“You coming?” he asked.
Another chance to say no. But she tugged the key out of the ignition and slid it into her purse. “Lock the door,” she said to Dane. “I don’t normally, but tonight...”
He nodded, pressing down the button.
They crossed the dirt yard, weeds springing up like a bad-hair day. Stella tripped on an overturned pot.
Dane caught her arm. “Sorry.”
He fumbled with the lock and pushed open the door. Stale pizza and the smell of old dishwater accosted her. “Sorry again,” he muttered.
He kicked clothes around to make a path to the sofa. Something small might have scurried, but Stella didn’t flinch. She was used to boy sloth and wasn’t any sort of neat freak. Cockroaches didn’t kill.
“Wanna sit?” Dane asked. “I have beer. Maybe some hard stuff.”
“I think some hard stuff,” she said. This day had been too much. Worse yet, the ugliness promised so much more ahead.
Dane disappeared through a doorway, and a light kicked on. He rummaged around, opening cabinets. He located a glass, then moved to the other side, out of sight.
Stella leaned back on the sofa, trying not to feel squeamish about what might have occurred on its cushions. She pictured Darlene there and grimaced. Not usually the jealous sort, this invasion of envy made her squirm.
Dane returned with two glasses filled with something clear.
“Been a busy place?” She smacked her hand on the couch.
He frowned.
So yes. She needed the drink more than ever.
“We broke it off clean,” he said suddenly. “Right after the run-in with Bobby Ray.”
“You and Darlene?”
“Yeah, I drove to the dealer.”
“Bleeding?”
“Yeah.”
She accepted the drink and clinked her glass against his. “Here’s to being single.”
He swallowed, an incredible gulp even to her, and she could drink most people under the table. Easier than answering, but she took that as a good thing. Maybe he didn’t consider himself on the market, just out of the triangle. Suited her.
She lifted the glass, immediately overwhelmed by the medicinal smell of bad vodka. She gulped and drew it away quickly.
Dane walked off again, down a hallway this time. After a moment, music came on, a radio station. A DJ squawked something unintelligible, and heavy metal blared from speakers strung on the wall above her.
Then hissing. He was switching to something else. First country. She smiled against the cool glass. No way. More hiss. Pop hits. Not him either.
Another hiss. Let’s see, what would he hit next, classical?
Sure enough, he tuned it in, popping his head around the corner. “This okay?”
She nodded, and he took off again as a smooth ribbon of violins flowed from the walls. A cabinet opened and closed with a mouse-like squeak. At least she hoped it was the door. She slid off her shoes and pulled her feet onto the sofa.
He returned with a pale yellow sheet, more wadded than folded. “It’s clean,” he said, spreading it on the sofa.
Stella stood to let him tuck it against the cushions.
“I sleep here. Fabric’s kind of rough on its own.”
She compared the length of the sofa to his height. “You must hang off the edge.”
“Close enough. And cheap.” He shrugged.
She settled back down again. “So what should we do about Bobby Ray?”
“Ignore him. He’ll get bored with it.” Dane stretched his arm along the back of the sofa, the gauze glowing faintly in the light from the kitchen.
Stella wanted to snuggle into his side, but resisted. “You could file a report with the sheriff.”
“No good. The bartender threw me out. Told me I wasn’t the regular.”
“Carmen threw you out?” They had closed ranks already.
“Yup.” Dane picked up his glass from the overturned crate that served as a coffee table and downed the rest of his drink. “That bad?”
“It is. They’ve sided with Bobby Ray, and that’s rare. Did she know he’d cut you?”
“She told me not to bleed on her bar.”
Stella sat up on her knees, anxious and jittery. “It’s ridiculous they’d default to him without knowing anything. I hate this town.”
“She had no reason to believe I hadn’t done something to deserve it.” He ran his thumb along her arm.
She pulled away. “This is serious! You won’t be able to do anything in this town. Do you know how many outsiders have been run out?” Hell, half the guys she’d slept with.
“Stell, it will be all right. It’ll die down.”
“It won’t! I’ve lived here all my life!”
“And weren’t you about to leave?” He reached for her arm again, and this time she relented.
“I am. I will. You too, if you know what’s good for you.”
“I think it’s okay. Joe likes me. Beatrice likes me. And you.” He slid his hand to that sensitive spot inside her elbow. “That’s enough for me.”
She relaxed against him. She hardly knew him. Really, she should walk right out. Let it go. But he’d split with Darlene. That was something.
He pulled her head to his shoulder. The music washed over them, simple, emotional, pretty. She didn’t listen to much classical. Maybe she should. It was calming.
The door flew open, smashing against the wall. The metal doorstop snapped and sprung across the room.
Dane jumped up, leaving Stella to fall against the cushions.
Ryker barreled in and grabbed Dane by the shirt, shoving him backward. “What the HELL have you gotten yourself into?” He snatched Dane’s arm, assessing the bandages. “I spend a year here trying to avoid this pissant town’s bullshit, and you wreck it all in a day?”
Dane stepped back, knocking Ryker loose from his arm. “This doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
Ryker whirled around, noticing Stella. “And you had to bring the problem over here?”
Before Stella could say anything, Dane had already landed a punch to Ryker’s jaw.
“Son of a BITCH!” Ryker rushed forward, tackling Dane. The glasses flew off the crate onto the carpet.
Stella stood on the sofa, ready to jump on Ryker. “Dane! Your arm! Stop it!”
The brothers rolled on the floor in a tumble of legs and arms, grunting, elbows landing in bellies. They knocked over a TV tray loaded with beer bottles.
Stella jumped off the sofa, kicking at the brothers with bare feet. “Stop it! Stop it! You should be on the same side!”
Ryker rolled onto his back, staring up at her. “You should have stayed out of this.” He turned to Dane, both of them breathing heavily. “You should have kept your dick in your pants.”
Stella stepped over Ryker, kneeling down to assess Dane’s bandage. It had come loose, and a bloody spiral rolled off as she unwound it. “You’re bleeding again. We’ll have to start over on this. I think you’re going to have to get stitches after all.”
“Screw that,” Dane said, tugging the gauze tight around his arm. “Screw all of it.” He sat up, forearms on his knees, head down. “This is so fucked up.”
Ryker had his arm thrown over his eyes. Blood trickled from his nose. Stella nudged him with her foot. “What the hell happened? You know that Bobby Ray stuck Dane from behind, right?”
Ryker’s voice was muffled from his shirt. “Yeah. At the Watering Hole. Supposedly Dane picked a fight, and Bobby Ray finished it.”
“That’s not exactly how it went,” Dane said.
Ryker sat up. His black hair stuck up in every direction. He ended up positioned the same way as Dane, arms on his knees, and Stella was struck by how similar they looked.
“I know that,” Ryker said. “Any asshole knows what Bobby Ray’s like. But he’s got cause. You were a dickhead.” He shoved at Dane again, but good-naturedly this time.
“Not like you haven’t been dipping your stick
all over Holly,” Dane said.
“But one at a time,” Ryker said. “You can’t go around like this with hometown girls.”
“I’m not,” Dane said. “On Tuesday I was dating Darlene.” He reached for Stella. “And today it’s Stella.”
Stella clasped both of her hands around his arm. “If you two are done roughing each other up, we should probably look at Dane’s cut.” She stood and brought Dane with her, leading him into the kitchen.
The place was a wreck, boxes and beer bottles and cheap plastic dishes everywhere. “If you boys had been raised in a barn, you’d be better off,” she said.
Dane dropped into a rickety metal chair by a beat-up Formica table. Ryker cleared a space, and Stella eased Dane’s elbow onto it, carefully removing the gauze.
The butterfly bandages had peeled off at the edges. Most of the cut was fine still, but the bottom, the deepest part, oozed blood. “I don’t suppose you guys have any sort of Band-Aids in this bachelor pad,” she said.
Ryker put his hand on his heart. “I’m offended by the suggestion.” He trundled off down the hallway.
Dane pulled Stella close to him. “I need to kiss you.”
Finally. All that time in the car, on the sofa, and nothing. His lips were warm, a little swollen. He kept it gentle, simple.
“Break it up,” Ryker said. “The man is injured.”
Stella shook her head. They were joking around now. You’d never know that five minutes earlier he’d stormed into the room and struck his brother with a killer blow.
“You boys always run hot and cold like this?”
Dane grinned. “Drove our mom crazy.”
Ryker handed her a rusting metal box of kiddie bandages with Smurfs on them.
“What is this?” She forced open the top, extracting one.
“Dated a chick with a kid for a while,” Ryker shrugged.
Stella peeled the backing away. “This will make him look tougher.”
Ryker laughed, turning to open the fridge. “Beer?”
“All around,” Dane said.
“Beer after liquor, never been sicker,” Stella said, wrapping the bloody gauze back around his arm. They’d have to buy a fresh roll in the morning.
“Beer BEFORE liquor,” Ryker said. “Get it straight.”
“I’m quite sure it’s beer after liquor,” Dane said.
Ryker popped the tops of the bottles. “I guess we’ll find out by who pukes.”
He passed the beer around as Stella used one last Smurf Band-Aid to lock down the gauze. “You’ll want to wear a shirt with sleeves, I think,” she said. “Unless you aim to show off your Smurfette.”
“I’ve been meaning to get a tattoo of her,” Dane said. “She’s hot.”
“Lots of men to service,” Ryker said. “No wonder she doesn’t have a job.”
They clinked their beers together.
“Seriously,” Dane said. “This will blow over.”
Ryker shook his head. “It ought to, but I’m not sure. Apparently Bobby Ray’s still got a thing for Stella here.”
Stella stared into her beer. “Done a long time ago.”
“Still, on top of throwing over his sister, you’ve got a perfect reason for him to hate Dane.” Ryker stared up at the ceiling. “Gonna be trouble.”
His statement was punctuated with the crash of smashing glass outside.
“What the hell?” Dane jumped up, running for the door.
“Dane, wait,” Stella said. “Let them pass.”
Ryker followed them into the living room, peering out the window as tires squealed away. “They got your car, Stell.”
Stella flung open the door and ran outside. The car seemed fine from the front, but as she rounded the back bumper, the fractured window glittered in the light from the streetlamp.
She banged her hand on the trunk, causing chunks of shatterproof glass to sprinkle down into the backseat. “Sons of bitches,” she said. “Grandma’s poor Mustang.”
“I’m going after those assholes,” Dane said. “This is enough.”
Ryker grabbed his shoulder. “This part is Stella’s battle. She’s the hometown girl.”
“Sure,” Stella said. “They’ll file a report, note that there were no witnesses, and move on.” She picked up a bit of glass and flung it into the street.
Stella didn’t think she could take one more minute of Holly. All the incidents, the gossip, the incestuous combinations of men and women screwing around or getting married or divorced, pair after pair. Too much. She wanted somewhere else, where the outsiders and the long-timers blended, where nobody knew what everybody had for breakfast, and with whom.
She turned to Dane. “Let’s leave this town.” She kicked the car, sending more glass cascading from the window. “I’ve got money to do it. Been saving for years. Let’s just get the hell out. You and me.”
Ryker whistled. “Sounds like quite a proposition, bro. You find a woman with money, I say GO.”
But Dane wouldn’t look at her. He stared at the moon, obscured behind a cloud, strange and eerie. Stella shivered. She’d probably just embarrassed herself completely.
13
Dane Calms Stella
––––––––
A werewolf moon, his mother used to call it.
Dane kicked at the gravel. His arm was screaming. Stella watched him, and he could feel pricks of anxiety sparking from her. He’d known this girl, what, three days? Now she wanted him to leave town with her.
“Never mind,” she said. She yanked on the car door and discovered it was locked. She reached for her purse and realized it wasn’t there.
Dane tried to come to her, but she walked away in mincing pained steps of bare feet on gravel.
“Stella,” he said, but she ignored him, moving fast once she hit the porch.
He sped up himself. He pulled the door closed behind him and locked it to keep Ryker out, at least for a moment.
She shoved her pink shoes on, trying to snatch up her purse in the same movement. Instead, the bag tipped over, spilling lipsticks and little pouches and pens and paper all over the floor.
“Damn it,” she said, dropping to her knees, and now he could see she was crying.
He knelt beside her, putting his hands over hers, stilling them, trying to make her stop. “Wait. Please.”
She did, her hair hanging down to hide her face. “I hate crying,” she said. “Stupidest thing to do, ever.”
He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her to the sofa again. “Let’s think this through.”
She flung his arms away. “I don’t want to think this through. It’s fine. I can head out of town without you. Let you fix the mess you’re in on your own. If nobody kills you.”
“Nobody’s going to kill me.”
“This town is killing me.”
She bent over, snatching up the contents of her purse like Darlene had at her desk. Two women picking up in his wake. He was like a tornado, tearing through everything.
He flung his head back on the sofa, the coolness of the sheet a relief. His arm throbbed, and his stomach grumbled. Fucked up. All of it.
Stella stood up and shoved her purse on her shoulder. He reached for her again. She couldn’t walk away. He wouldn’t let her just yet.
“Let’s drive somewhere,” he said. “Work this out.”
“There’s apparently nothing to work out.” She swiped her hand under her nose. “It was silly and impulsive. Not a big deal.”
“It is.”
She tried to move forward, but he held her at the waist, his arm screaming. He flinched, and she held still. “Your arm?”
“Please, sit.”
She plunked back down. “Don’t make it bleed again.”
He gathered her against him, smelling the perfume lingering in her hair from the shop. “Which is your favorite?” he asked.
“My favorite what?”
“Perfume.”
“We can’t talk about this now.”
“We can. Let’s do.”
She relaxed a little and settled against him. “It’s silly.”
“Which one?”
“An old one. The cliché.”
“Charlie?”
She sat up and smacked his chest. “Good God, no.” She leaned back against him. “Chanel No. 5.”
“A classic.”
“Chanel found the number five to be intoxicating. She’d been surrounded by it since she was a girl in a convent.”
She was calming down. He had to keep her talking. “So it took five chances to get it right?”
“I think she got all five at once, but legend says that she would have had none other than the fifth one.”
“Good thing it didn’t suck.”
Stella shook her head.
“Is this what you want to do? Sell perfume?” He stroked her lightly on the arm.
“Beatrice is great. But it’s not a life.” She drew small circles on his thigh. “I can hardly stand it when people come in smelling cheap and buying more of it.”
He nodded. His mother had never worn any scents. She’d always smelled of Pledge and Palmolive. Or, if she’d been cooking, like sweet onions and bacon, the only two things she used for flavor.
“I should go,” Stella said. “Ryker will want his place back.”
“Ryker can wait.”
She sat up. “No, I’ve made a decision. I’ll get Joe to put in a new windshield, and then I’m taking off. Out of here. Someplace big enough to swallow me up, let me disappear into the crowd.”
“That’s no picnic either.” Dane knew that drill. No money for college, working menial jobs. Never getting anywhere. Spinning wheels. “At least here you have family.”
Stella snorted. “Right. Dish-mop dad. Whoremonger mother turned Jesus freak. MIA sister. The only person who ever cared for me is going to die any day.” Her voice broke.
Dane pulled her back down. “I understand. My dad took off when I was three. Didn’t bother me none, more time with mom. But Ryker was eight. He took it real hard.”
“Where is your mom now?”
“Died. A month ago. That’s why I moved up here. Didn’t have nobody in Texas worth staying around for.”
“Ever hear from your dad?”
“Sometimes, on Father’s Day. He calls up, jokes about where’s his gift. Like he remembered our birthdays or Christmas. Don’t think he ever sent my mom a dime.”
Tangled: A New Adult Romance Boxed Set (12 Book Bundle of Billionaires, Bad Boys, and Royalty) Page 121
