I suggested that Hooch try to win them over by making his own brand of alcohol that honored the hard-working officers. That was the night that Badge Bunny Booze became Hooch’s house label. Yeah, he knew what I was up to in my social life, and it was all cool with Hooch. I suggested “Badge Bunny Booze” might be sexist, because it didn’t include the women on the force. Hooch scoffed, “Lot you know,” and off he went to design the label. That was also the night that I got the gig as his manager. Whoop! The next day, I resigned from my Fortune 500 nightmare and left my pantyhose in the trash on my way out. I’d been working here at Hooch’s for almost a year now and felt right at home.
Home enough, anyway, that I could make my way through the bar while my eyes adjusted to the low lighting. I saw Hooch sitting on a stool in his typical Hawaiian shirt, baggy cargo shorts, and flip-flops. What was new was the suitcase sitting by his feet.
“Heading out?” I asked, sitting next to him.
“Yep,” he said.
A file folder was open in front of him with a blue pen resting on top. I looked to our right—a little weasel-looking guy sat in the booth, wearing a dark blue suit and very shiny shoes on his dainty little feet. I rolled my lips in and waited.
“I’m going to take a trip. A sabbatical, if you will.”
“Okay,” I said, knowing that was the opening pitch, and the game would soon follow.
“I have a proposal. Hooch’s, as you know, is having trouble. We’re headed down the drain. The doc says I need to let go of stress. I need to go hang out on a beach somewhere and watch the waves.”
“And the girls in bikinis.”
“There is that.” He grinned. “I decided, though, not to sell Hooch’s. What I’m doing instead is giving you a shot at it.”
I tilted my head, not sure where this was heading.
“That’s Barney.” Hooch lifted his chin toward the weasel. “He’s here to notarize this contract.” He tapped his middle finger onto the manila folder resting on the bar between us. “It basically says that if you can turn the bar around and make it solvent, then you become my partner. Fifty-fifty. If you fail, and it goes bankrupt, you’re the manager, so you’re not beholden to any creditors. And I? I’ll be off on some island with bikini clad women, so it’ll be tough to come after me.”
“You’re serious?” This day just kept getting weirder and weirder.
“Totally.”
I opened the file and read it over. Yep. If the bar became the gold mine it had the potential to be, I got half-stake. If I failed, I’d be none the worse for wear. “You have enough money to live on?” I asked.
“In spades. I’m set for life. This was supposed to be for fun. It’s not fun anymore. It’s just a drag. And the doc—he says to get rid of the stressors.”
I sent a worried eye toward Hooch. “Why did you go see the doctor? What’s going on? Is it your heart?”
“It’s just old age.”
“You’re sixty. You’re a spring chicken.”
“Okay, it was me looking for an excuse to get the hell out of Dodge and chase girls in grass skirts.”
That seemed reasonable. I picked up the pen. “When are you leaving?” I asked as the weasel ran over to watch me scrawl my signature onto the contract.
“Plane takes off at five—just in time for opening tonight. There’s one catch, though, Bobbie Jax.” He put his hand on my arm. “Whatever happens, that prick next door, Nicky, is not—and I mean not!—to get this place. He’s been trying to run me out of here for years, and I have some pride.”
I knew Hooch had been having a pissing contest with the restauranteur next door, Nicky Stromboli, the owner of “Nicky’s.” What kind of person was vain enough to name the restaurant after himself, as well as every darned thing on the menu? What the heck is Spaghetti alla Nicky or Caprese alla Nicky? And who wants to eat a Stromboli alla Stromboli? That seems cannibalistic on some level. To me, it read as an egotistical proclamation that Nicky was setting the standard and others could only hope to taste as good. That was self-delusion.
I ate there. Once. It was convenient. I was hungry. The food was subpar at best. He had nice flowers on the tables, though. After that, I made sure to keep a couple menus from restaurants that would deliver next to the phone.
On the surface, you’d think Hooch did the exact same thing as Nicky in naming his place Hooch’s. But that is one of those “which came first, the chicken or the egg?” discussions. I know the truth. James Bradley, AKA Hooch Bradley, bought a bar already named Hooch’s. Well, “bought” was a stretch. He won it in a poker game. And when he took the reins into his own hands, the long-time customers simply started calling the new owner the old owner’s name. It made the transition simpler for their alcohol-soaked brains.
I scowled at Hooch, wondering why Nicky Stromboli would want him out of business. It didn’t make much sense to me. You’d think a bar and a restaurant would be kind of symbiotic. “I don’t understand.”
“Nicky wants to expand into the bar, so he has control of the entire block. Of course, that could solve a lot of my problems, but I won’t sell to him. If you can’t right this ship, I need you to at least make sure it doesn’t get into that guy’s hands.”
I nodded. Hooch had built this place up for the fun of it, and this guy would tear it all down. In the sum of things, we are only what we left behind and the memories we take with us. “I promise, Hooch,” I said. I meant and felt each letter of my pledge.
Hooch leaned over and placed a fatherly kiss on my forehead. A stamp of approval, just like he did all my life, from the first time I did a wheelie on my bike, to the time I’d knocked back my first double Scotch and didn’t mind the burn. He didn’t give out that level of praise often, but when he did, it felt like magic.
I watched emotions play behind those wise gray eyes. The weasel interrupted our father-daughter moment when he banged his stamp on the page and entered his numbers. He slid the contract back to Hooch. Hooch stood and gave one last Whoop! He grabbed hold of his duffel and headed off to Mai Tais on some faraway beach. And for one brief moment I thought, what the hell had I just signed up for?
3
That night, Hooch’s had been kind of slow. That was a bad sign. I knew our clientele had been falling off, but it seemed much more significant now. If I succeeded in turning this place around, I’d be set as far as my career went. If I failed, I’d be back in a pair of pantyhose. Just that thought alone made me desperate for success.
My best friends the Fitzgeralds—Connor and his sister Kay—had shown up to celebrate and help me out if I was short-handed. “Speaking of short-handed, Kay, I have a really big favor to ask.”
Kay looked up with a slice of orange garnish in her hand. She nibbled out the center, waiting for me to finish.
“I was hoping you would help out here at the bar.” I held up a hand to stop her from saying no straight-out. “I know you’re busy at work, but this would be some part-time cash, and it would be for a very short time. Just until I can hire some help. It’s just me and the dishwasher, Joe, now that Hooch took off. Of course, if things stay this slow, I won’t be needing to hire any help.” I grimaced.
Kay picked up another slice of orange and seemed to deeply contemplate the act of peeling the rind from the fruit, then she stuck it in her mouth, chewing slowly, swallowing slowly, smiling slowly. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
I looked over at Connor. He didn’t even wait; he shook his head. “I signed a contract that says I can’t take any other jobs. I’m glad to run in and sling some steins if things get really tight, but it would be a friendship thing, not a work-for-you thing.”
That was fair. Connor was a sergeant on the police force, and before anyone asks, no, I’ve never slept with him. He was darned good looking, and I’m sure one hell of a roll. But one, I had real feelings for the man. He was a dear friend. And two, he had a long-standing girlfriend, Ashley. They’d been together ever since high school, as a matter of fact. I didn’t get along
with her that well—I seldom do with people who sport resting bitch faces as their go to expressions—besides I’ve got my girl code to follow.
Connor’s phone rang, and he swept his finger across the screen. I knew it was Ashley Virginia Randolph by the way he wrinkled his nose before he answered. I wondered if he knew he did that. Sort of like he was smelling B.O. Connor moved away to talk her down from whatever window ledge she was hanging from this time. In the distance, thunder rolled.
“It’s going to rain,” I told Kay, looking out the big picture window at the moonless night.
“Sounds like it.”
I turned to catch her eye. “Remember the mannequin I told you about I found in the bushes? It’s going to be destroyed in the rain.”
“They’re going to pitch it into the bin tomorrow anyway.”
I sniffed. “Feels wrong.”
Kay studied me. “Yeah? You’re serious?”
“I am. It feels wrong to leave her out there like that in the rain. I think we should go rescue her.”
“You understand she’s inanimate.”
“Which is good, since I have boxes filling up the back of my Mini, so I’ll have to tie her to the roof of my car. That is, if you’re coming.”
“If?” she asked.
That right there is why I love Kay.
I closed up the bar early. Shit, I was in charge. I had no customers. I could do what I wanted to. Connor had to go home and soothe the ruffled feathers of the prima donna, anyway. Kay and I grabbed a pair of plastic food-prep gloves, a couple of garbage bags, and a roll of duct tape. Hooch hadn’t really equipped the bar with good mannequin-rescuing tools.
Off we went, with a quick stop by my apartment to fetch my dog, Twinkles. I mean, it was one thing to go rescue a mannequin alone in the park with a storm brewing, but it was quite another to do it knowing the perv might be trying to do the same. Twinkles was a must.
Twinkles, my hundred-and-thirty-pound, muscle bound, all-male Rottweiler. He got his name because he was a Christmas gift from my dad. I left him alone for two seconds. Two seconds! And he must have eaten a string of twinkling Christmas lights off my little table top tree, battery case and all. I figured this out the next day when he was moaning at the door. I put him on his leash and led him to the dog park so he could do his business and meet some of the neighborhood dogs, maybe make a new friend or two. Everyone was super impressed when he finally made his poop, and it came out with flashing mini Christmas lights. At that point, he kind of got the name whether I liked it or not. So “Thor” went by the wayside, and Twinkles it was. It’s okay, he was comfortable in his manhood despite the ridiculous name.
As I loaded us into my car, I looked up at the ominous clouds overhead. In the distance I could see a flash of lightning. Twinkles wasn’t a fan of thunder. Let me rephrase that—I wasn’t a fan of Twinkles and thunder. Something about the low vibrations made Twinkles puke. I usually tried to keep him next to a towel and plastic bag during a thunderstorm, but this was an emergency. Hopefully we’d be home before this became a problem.
When we reached the tulip tree with the azaleas off to the right, Kay gave me a look. “Seriously? You were going to do it here, in the middle of the day?”
“What could go wrong?”
Kay laughed and climbed out of the car. I had Twinkles on a lead, so Kay carried our gear. We snuck into the bushes, and I used the flashlight on my phone to find the mannequin. “She needs a name,” I said, aiming my light over to where Peter and I had left her. We had straightened her out and pulled down her skirt for modesty’s sake, since Peter had packaged her undies. Twinkles let out a menacing growl, then sniffed the mannequin all over.
“Well, she’s a redhead. How about Lucy?” Kay offered as she held out a pair of food prep gloves to me.
“Mmm, she’s dressed more like Jessica Rabbit,” I observed as I pulled the plastic gloves into place.
“Jessica it is. So, what’s the plan?”
“I think we should put her in the plastic bag in case it starts raining and tighten it into place with the duct tape. I grabbed some twine when I was getting Twinkles. We can tie her to my roof and drive her back to the bar.”
“The bar?” Kay mumbled, then used her teeth to bite off a length of duct tape, and wrapped it around the plastic bag at the mannequin’s neck to hold it in place.
“I don’t have room for her in my apartment. I think she might be a conversation piece in the bar. Besides, if I get a talker, and he’s drunk enough, I’ll just push Jessica over to his side to keep him company.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
And that’s what we did.
The trash bags only covered Jessica down to her knees, so her feet were sticking out of the bottom. It turned out the roof of my car was only but so long, so it was a good thing that she had joints in her hips and knees. I could sort of bend her, so she was draping, wide-legged, over my back window. She was pretty secure. I looked up at the swirling black clouds and hoped the rain would hold off for a bit. I loaded Twinkles into the car, Kay climbed in, and I cranked the engine.
4
We were making pretty good time through the city when I saw the red and blue lights in my rearview mirror.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I get as excited as any girl would when she knows she’s about to get up close and personal with a cop. But this time, I was kind of transporting stolen goods. I mean, Jessica didn’t really belong to me. Even though I thought there was a nine-tenths rule and maybe something about the spoils of war that might have me covered.
You can’t imagine my relief when I recognized the swagger of one Peter Harris, shaking his head and moving up to my window. I rolled the glass all the way down. “Top of the morning to you, officer.” I batted my eyelashes and sent him a smile. “I thought you’d be done with your shift by now.”
“I got caught up in a B and E. I’m late getting off. I was driving back to the station when what do I hear over the radio?”
I opened my eyes as wide and innocent as I could make them.
“Two females and a big-ass dog are driving down Main Street with a woman tied to the roof of their car, her legs dangling off the back.” He raised his eyebrows at me. “And I thought to myself, now, who could that possibly be?”
“Peter, can I just say sarcasm is never sexy?” Twinkles was trying to climb into the front seat so he could sniff Peter, and I was trying to push my dog back. I wasn’t having much success. He outweighed me and wasn’t nearly as polite. I grabbed my steering wheel and stuck my elbow out to make a barricade. “Look, I know things didn’t work out the way we thought they would today. That’s not really my fault. But,” I worked to explain as I struggled against Twinkles’s enthusiastic tongue licks, “I told you I’d make it up to you. And I will.”
Kay’s laughter as she pressed up against her door caught Peter’s attention.
“Hi, Kay.”
“Hey there, Peter. I heard that you had an uncomfortable afternoon. I hope you got your color back to normal,” she said in all seriousness.
I reached under Twinkles so I could swat her. I didn’t need her egging things on in just that moment. I wasn’t sure of the laws about this particular situation, but it felt like thin ice to me.
“Do you want to come back to the bar to look for fingerprints on Jessica?”
Peter scrunched his brow. “Jessica?”
I pointed toward the roof. “Maybe after you punch the clock back at the station, you could come by the bar and punch my clock, so to speak?”
“Eww,” Kay said, and I swatted her again.
“I’d love to help out dusting for fingerprints, but I don’t know how to do that, and I haven’t got that kind of equipment. I can make it back to the bar, though. I’ll be happy to show you what equipment I do have.”
I looked over at Kay. “Who do we know…”
“Richard Bishop?” she offered, holding down Twinkles’s bottom so he wasn’t shaking it in her face.
; “You mean, Dick? You’re right! He just got promoted to detective. Yes, I need Dick. And I know he has graveyard shift this week. Let’s call him.” I turned back to Peter, who was looking like I’d just stolen his favorite toy. “I’m sorry, Peter,” I said in all sincerity, putting my hand on his. “Let’s—”
The thunder rumbled, and Twinkles’s stomach gurgled. He whined pitifully, and I let him lunge toward the window as he gagged up his dinner, some grass, and a whole lot of mucous goo.
Peter engaged his cop reflexes, skipping back out of the way as the spew dripped to the road. He was well-versed from his time as a traffic cop, jumping back from nervous DUI stops.
“Hmm,” I said, looking at the flecks that sprinkled his pants and shiny black shoes. “That’s kind of a mood killer, isn’t it?” I was feeling a little green myself. “How about you send me the dry-cleaning bill, and we try to hook up later this week?”
Peter rolled his eyes, tapped the roof of my car, and sauntered back to his vehicle.
As I started up the engine, Kay sang, “Don’t it make his blue balls, don’t it make his blue balls, don’t it make his blue balls blue-oo?”
Peter turned onto State Street and I was aimed for Hooch’s when a whoosh and a buzz muffled Kay’s song. Black filled my rearview mirror. “What the heck?” I threw my arm over the back of Kay’s seat and looked between Jessica’s dangling legs. “What is that?”
“Eyes on the road!” Kay slapped at me. “What are you doing? Put your eyes on the road!”
I jerked the wheel to the right and just missed the center meridian as I swerved to get control. I caught a glimpse of the thing in my side mirror. “Is that a drone?”
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