Broken Open

by Lauren Dane

  “Mere mortals can choose a dress that’s flattering and fits well. Every woman should have clothes that make her feel beautiful and special, even if it’s jeans. It’s so rare when something funky and eclectic works perfectly on someone. You carry it. You’re a bigger than life personality. Your beauty is bold and I think you’d be so wasted in that dress.” Kelly pointed to the pretty black cocktail dress on the hanger. “Which I should point out costs two hundred dollars more than the one you have on. That one you’re in now is on sale. Plus you get a discount.”

  Tuesday smirked at Kelly. “Discount? And why is that?”

  “You’re a contractor of ours. It comes with a fifteen percent discount. Plus it’s been here in the shop for five months and hasn’t moved and I had just decided to mark it down twenty-five percent. It’s forty percent off. It’s perfect for you.”

  Tuesday had just recently finished a piece that was all fire, in varying shades of red, orange and amber. A bracelet that wrapped up the forearm. Daring. A piece meant to be worn with something like the dress she had on.

  “Your butt. Tuesday, look at it. Ezra needs to see that.”

  “You’re supposed to be making me buy the more expensive one, not giving me price breaks until I have no other choice but to say yes and buy this dress.”

  “Is that what I’m doing?”

  “Don’t try that blonde I’m so innocent thing on me, sister. I’ve had a pretty blonde best friend for over a decade. I’m immune to it. But not this dress.”

  “You’re relaunching yourself into the future. This is your gallery opening. You need to look like this. Because I’m thinking the finished product with lipstick and high heels will be a total knockout. The bodice is fitted and even has a place for your boobs to go because that’s not a bra-friendly back and you’re not going to get away with braless with your rack.”

  “Rack? Is that a term you learned at model school?”

  “That one is courtesy of a thing called life. Oh, and my eight-year-old, who asked me why her teacher would have a rack and was she going to display things on it. I told her to ask her dad.”

  Tuesday laughed as Kelly helped her get free from the dress so she didn’t rip it before she’d even left the store.

  “All kidding aside. You need that dress. I know it might be sticker shock, but it’s a piece of art and it makes you look like a piece of art.”

  “I’m buying it already. Sheesh.”

  Kelly beamed and looked even prettier.

  “So...are you guys coming?”

  “The girls and I will stop by with Vaughan, on our way home from all having dinner with Sharon and Michael.” Kelly pasted on an expression that was more panicked than pleased.

  “Wow, that’s some smile. My mom calls that her I’m in church so the Lord says I can’t call you out but you need it. I’ll pray for you face.”

  “Ha! Good one. Sharon and I have never really got along. I know everyone thinks she’s fantastic and maybe she is if she doesn’t hate you but it took me two years in therapy not to hate her.”

  Sharon was protective of her family. Tuesday could only guess how painful it would be for the woman to decide you were a threat.

  “Is Vaughan ever going to tell her the whole story? Why things broke?”

  “That’s between Vaughan and Sharon. The only way I can envision this second chance working is for him to make sure he will always be between us because I’m not going to tolerate any shit from her this time around.”

  “So, you’re back on again? You’re together?”

  Kelly sighed. “It’s complicated. I know you have an opening to deal with on Wednesday night but maybe we could go out Saturday after your stall closes for a drink? I know Jeremy and Ezra are going up to Vancouver for the weekend so I’m not edging into his weekend time.”

  He was? Nice of him to tell her.

  He’d been very sweet to her that weekend. He’d even told her about Jeremy’s call. But not a freaking word about going away.

  They’d both been superbusy, though, and only connected for brief phone calls and texts as she’d readied for her gallery launch and he’d been dealing with the harvest.

  “Sounds perfect. We can grab a late lunch and a beer and you can tell me what the heck is going on.”

  “Only if you do the same.”

  “Sure. If I figure it out before then, I’ll be happy to share.”

  * * *

  EZRA HADN’T EXPECTED to be so damned busy that week, but they’d brought in the alfalfa, which looked to be a damned good crop that season. So pretty much all his life had focused down to was getting up, going out, dealing with alfalfa and alfalfa-related stuff for twelve to fifteen hours, calling Tuesday to hear her voice and crashing only to start over again the following morning.

  He missed Tuesday fiercely. It had been over a week since he’d seen her last. Touched her last.

  He looked at the satin pillowcase on the pillow she slept on—oh who was he kidding—on her pillow.

  They’d had a breakthrough of sorts the night they’d gone to her parents’ house. But there’d been so much between them that night he’d ended up in a panic when they returned and it had been a contest of sorts for him to see how long he could go with not seeing her. As if he could prove to himself that he could kick Tuesday if he had to.

  Goldfish came to stand on his chest and Peanut decided to lie over his face.

  “We’re past passive-aggressive scratching my couch to attempted suffocation?” he asked as he moved her to the side. She gave him a look and kneaded his forearm with a little too much claw.

  “She’ll be back soon. Harvest is over and her grand opening is tomorrow night. I have plans for her after that so don’t get any ideas about hogging her when I bring her back.”

  He sat up, sending animals scampering in all directions. Talking to his cats. He, the guy who’d filled tens of thousands of seats in arenas on a regular basis, was now a crazy cat lady.

  If he got out there now and worked a solid four or five hours he had the time to run into town to pick up his beauty and spend some quality time with her.

  It wasn’t until he was out in the middle of an empty field that it hit him. He used to make deals like that at the beginning with heroin. If he just did these four things he had to do he’d get high as a reward.

  And then it was three things. And two. And, hey I’ll get high first so I’m not thinking about getting high while I’m trying to get stuff done. And then he’d just got high and done nothing.

  Everything in his life had been about getting heroin, doing heroin, thinking about how to get more and being unconscious. Opiate highs had been his favorite so he’d simply considered himself a connoisseur instead of a junkie until it was far too late.

  He’d sort of been feeling that this thing with Tuesday was substituting one addiction with another but now, the corollaries seemed inescapable. She’d be the one craving that would slowly take over his entire life until he’d forgotten everything else.

  The need for her crawled over his skin and he was going to reward it. Need? He didn’t need her, he craved her. Craved.

  Loopy head butted him and he reached down absently to pet her as he reeled. He hadn’t been so needy for something since heroin.

  Violet grunted at him.

  “Yes, yes, let’s keep moving.” He continued on, pretty much on autopilot as he tried to figure out how to think about the issue.

  Two hours later and the muscles in his arms burned as he struggled through pull-up after pull-up. He’d already jumped rope for so long his legs still twitched.

  “What are you doing to yourself, Ezra?”

  He opened his eyes. His mother stood a few feet away, glaring at him.

  “Exercise, Mom.”

  “Try again.”

  He dropped down and hoped he covered that little bit of a wobble before his mother saw it.

  “So you think working out until you can barely stand is exercise? Do you need to work on the
concept of moderation again, boy?”

  He groaned as he headed to the fridge to get some water. He was going to be sore as hell in the morning. But first he had to deal with Sharon Hurley, who was on the scent of something. She didn’t know what it was, but she would stop at nothing until she figured it out or broke him open to get a confession.

  “Mom, I work out pretty much every day. I don’t know what you’re upset about.”

  She leaned back against the wall, crossing her arms over her chest. One of her brows slid up ever so slowly as she dared him to keep it up. How she could even know he was troubled he didn’t know.

  “Well, you told me at six this morning that you were going to head down to grab Tuesday to see if she wanted to come to dinner. And yet, an hour ago when I retrieved your pig, who ate my carnations again I might add, and brought her back here, you were jumping rope and listening to music so loud I didn’t want to bother you. And I come back to check in, to let Tuesday know your dad and I are so excited about her opening tomorrow night and I find you still working out and looking so tense and miserable there’s no way I’m going to believe you when you say there’s nothing wrong.”

  “It’s just something I’m trying to work through. It’ll be fine.”

  “Let me guess—you realized how happy you were and decided you weren’t worthy. You’re going to go off and do something stupid. Don’t you break up with that girl—she’s so, so strong, but you’ll break her into a million pieces if you’re careless and you don’t handle your own fear first.”

  He dug deep for patience.

  “I’m not breaking up with Tuesday.”

  Right? Because that would be stupid. He just needed to keep some space between them as he worked through how he could see her without craving her. Being with a woman was one thing; replacing one addiction with another wasn’t a road he could survive.

  “So you’re going to bring her back here tonight then? Shouldn’t you be on your way to her now?”

  “Jeremy’ll be here tomorrow morning. There’s a band meeting and I have a lot to do. She’d just get bored up here and I can’t really pay her any attention until her opening. She has things to focus on right now. I’ll see her tomorrow night at the gallery.”

  “Ezra...”

  “Mom, back off. I’m not kidding. I need some space. I’m a grown man.”

  “Whatever. You still make the same pouty face you did when you were three.”

  “I’m very charming. It clearly came to me very early on.”

  She tried to stifle a smile but failed. And that made him smile, too.

  “You get your modesty from your father’s side of the family. You can tell him I said so. Work it out. She loves you. It’s written all over her. Which is good because you love her, too.”

  “She’s my girlfriend so yes, I care about her. Too early for love.”

  “Oh, sweetheart.” His mother tipped her head to the side. “You can’t tell yourself when it’s acceptable to love and not love. You simply love or you don’t.”

  She hopped up onto a stool and he groaned inwardly. Sharon was making herself comfortable, which meant a lecture was imminent.

  “Your problem is that you have spent every moment since you got home from sober living proving you’re worthy of a second chance. So much time and energy that you can’t even see we’ve given you that second chance long, long ago and you proved us right to have done so. When are you going to accept that you’re worthy? You’re the only skeptic left. So what is it? Your entire life can’t continue to be one long prison sentence of guilt and shame. This isn’t purgatory and you long since served your sentence.”

  “I’m going to my house. I’m going to eat something, take a shower and I’ll be sleeping by nine. Go see Mary. She was having contractions earlier.”

  Sharon pursed her lips. “Look at you shoving your mother out the door and throwing your sister-in-law under the bus. Someone’s defensive. Those were practice contractions. Our Damien, he’s going to be a daddy. He’s grown so much. Love does that.”

  He should have known his mother would be back to him.

  “I was beginning to wonder if he’d ever settle down. My little charmer. But he has and he’s grown. He’s starting a family with a woman he took a chance on. Was vulnerable to. Maybe if you shared whatever it was with Tuesday? Sometimes once you say the scary stuff out loud it’s not that scary anymore. Are you worried that your racial differences are going to be an issue?”

  He laughed because she wasn’t going to let go, like a bulldog with a Southern accent.

  “No. I mean, it’s there. There’s no denying some people react negatively. Mostly people look twice because she’s beautiful and has all that gorgeous hair.” She always carried herself like a queen. “But that’s outside stuff. Between us, that’s not an issue. With our friends and family it’s not an issue.”

  “I didn’t think so. Is it that she was married before?”

  He kissed her cheek as he passed her to head out and back to the house. “I’ll see you tomorrow night at the gallery.”

  She hopped down and followed him, Loopy trotting along.

  He paused at his back door. “Thanks for not making Violet into Sunday dinner. I’ll plant you some new carnations next week when I’m back from Vancouver.”

  His mother waltzed right in through the door he’d opened for himself. He groaned, just very quietly.

  “Make me some tea, please. I’m coming down with a sore throat. I want to feel better before the baby comes.”

  He put on a kettle for her and pulled out some tea and mugs. It was warm outside but his kitchen was shaded by the big pine trees in the yard so it was nice and cool inside.

  “Do you feel like maybe she’s still pining for her dead husband?”

  “And she’s back.”

  “Well, that’s what he is. Dead. He’s not coming back to claim her.”

  And even if he had been, Ezra wondered if he would have. From where Ezra stood, the man had done her wrong. Tuesday might have given him a second chance but Ezra didn’t have to be forgiving. Ezra didn’t have to have a very high opinion of anyone who’d cheat on Tuesday and he didn’t think much of Eric as a man.

  He’d never say so to Tuesday, of course. Or even out loud to his mother.

  He ached to shoo her off toward Vaughan and Kelly to be free of this interference but Vaughan would kick Ezra’s ass for it and given how delicate things were between his baby brother and his ex-wife, a visit from Sharon might just send the whole thing over a cliff in flames and he didn’t want that at all.

  “You’re okay, right? Not struggling with sobriety?”

  He put his face in his hands. “Mom. I’m fine. Have some tea. I’m going to shower. I’ve been up since four and this is the first time I’ve had a pause of longer than ten minutes all day long.”

  “You go on ahead. I have to make some calls. I’ll finish the tea and make us some sandwiches if you’re not just going to go to Tuesday’s.”

  “Dad would appreciate that more than I would.”

  “Your father doesn’t need it. You do, though.”

  “I’m fine! How many times do I have to tell you that before you leave me the hell alone?”

  Though he’d yelled it loud enough to send the cats running from the room, his mother just looked at him.

  “If you think this is going to drive me away you’re dumber than I thought.”

  He turned and stalked from the room, slamming his bedroom door, which didn’t make him feel any better and probably made his mother laugh.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  “HOLY WOW.” NATALIE walked around Tuesday in a slow circle. “You were not kidding about that dress. You look so hot I’d totally bang you and yet, you also look like a person who runs a fantastically successful art gallery.”

  “Look at you with your compliments.”

  Tuesday gave herself a critical look in the full-length mirror in her room. “I can’t believe the built-in bra
part of the bodice actually works. We all know shelf bras and the like are pipe dreams.” They never worked and the weight of her boobs would slowly begin to pull the front of the tank top or whatever down until her areolae were popping out.

  “Totally presents the cleavage in a gravity-defying and yet superhot way. Jeez. You and I need to go to Kelly’s boutique so I can find stuff that makes me look as smoldering as you.”

  “Don’t worry. I transferred my half of the mortgage to your account three days ago.”

  Natalie laughed.

  Tuesday had got her hair done that morning and her stylist had put in just a small hint of shimmer spray so when Tuesday was in the right light it would show.

  “I want this necklace to fit backward. Can you help hold it while I fasten it?”

  They fit it just perfectly to drape down her spine, a tail of amber at the center of the design keeping it in place. She’d hoped to wear the bracelet instead, but she’d sold it just a few hours after she bought the dress.

  She had plenty of jewelry. Sales were even better.

  The front of the dress was simple with her cleavage as the star. Even with the pretty feathers on the skirt.

  The back was all her skin and the stones of the necklace. The bronze glinted in one way and the stones would another.

  “You’re like a four hundred and thirty on a scale of one-to-ten hot. Seriously. You’re working every single angle tonight like a fabulous trifecta. I know this is your night and we’re all woo gallery and I’m your very biggest woo-er. But if you, say, cared what a certain taciturn alpha male with powerful thighs and a great ass thought, you’re thunderbirds go on that.”

  “His ass is remarkable, isn’t it? Also his wrists and forearms. His hands. Shoulders. Piercings. Tattoos. The dick is my favorite. You don’t get to comment on that.”

  Natalie saluted.

  “So if I wanted to be the hottest woman he’d ever laid eyes on the whole of his life, I’d be in that territory tonight?”

  “Since you just added that lipstick and those heels, what are they five inches? Jeez. Anyway, you’re bull’s-eye hottest woman.”

  Tuesday looked down her legs, which looked about a foot longer between the short skirt and the delicate, strappy stiletto heels.