Still, William did have his charms. He was smart, funny, and had a strong sense of right and wrong Suzanne found admirable. He had a quiet persistence, too, which finally paid off at a Fourth of July barbecue at the country club. They were both several beers into a long holiday weekend with their parents when they ran into each other in the hot dog line. They had started out arguing about condiments, and ended up on a deserted hillside near the seventh hole, sharing a contraband flask of bourbon.
Until William, Suzanne had consistently chosen men who were either unattainable or unsuitable in the eyes of her family. Her picks were all about the challenge—from the punk band leader with a nose ring to her married art history professor in college. She had taken pleasure in defying expectations, but she had never considered what would happen if she tried to meet them instead.
William was a chance to find out what it was like to be the good girl. He also happened to treat her well, which was nice, if not necessarily thrilling. After a few months, William began hinting at their future together. Suzanne felt conflicted, but told herself it was probably normal to feel that way in a relationship that lasted more than a couple of months. It might be scary, but would it really be so bad? Marriage, kids, the whole suburban dream?
The more the relationship cycled toward commitment, however, the more she noticed about William that she didn’t like. He had no fashion sense. He slurped his spaghetti like an eight-year-old. He said, “It’s all good,” way too often. She began to notice every little thing she hated about him, and with each item, the feeling that she was trapped in an ever-shrinking box increased.
By mid-December that year, she decided it had to end. But the holidays were approaching, and there were plans and parties that would be ruined if they broke up now—not just for herself and William, but their families, too. She’d wait until January.
To her horror, William did not intend to wait that long at all. At the New Year’s Eve party at the country club, he had gone on stage just before midnight, borrowed the microphone from the band, and proposed to her. It had seemed everyone in the club was watching, sighing collectively and turning to kiss their own spouses in celebration of how fucking romantic it was. Suzanne had wanted to die.
No such luck. So she had gone to the stage, pushed from behind by her mother, and when the crowd began to cry out for her to answer him, he held the microphone to her mouth. She shook her head, begging him with her eyes not to make it any worse.
“Don’t be shy, honey,” someone nearby said. William grinned and held the mike in front of her.
So when she whispered, “We need to talk,” it was broadcast not only to the immediate onlookers, but to everyone within hearing distance. William had stood as gracefully as he could, handed the mike back to the singer, and left the room through the back door. His face had been a horrifying combination of shock and hurt that she never wanted to see again. Suzanne followed him, but he ran into the men’s locker room near the golf course. Part of her had been relieved to have an excuse not to go in after him. He had never spoken to her again.
That was the day Suzanne starting making her rules for dating. She never wanted to get that close to someone again, only to hurt them. Instead, she tried to figure out as soon as possible what might not work about a relationship and make a decision early on, before things got too serious. She had more or less decided then, though she had never uttered it aloud, that she would most likely never get married. And dated accordingly.
Now, out on her balcony, slapping paint on the canvas in a messy but therapeutic abstract, she thought perhaps she had been too hasty when she rejected William. Or maybe she just hadn’t been ready back then. Immature. He had loved her—that was absolutely clear. Maybe he still could. Why shouldn’t she have the beautiful marriage Marci and Jake had? What was so scary about sharing your life with someone who wanted to be there for you and take care of you? She’d been basically single for more than a decade, and she had nothing to show for it except a ruined career and a stalker. Of course, a stable relationship didn’t solve everything, but at least it would mean she wasn’t battling all this alone.
Her reverie was interrupted by the sound of a phone in the distance, and after a moment she realized it was her phone, inside. She barely got through the sliding glass door fast enough to catch it before it went to voicemail. She hoped it was William.
“Oh, hey,” she said when she heard the voice on the other end.
“Wow, it’s been a while since a woman sounded so disappointed to hear from me,” Dylan said. “I’m having flashbacks to tenth grade.”
“No, no, of course not.” She tried to recover her usual graciousness. “Don’t be silly.”
“You left the cabin in such a rush,” he said.
This time she heard her dad’s voice. Never explain, never apologize. Let them come to you. “Yes.”
“Well, anyway, you left a scarf at the cabin on Wednesday. Yvette found it and asked me to bring it to you because I’m in Atlanta tonight for a meeting tomorrow. It’s light green with a blue pattern on it. Kinda wispy.” Her father had given her that scarf for college graduation.
“Yes, it’s mine,” she said, about to suggest that he mail it to her, when the thought of Rick and the stray panties gave her pause.
“I was thinking we could meet for a beer later and I’ll return it to you. If that’s convenient for you, of course, Scarlett.”
Was Dylan Burke asking her out? No. It wasn’t possible. Her first impulse was to say no. But why? He was a client; that was all. She was free, and there was no reason not to meet him.
“Sure,” she said.
“I’ll email you the address,” he said and hung up.
#
Suzanne re-confirmed the address of the bar in front of her against the printed email several times before finally turning off the car and going inside. She was somewhere west of the city, away from the populated areas with trendy nightclubs but not yet into the clean, predictable suburbs. The bar was in a shopping center between a nondescript nail salon and a check cashing store. The storefront was darkly tinted glass with a simple neon “OPEN” sign near the door, and a handwritten sign taped to the door. “This is a smoking establishment. No one under 21 allowed. Period.” She took a last glorious gulp of fresh air and went in, thinking she should have had Dylan mail the scarf.
To her relief, however, the inside was not nearly as sketchy as the view from the parking lot. Beyond a cold, dark entryway, there were warmly lighted tables and booths surrounding a clean, polished wood bar. A couple of pool tables and dart boards were occupied in a back corner. A garage punk band was performing a passable rendition of a Smiths’ song on a crude wooden stage in the other corner.
It took a moment to find Dylan, who was tucked into a booth on the music side, wearing a frayed Braves baseball hat pulled down low, a crisp blue Oxford shirt, and the glasses he’d worn at the gala. When he noticed her, he waved to get her attention just as her recognition was sinking in.
“What, no camouflage today?” she said.
“Nope,” he said, smiling. “It’s my night off.”
“I like the glasses,” she said. “They make you look…mature.”
“Thanks,” he said. “I always feel a little self-conscious in them. But my contacts were hurting my eyes.”
A waitress came by and Dylan ordered them each a pint of Guinness, raising an eyebrow for her approval as he did. She shrugged and glanced around for her scarf.
“It’s in the truck,” he said, following her gaze. “I didn’t want to get it all smoky. Or for you to get hammered and forget it.”
“I’m not planning on drinking tonight, Mr. Burke.”
“Whoa. What’s with the sudden formality, Scarlett?”
Suzanne had decided on the drive over to bring things back to a safer, more professional level with Dylan—for the sake of her reputation and her sanity. But it was meant to be a subtle change, and she didn’t expect him to notice. “Sorry,” she sai
d. “Dylan. Have you been here before?”
“Yeah, I like this place. It reminds me of a bar we used to play in outside Knoxville, you know, in the early days.”
She nodded and looked around, politely taking it in. The bar was fairly busy, but not crowded, considering it was a Friday night. There seemed to be a good mix of people, of various ages and races, which was somewhat unusual for a dive bar in Atlanta. The walls were adorned with liquor and beer ads, with a few British travel posters and some Union Jacks thrown in. She noticed a random stuffed sheep on one wall next to a flat screen with a soccer game on. The more she looked around, the more she liked it.
“The owner is English,” Dylan said. “He’s from Newcastle, I think. I came here pretty late one night after a rehearsal and had a few beers with him. Didn’t know who I was until the fourth drink. That’s what I love about being in Atlanta.”
“Being anonymous?”
“Sure, sometimes,” he said. “I mean, it’s fun when people like you and tell you how much they like your music and all. But other times it’s nice just to be a regular person, talking about sports and eavesdropping on bar conversations. I can’t exactly do that in Nashville.”
“So you’re an eavesdropper?” she asked.
“Oh, like you don’t do it, too,” he said. “Bar conversations are better than soap operas. I get great ideas for songs that way sometimes. Not that you would know, seeing how you don’t like my work…” He nudged her under the table with his foot.
“Oh, get over it already,” she scowled playfully. “Oooh, one person doesn’t own every song you’ve ever made. Poor little rock star!”
He grinned. “I know, I know. I’m a narcissistic asshole. But you’re not ‘one person,’ you’re…you.”
She was unsure how to respond to this, so she took a big swig of Guinness. He looked at the table, toying with a paper coaster. “Speaking of you, being you…” he began awkwardly. “This doesn’t have to mean more than it does, but I’m really sorry about what happened with Misty the other day.”
Suzanne’s face flushed a bit. The Guinness, surely. “No, no. It’s not a big deal,” she said dismissively. “I can understand why she would feel territorial. It must be hard dating a superstar.” She attempted a sideways grin like the ones he gave her sometimes.
He rolled his eyes. “Well, we weren’t exactly dating. And she probably was feeling territorial, and pissed off for other reasons.” He looked at her as though waiting for some kind of response, but she had no idea what to say.
He went on. “Anyway, it was totally inappropriate and childish, whether we were dating or not. I told her that when you left. And I made her leave, too.”
“You did?”
“Yeah. It was overdue. You were just a catalyst.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said.
“Are you?” he asked.
“Shouldn’t I be?” This conversation reminded Suzanne of an old movie, but she couldn’t place which one.
“Well, this conversation is really going places,” he said. “Anyway, I apologize.”
“Apology accepted,” she said definitively.
They were quiet again then, but with less awkwardness than before. She drank her Guinness and bopped her head a little to the sound of the band, watching them do a version of a 10,000 Maniacs song she loved, but couldn’t remember the title. Dylan turned to watch them with her, and she saw that his hair was getting just long enough to make a little duck tail at the back of his hat.
“They’re pretty good,” he said appreciatively.
“I wouldn’t have thought this was your kind of thing,” she said.
He nodded as if he was expecting this. “Yeah. Actually, I like all kinds of music. Good is good, as far as I’m concerned. I mean, sure, my roots are country, especially the old school stuff, but I think you always benefit from keeping your horizons broad. Some of my favorite artists aren’t anything close to country.”
Suzanne nodded, still watching the band. They all seemed to be in their early twenties, wearing black, with longish hair of varying artificial colors, a variety of piercings, and black fingernails. She wondered how they would feel if they knew that one of music’s biggest stars was watching them right now. Would it change how they played? Would they scramble to play the twangiest thing in their repertoire, something he could relate to? Or would they think a mere country star irrelevant to them? She had joked with Dylan about being the only person who didn’t know his music, but she could hazard a guess that most of these guys didn’t either.
“So have you had any more problems?” he asked after a while. “Any creepy deliveries since the last one?”
“No,” she said. “I’ve been trying to pay attention, and Bonita calls me every couple of days to check in. She’s really going above and beyond.”
“She’s good people,” he agreed. “But you’re no closer to figuring out who this jerk is?”
“No, I’m not. But I haven’t been trying, except…” She broke off.
“Except?”
Oh, why not? He’d been honest with her, and it was nice to have someone she could talk to, especially with Marci not speaking to her. “Well, it’s not really related to who is stalking me, but seeing all those names up there—as you so graciously pointed out, there are lots of them—made me think about whether I am doing something wrong. Like maybe I’ve let some people go I shouldn’t have.”
“What do you mean?” He seemed genuinely perplexed.
“Well, I know it sounds silly, but I’m thirty-three, and I’ve never really wanted to get married, but I’m starting to get concerned that I haven’t had a relationship last for more than a couple of months since…”
“Since when?”
She hesitated, and then told him. About William and his proposal. About her conflicted feelings, and how she was now searching for him to try to understand it all better. She didn’t mention the part that was so far just a glimmer of something in the back of her mind—the hope that finding William would not just be insight into why she pushed men away, but that a rekindled relationship with him could be an answer in itself.
“So this guy was the beginning? After him you started chewing men up and spitting them out?”
“You make me sound like a monster.”
“Not a monster. Maybe a praying mantis,” he said. She kicked him under the table. “Ouch!”
The waitress brought another round and Suzanne licked the foam of the fresh Guinness off her top lip. “I don’t chew men up and spit them out. I’m…picky. You don’t know what it was like, to let things get that far and then hurt him so badly. I never want to make that kind of mistake again. So I don’t stay in a relationship unless I feel really sure about it.”
“I know,” he said. “I saw the list. Poor bastards.”
“What about you?” she fired back accusingly. “You’re not exactly living like a model of monogamy yourself.”
“True,” he said, “but I think girls know what they’re getting into when they’re with me.”
“That is such a typical male way of seeing things,” she said, her Southern accent becoming thicker with her slight buzz and sense of outrage. “It’s such a fucking double standard.”
He laughed, and pretended to back away from the table, holding his hands up in surrender. “Whoa, there, Scarlett.”
“Well, it is. You can do what you want and you’re a playboy; I do the same thing, and I’m a slut. How is that fair?”
“I don’t think you’re a slut,” he said seriously. “I would never call you that.”
She had hit a nerve. “Sorry,” she said, though why she was apologizing to him, she wasn’t sure.
“I have five sisters, remember? I don’t do that word. The guys around me don’t use it either.” His face was full of conviction, and then he added more playfully, “Besides, now that I have a feminist friend in my acquaintance, I have a feeling there will be plenty of other politically incorrect words I’m not allowed to use a
nymore either. I’m assuming you’ll provide me with a list or something? Or will I just have to run into each one as I go?”
She smiled. No one had referred to her as a feminist in a long time. It was a mantle she had taken up in college with some amount of seriousness, but somehow pushed aside as the years went on. Could you still be a feminist if you were in the Junior League and flirted with men to get discounts on facility rentals for a living?
Then something else struck her. Feminist friend. Dylan considered her a friend, and she realized she thought of him that way, too. How odd. If someone had told me two months ago that my newest friend would be a twenty-six-year-old country superstar with a high school diploma and friends who still got drunk and played video games…. It felt like the weirdest dream ever. Maybe none of this had actually happened, and she was still passed out on her couch with her arm in a cast having painkiller dreams.
The lead singer came to the mike as they finished a song Suzanne didn’t recognize. “Thanks,” he said to the smattering of applause. Sixty or seventy people were in the bar now, about ten or fifteen of whom seemed engaged with the music. “We’re Rickenbacker’s Revenge. Taking a break for beer; we’ll be back in ten.”
“I get it, I really do,” Dylan said, grasping her hands across the table. “I think it’s admirable that you’re trying to figure out why your relationships haven’t worked so far. But maybe, just maybe, you ought to consider that you’re an exceptional woman. Why would you want to settle for someone who doesn’t deserve you?”
Her heart lurched. What was he saying? She looked down at their hands, linked on the table between them. His grip was warm and firm, but not necessarily romantic. She met his eyes, and he held her gaze with sincerity. She felt as if she was in a staring contest with Marci back in middle school, and had to fight the totally inappropriate urge to giggle.
Dylan broke the spell, laughing good-naturedly. “I fold. Again,” he said, standing to exit the booth. “I definitely wouldn’t pass the Suzanne Hamilton perfection test. Poor bastards.”
Regrets Only (Sequel to The Marriage Pact) Page 15
