by Misti Murphy
“Wha—” His hand sneaks up on my hip, holding me still as he drifts his lips over mine. They’re firm and supple all at the same time. Cheeky, too, the way he nips at my bottom lip, making me want to open to him. My hand on his chest turns into a fist, crushing the fabric of his shirt as he slips his tongue between my lips.
“You two are together?”
Christ, my mother is in the room. That’s my mother. Shit. I push him back and break off the kiss we barely began. “Danny, my mother.”
“Wonderful woman. I like her. Not as much as I like you.”
“No. My mother. She’s watching.”
“Oh, right.” He stumbles over the words while he shoves a hand through his hair in a way that makes it hard to tell if he’s still enacting this ridiculous plan or if that kiss was as real as it felt. “I guess we’re busted.”
CHAPTER FIVE
DANNY
Tonight’s date is with Donna. She’s been dating a stripper named Sam, but they recently had a falling out. Donna’s going to be with her girls at a bar where Sam has a gig, and she’s paying me to show up, hit on her, and shower her with attention, basically make Sam jealous enough to realize he’s better off with her than without.
And I’m not feeling it. It’s the first time since Ronnie and I started this business that I’m struggling.
It’s probably that damn kiss. No, scratch that, it is the kiss. Ronnie’s lips, pressed to mine for the briefest and yet sweetest of seconds. The taste of her plump bottom lip as I nibbled on it is still in my mouth, still in my head. Messing with my mojo. Which is annoying as fuck because I’ve perfected the art of not letting anything get to me, so how the hell has one little kiss accomplished the task?
I step into the club and head straight for the bar. It’s one of those places that attracts the younger set. Lots of flashing lights, cages set up on either side of the dance floor where patrons can pay to make a spectacle of themselves by dancing for the crowd’s enjoyment. The DJ’s setup is elaborate, a story above the rest of the club, so she can lord over those she’s enticing into bouncing to the beat until they’re dripping with sweat.
There are a series of alcoves set off from the dance floor, where small groups can rent space, hold semi-private parties, and do things like hire strippers for the bachelor or bachelorette or birthday girl-slash-boy. During our pre-meeting earlier today, Donna told me Sam does private parties on occasion, but the bulk of his income comes from working in this club. The men and women who frequent this place pay and tip well. I suppose that bodes well for me, assuming I can get through this job.
Because all I really want to do is head over to Ronnie’s apartment and beg her to speak to me face to face, to work through whatever the hell happened between us that Sunday afternoon at her parents’ house.
Except Ronnie isn’t taking my calls, has thus far refused to answer her door. She emailed me the details for this particular date, with a suggestion that we communicate in this way moving forward. I almost typed back that I quit, except this is her sole form of income, and unlike me, she actually wants to do something productive with her life.
I order a shot of Patrón, and the tender places before me a purple shot glass filled with amber liquid, a shaker of salt, and a wedge of lemon. Almost listlessly, I lick my hand, pour the salt, down the shot, and then suck the lemon into my mouth, relishing the tang along with the burn that almost instantly helps to push away the bout of nerves I don’t usually feel.
This is the easiest job I’ve had to date, so I’m not sure why I’m so damn on edge. The only expectation is to flirt with Donna—piece of cake for a guy like me, who’s an expert at hitting on girls to get them to buy my drinks in bars—pretend to give her my number, and leave.
Leaning against the bar, I scan my surroundings, easily spot Donna and crew clustered around a high-top table near the dance floor. There’s a smattering of empty shot glasses on the table, and they’re all giggling like schoolchildren as they head out onto the parquet to get jiggy with it.
Sam’s easy to spot, too. The leather vest, oiled skin, and tear-away pants are a dead giveaway. He’s only a few feet away, seemingly lounging against the bar. There’s a beer near his elbow, but he’s appeared to have forgotten it in favor of staring at his ex-girlfriend and crew. I wave down the bartender, point at Sam and tell her to pour him another and add one for me, and then I head his way.
“Hey,” I say, lifting the mug closest to me.
Sam flicks me a glance and dismisses me without a word.
“This is good. One of the best IPAs I’ve tasted,” I say.
“You’re good looking, man, but I don’t swing that way,” Sam finally acknowledges me without taking his gaze away from Donna’s swaying body.
“So those clichés about strippers aren’t all true?”
“Nope, not all of them.”
“How about the idea that they can’t have long-lasting relationships?”
He narrows his eyes and turns his head my way. I nod at the gaggle of women on the dance floor.
“She’s a great girl. Definitely a keeper,” I say.
“How do you know?”
“Met her for lunch earlier today.”
He tenses, the glistening muscles on his arms bunching while he clutches his beer mug and probably talks himself down from tossing it at my head.
“She’s paying me to be here,” I confess. “I’m supposed to go over there and hit on her to make you jealous.”
His eyes widen. “You’re fucking kidding me.”
“Nope. She claims nothing else she’s tried has worked.”
“She hasn’t tried anything else.”
I shrug. “She thinks she has.”
He swipes his hand over his face and then polishes off the first beer before shaking his head. “She hates my job. I keep telling her it’s good money, it’s harmless, and I’m only doing it to pay my way through school. But she’s afraid I’m going to fall for one of my clients and break up with her. So last week she decided to beat me to the punch by calling it quits on me.”
“And now she’s realized her mistake and can’t figure out how to fix it.”
He gave the topic of our conversation a mournful look. “I guess.”
“Does she have justification for her fear?”
He shakes his head. “No. I mean, that’s how we met, but I love her. I don’t even see these other women. They’re just a paycheck.”
I can relate. I glance at my almost-empty beer mug. “So how do you want to play this out? I’m happy to give her a refund.”
“Nah. Keep the money. We all gotta live. But I’ll handle tonight’s job.” He pushes off from the bar and stalks to the dance floor. Doesn’t even hesitate as he walks up to Donna, wraps his arms around her, and pulls her into his chest. She collapses against him, her hands gripping the back of his vest, while he whispers something into her ear. When she lifts her gaze to me, he shakes his head and whispers more, and then she nods, and the two of them step off the dance floor, hand in hand.
My work here is done.
***
Erin steps through the sliding glass doors and heads across the patio to hand me a beer before she drops into the lounge chair next to me and puts the other bottle to her lips.
“Welcome home. I take it there’s no honeymoon baby?” I ask, watching her drink. She’s glowing, a combination of post-honeymoon bliss and a nice Caribbean tan.
“Nah. We decided we just want to have fun. Plus, those fruity drinks were so damn good, I wasn’t about to forego them.”
“Can’t say I blame you. Although I thought the plan was to work on providing Mama Frost with her next grandbaby?”
Erin shrugs and drinks more beer. “We’ll probably start trying after the first of the year. That way, if it happens right away, the baby will be born during the off-season and Garrett won’t have to worry about traveling very much for the first few months.”
That’s my best friend. A woman with a plan. Jus
t like the woman her mother-in-law now believes I’m dating.
Me. Dating. Even better: Ronnie dating. Me.
“I heard something interesting from my mother-in-law a little while ago.”
Speaking of… “Oh yeah? I swear, I’m not the one who taught Abby how to say fuck.”
Her mouth falls open. “Abby said fuck? She’s four, Danny. How could you?”
“I just said it wasn’t me.”
“There is no one else in her life who would teach her that.”
“Besides her dad, you mean.”
“He’s gotten way better. Plus, we’ve been gone for two weeks. So, how did it happen?”
I rub my finger through the condensation on the bottle’s label and then come clean. “I took her to this exotic pet store. The guy had just taken in this parrot from a rescue league. He didn’t know the bird’s favorite word is fuck. At least, not until we were there.”
She leans back in her chair and chuckles. “This would only happen to you. Speaking of…you and Ronnie?”
I don’t say anything. Just work on sucking down the beer she brought me.
“Mama Frost seems to be under the impression there is something going on between you two,” she adds. “Claims she saw you kissing. I think she’s already begun crocheting baby blankets.”
“Christ.”
Erin has been my best friend since high school, since the day I hit on her and she said, “You’re only acting this way to try to get under your dad’s skin, and I’m not that kind of girl anyway.” Yes, she literally said that. And we’ve been friends and confidants ever since.
And yet I’m sitting here contemplating lying to her. Okay, maybe not lying, per se, because in truth, I don’t know what’s going on. Yes, I deliberately led Cynthia to believe Ronnie and I are dating, but it was only supposed to be a ploy to get her off Ronnie’s back, to convince her to quit trying to set her daughter up with every available jock on her meddling mother radar. I figured we’d let the charade go on for a few weeks, until one or the other of her sons announced another pregnancy—it’s bound to happen—and then we’d stage an amicable breakup and go about our merry lives.
But then I kissed her. That damn kiss.
It wasn’t supposed to happen. Wasn’t even really a kiss, not a full one anyway. It was barely there, a little brush of skin and the tiniest nip, practically nothing.
And my balls have been blue ever since. No matter how many times I spank the monkey, no matter how many cold showers, how much alcohol I try to drown in, doesn’t matter.
I want more. I want to deepen the kiss, to lift my hands and twine them in her hair. I want to run my fingers along her cheek, onto her chest, trace them down the plunging neckline of that shirt that made me almost swallow my tongue when she first walked out of her bedroom. What if she’d dressed conservatively—would this have happened? Or would Ben have panicked and made an excuse to end their afternoon date early? Then I’d still be chasing her for the thrill of the chase, she’d still be keeping me at arm’s length, and life would be just peachy.
“I’m a hot mess, Erin.”
“This is news?”
“I’m serious.”
“Okay, that is news. Because Danny Harrison is never serious. Not ever.”
“Forget it then. I won’t talk to you.” I start to stand, and she grabs my arm, holds me in place.
“Okay, okay, I’m sorry. Tell me what’s really going on.”
I move away anyhow, to the small beer fridge I purchased with my first Rent-A-Danny paycheck, and extract two more brewskies. As I hand one to her, I drop back into my lounger, stare out at the yard that slopes down to a small, secluded lake. I can see Erin’s pet duck down there, lazily swimming near the shoreline. Paynter and Chloe’s goat is next door in its pen, bleating occasionally. Undoubtedly, James and Myra’s cat is somewhere nearby, too, possibly sitting on the beach, watching the duck, contemplating dinner.
Or maybe not, since for some strange reason, all three animals get along like siblings. Like Ronnie and her brothers. They may bicker on occasion, but the reality is, they love each other with this bond I may be slightly jealous of. God knows I don’t have that relationship with my brother. But then again, he’s just like my dad, and the old man and I don’t have a relationship at all.
“Ronnie quit her job, moved back to Chicago while you were off honeymooning,” I tell Erin.
“That’s great. I mean, that is great, right?”
I shrug. I think so. Or at least, I did. “She pretends she doesn’t like the family thing, but yeah, I think it’s good. Except her mom, of course, wants her to get married and start spitting out babies. But Mama Frost picks the wrong sort of guys to introduce her to.”
Jocks, when Ronnie likes bad boys. Too bad I don’t fit into either category.
“So Sunday afternoon, her mom invites her over, wants her to meet the new neighbor. A jock with two kids and still mourning his dead wife.”
“Oh no.”
“I went along to play interference.” And to torture myself watching while Ronnie apparently changed her mind about bad boys as her boy toy preference and started cozying up to Jockstrap. She may not want forever like her mother hopes, but she sure looked like she would have been open to a few hours of afternoon delight.
“And telling her mother you two are dating was your game plan?”
“Why are we speaking in sports lingo? You know I hate that shit.”
“You started it.”
I roll my eyes. Erin is more family to me than my flesh-and-blood kin. Hell, the Frosts are all more like family than the ones who raised me. Even Erin’s husband, Garrett, who pretends he doesn’t like me. Except I helped him figure out he was in love with Erin, so he’s pretty much indebted to me for life.
“So where does the kissing come into play?” Erin asks.
The real question is why. Why did I do it? I should have known a quick peck and nibble would never be enough. I’ve been lusting after the woman for well over a year. Even by my terms, that’s a whole hell of a lot of buildup.
“It was an accident,” I tell her.
She snickers. “Your lips accidentally fell against hers?”
“Something like that,” I mumble. To top it all off, her mother wasn’t supposed to see that part.
“So now what?”
“So now Ronnie won’t speak to me.” I don’t mention our new business. It’s something I normally wouldn’t hesitate to share with Erin, but Ronnie asked me to hold off.
Erin grabs the two empty beer bottles parked on the glass table between us and then stands. “Well, I should warn you: Paynt and Chloe have invited everybody over to their house for dinner and drinks tonight. Sort of a welcome home for us, and, I assume, Ronnie. The entire Frost family will be there. You’re welcome, of course, but I understand if you want to stay away.”
***
I don’t stay away. Hell no. Not if there’s a remote chance of seeing Ronnie. Of talking to her, convincing her that at the very least, we should let things go back to the way they were between us. I’d much rather hang out with her while wishing she’d get naked with me than not speaking to her at all.
The get-together is casual, one of those impromptu family gatherings where everybody shows up with a dish to pass and either a bottle of wine or a six-pack of beer. The hugs are aplenty, the laughter loud, boisterous, and contagious. All the animals are there, and Abby’s playing with them like they’re other children, while Myra and James’s infant daughter sits in a bouncy chair and watches with wide eyes.
It’s June, a beautiful evening with a steady breeze, so the mosquitoes are blessedly non-existent. We’re all gathered on the deck. Paynter is standing over the grill, with his father on one side and Garrett on the other, joking and teasing him about the way he’s cooking the meat. I have a flashback of another time, another life. My own.
I’m fourteen. It’s me standing at the grill, and my dad and brother are guiding me through the process. But I
can’t do it to their specifications—I never could, no matter what I did or how hard I tried.
That night, the steaks were charred—hockey pucks, essentially—and before the evening was over, we were all screaming at each other, until I stormed off to my room and my brother left in a huff and my dad went to seek solace in my mother’s arms. She was the only one who never judged me, but I resented her anyway because she was always there for my dad.
“Hey.” The soft, slightly raw word jars me, and I blink several times until Ronnie comes into focus. She’s standing in front of me, holding a glass of dark liquid, probably blended scotch. She’s wearing this red sundress, cotton, not formfitting, but it still stirs to life that fire inside me that hasn’t truly died down since the first day I met her.
“You okay?” she asks.
I frown. We’re standing to the side, sure, but the rest of her family is only a few feet away. And she wants to talk about what happened now, here?
“You looked like you were, I don’t know…almost in pain or something.”
“Oh.” I scrub my hand over my face. “Just thinking, I guess.”
“About what happened?”
“No,” I admit. “My family.” This is not a subject I like to dwell on. Erin knows, of course, but that’s pretty much the extent of it.
“Funny, I was recently wondering about your family.”
“You were?”
She nods and sips her drink. “You never talk about them. Doesn’t seem like you spend any time with them, since you’re always, well, with mine. Do you have parents? Siblings?”
Is this her way of calling a truce? Maybe I’d rather we go back to not talking.
“Yes, I have parents, although no, I don’t talk to them much.” Or at all. “And yes, I have a sibling. A brother. He’s older, your age, actually. We also don’t talk much.” Or at all. But then again, he lives in California, so it’s easier to pretend it’s because of the distance. My parents live probably twenty minutes away, so there’s really no excuse except, well, we just don’t like each other.
Her gaze sweeps over the group of people gathered nearby. “I couldn’t imagine not talking to them.”
