunted again, but this time it formed no words.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  “Sure,” he lied.

  Hmm.

  Time to take the direct approach.

  “So, um…Pepper said you and Ryn had a thing. Is everything all right with that?”

  He said nothing.

  “Not my business,” I muttered, turning to look out the windshield.

  After a long while, he announced, “We all got it, you know.”

  I looked to him again. “Got what?”

  “Issues,” he stated. “After shit we’ve seen, shit we’ve done.”

  “Right,” I said softly.

  “We share, talk it out.”

  I was glad they did that.

  Boone kept going.

  “Mag’s told us you’ve seen him lose it.”

  Hmm.

  “It is what it is, Boone,” I replied. “I can’t say how right now, but as his friend, I want to assure you, I like him a lot, so I’m determined we’ll find our way.”

  “Me, it’s sex.”

  I blinked at his profile after he shared this in a way he sounded like he didn’t want to, he had to, and I whispered, “Sorry?”

  “Sex. For me. Outside talking to the guys, that’s how I work it out.”

  “Okay,” I said softly. Then quickly, I went on, “You don’t have to—”

  “And control.”

  I pressed my lips together.

  “You get what I’m sayin’ to you, Evie?”

  “I don’t know,” I replied carefully.

  “You don’t need this shit,” he muttered.

  That was when I really looked at him in the dashboard lights.

  And what I saw was that he was messed up.

  “I can take whatever shit you wanna give me, Boone,” I told him quietly.

  “Yeah, that’s you. You lived your whole life taking shit. You don’t need mine.”

  “Well, the shit I took was from people who didn’t care about me. You just gave your Sunday night to keep me safe. You tackled the bad guy for me through smoke grenades billowing. In this kind of thing, it isn’t tit for tat. But just to say, you’ve given yours, but that isn’t the only reason I’m down to give mine.”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “But if you don’t want to share, Boone, I won’t be hurt. Promise.”

  “I had it in me, you know, before shit went down when I was in the service. It went into overdrive after.”

  “It?”

  He glanced at me.

  He looked back to the road.

  Another glance at me.

  Then back to the road and, “I’m a Dom.”

  “A Dom?” I asked.

  “A Dominant. A Dom. In sex.”

  Okay, so we weren’t sharing.

  We were sharing.

  “Boone, I—”

  “She’s a sub.”

  “Ryn?” I asked in surprise.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  That didn’t track.

  Outside Lottie (and Mag), Ryn was one of the most dominant personalities I knew.

  Then again, I didn’t know how these things worked, maybe she was so in charge all the time, she had to find ways to let go.

  “You really don’t have to share this with me if you don’t want to,” I told him quietly.

  “Am I making you uncomfortable?”

  “No, I mean, you just watched me strip for eight hours.”

  “Yeah.” He was back to grunting.

  Hmm.

  I had a feeling the guys weren’t much happier than Mag would be, watching me strip.

  Then again, whenever I caught them out in the crowd, they weren’t looking at me but scanning the area.

  And I was learning, such was the brotherhood, they’d do anything for Mag.

  And possibly, for me.

  “But like I said, I’m happy to listen if you want to talk,” I told him.

  “It’s not that I wanna, it’s that I gotta. Shit festers. I learned, you get it out.”

  “Well, I’m here to lay it on, Boone.”

  Another grunt, this time forming the word “Thanks.”

  Light dawned and I said, “The lap dance.”

  He gave a jerky nod. “I’m into her. Made that clear. She’s putting me off. And that’s okay. Her prerogative. Not how my mind works, though.”

  Oh boy.

  “So you kinda already in your head think Ryn’s yours, and she’s giving lap dances.”

  Another grunt with his “Yeah.”

  This was a problem because, like all of us, Ryn worked at Smithie’s because she had to.

  “It’s not the stripping,” Boone declared, like he could read my thoughts. “I’m down with look, don’t touch. And she’s gotta make a living. I’m not that kind of Dom where I inject myself into shit like that. It’s the lap dances. That’s not in her control, or mine. And that’s not good. It fucks with me.”

  “Well, Boone—”

  “You don’t give lap dances,” he noted.

  “Only the girls who are okay to do that, do that,” I shared.

  “Yeah, so she could not do that.”

  I couldn’t argue that, though I had to admit, even if I sucked at it and it was major euw, in times when I was hurting financially, I’d considered it. It mega upped your tips.

  Which was why Ryn did it.

  She needed the money.

  “I hate to remind you of this, honey, but you two haven’t even been on a date,” I said.

  “I know that logically, Evie. But my mind sometimes doesn’t work logically. The shit happening with you, I know Lottie wants her for me, and she wanted you for Mag and you two are workin’ out great. But more, I’m into her and I know Ryn is attracted to me. And her not wearin’ barely anything, straddling some stranger’s lap, it’s messing with my head.”

  Another glance my way while I processed a happy quiver at his saying “you two are workin’ out great,” before he turned back to the road and kept speaking.

  “The thing is, I’m not that kind of Dom where play gets into life. But I’m that kinda guy.”

  “Protective,” I whispered.

  “Yeah,” he whispered back.

  “Do you want me to talk to her?” I offered.

  “I’m not sure that would help.” I watched him smile a smile that I wished Ryn could see because I was going home to all that was Mag, and still, it made me shiver. “She’s definitely a brat.”

  “A brat?”

  He glanced at me again before he said to the windshield, “You don’t know the life, do you?”

  “No.”

  “Then, if you’re interested, I’ll let Ryn tell you.”

  “Okeydoke,” I mumbled.

  “I’m gonna let other guys take your duty at Smithie’s, babe,” he shared. “Unless Ryn’s not on. Better for her and for me.”

  “Okay, Boone.”

  We fell into silence and I didn’t know what Boone was thinking, but what I was thinking was that I’d never really had good girlfriends.

  I still knew the drill.

  If it wasn’t yours to share, you didn’t share it.

  Especially with a guy.

  Most es
pecially with a guy your girlfriend was attracted to.

  But arguably, Boone was more my friend than Ryn was. It was true; I hadn’t known him longer.

  That said, he’d tackled a guy through a billowing smoke bomb for me.

  Quandary.

  Boone seemed to know I was turning this over in my head because he said, “I don’t really find it hard to find a partner, Evie. Do I want more? Yeah. But by process of elimination, that’s bound to happen. If Ryn doesn’t want to go there, I need to get into that headspace and find someone who does. And I will.”

  Oh no.

  He was going to give up on Ryn.

  “She needs the money,” I blurted.

  “Sorry?” he asked.

  “The lap dances. None of the girls really want to do them. But Smithie makes his money on the door and at the bar. He doesn’t take a cut of tips. A lap dance lasts maybe ten, fifteen minutes and it’s fifty bucks, plus a lot of guys tip on top of that. So, she does it for the money.”

  The vibe in the car was no longer heavy with his mood.

  It was stifling with his mood.

  “Is she in trouble?”

  Sadly, I had to say, “I don’t really know. I could find out, but I don’t think it’s girlfriend code for me to pump her for information to give to you.”

  “You don’t have to pump her for information. I’ll find out.”

  Hmm!

  We drove the rest of the way home, the silence broken occasionally with idle chitchat.

  Boone escorted me up to Mag’s place and let me in.

  Mag was on the couch, watching TV, waiting up for me, even though it was after three in the morning. This, what he’d been doing the first time I came home from Smithie’s, as well as Friday, the first night I was back to dancing.

  I so totally was falling for this guy.

  After cursory greetings, Boone gave me a hug and said to Mag, “I’m out.”

  “Thanks, brother,” he called.

  I heard Boone lock the door behind him as I dropped my bag on the island and wandered to Mag.

  He didn’t have his sling on, and I made it clear with my eyes how I felt about that.

  Mag just grinned at me and reached when I got close enough for him to do it.

  I was on my back on the couch, with him on top of me, his bad arm resting with his hand flat against my chest, and I noted from close up his lashes were just as amazing lit only by a television set.