CHAPTER 18
Nellie
After a week of feeling turned on and embarrassed, I decided I needed a drink. Vera had begged me to allow Waylan to have a sleepover at her house so I was alone for the night for the first time in a long time. Even Ms. Vivian had gone out of town for the night to visit a friend. Everyone had a life but me. I had a pretend, slash, maybe not so pretend, flirtation with my neighbors and a cat who stared at me like I could be his next meal if I didn’t move fast enough.
Deciding to spend my solo night acting like I was a normal, modern woman in her mid-twenties, I went through my clothes and stressed over what to wear for half an hour. Then, after I tried on four different outfits, I settled on my favorite pair of vintage jeans that flared out at the bottom and a lacey white halter top. The outfit made my body transform from the reality of my diet consisting of too many sweets to dangerous curves made to lure men in.
“The miracle of well-made clothing.” I stared at myself in the mirror and shook my head. I’d looked like a blob of woman five minutes earlier. It was magic.
My hair did its thing and I didn’t try to step into its space. I knew my place. After applying a little makeup, I slipped into my vintage clogs and then grabbed my phone and credit card. I was going to the bar and I was going to have a beer and maybe even a good time.
It was already dark out but I still chose to walk to the bar. With Hammer behind bars, Devil’s Den was the place I felt safest in the world. The bar, Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Bar, was busy when I got there. A twangy country song that would’ve pissed Papa Jack off played loudly and hit me in the face as soon as I opened the door. The smell of beer and sawdust filled my nose and I had a moment of awe that it was the first time I was ever stepping foot in the bar. That didn’t happen often in Devil’s Den. Most things hadn’t changed in the decade I’d been gone.
I pushed my shoulders back and walked across the room to get to the long bar being manned by a single woman. Meredith. She noticed me when I leaned against the bar and grinned.
“Well, well. I wasn’t sure this place was your kind of hangout.” She pushed me a beer. “I’m down two bartenders and this is all I’ve got the time and mind to serve tonight, honey. I hope it’s okay.”
“I was going to say that this place is my kind of hangout if it has ice cold beer and no interfering brothers.” I took a long swig from the bottle and let out a sigh of relief. “Perfect.”
Meredith slung beers for a few minutes and then came back to me. “I heard you had a mishap while walking home with your basket the other night.”
I gasped. “Who the hell told you that?”
She threw her head back and laughed. “You really want to know?”
I hesitated. Was Henry a gossiping busybody? “Yes.”
“Sugar saw it happen and she told Bianca. Bianca thought she would get away with telling Vera and not me for some reason so when Vera told me that Bianca told her, I ripped her a new one. Bianca. Not Vera.” She shook her head. “I’ve tried my best to train her but she really thought I didn’t need to know something that juicy ASAP. It’s terrible.”
I couldn’t help laughing. “I really thought you were going to tell me Henry goes to the diner first thing in the morning and gossips with the early morning senior club.”
“You don’t play your cards right and I might.” Henry’s voice startled me. He grinned as he moved around to my side and tugged one of my curls. “You look like a present with that bow at the back of your neck.”
Meredith’s mouth had fallen open and it wasn’t shutting. She looked between the two of us and then just stared at Henry. “You smile.”
Henry groaned. “Of course, I smile. I have all the same muscles as anyone else.”
“You don’t smile.” She pulled out her phone and snapped a photo of him. “Nellie must have magic between her thighs. Holy shit. I’ve got to send this to everyone.”
Henry watched me as Meredith walked away with her phone gripped tight as she tapped away at it. “She didn’t even give me a beer.”
I pushed him mine. “I’ve only had one drink but I must be drunk because Meredith just said I have magic between my thighs.”
He took a long pull from the bottle and then ran the cold mouth of it down my arm. “There is nothing I can say here that won’t get me slapped.”
I shivered as he moved the bottle over my shoulder and down my chest. He was being more forward than he’d ever been and I was quickly realizing the little harmless flirting I’d been doing was elementary school shit. Henry was so out of my league.
His eyes danced with humor as he watched me. “We’ve got a table in a dimly lit corner. Want to take a chance?”
Meredith reappeared with four beers. “Take the fucking chance, Nellie. Run. Be free. Sleep with the men!”
I gasped. “Jesus Christ, this entire town is insane.”
Sugar laughed as she walked by. “Takes one to know one, baby.”
I sent a pleading look to Henry. “I think the corner might be safer for my sanity.”
Once I was standing, he tugged me into his chest and stared down at me with a wicked curve to his mouth. “Out of the fire and into the devil’s den, Nellie.”
I snorted. “That was terrible. I mean it. Probably the worst thing I’ve ever heard.”
He winked. “Keep the bar low and wow them later, that’s how I like to play it.”
I let him pull me after him. “Are you already drunk? Or high? You’re not normally so…”
“Ready to steal your virtue?”
“Flirty.” I swallowed wrong way and started to choke. “Shit. I was going to say you’re not normally so flirty. What the hell, Henry?”
His hands were full of cold beer as he pulled me into him again. In the middle of the dance floor, the bottles pressing into my back, Henry lowered his mouth to the side of my head and nipped my ear. “You’ve been playing with fire all week. Now we’re calling your bluff.”
I locked my arms around his neck and stood up on my tiptoes to return the favor. I raked my teeth over his earlobe and felt his body shudder against mine. “Who said I was bluffing?”
Oh, god, of course I was bluffing! I screamed in my head but I wasn’t going to look weak in front of them. It didn’t matter I didn’t have a clue what the rules were to the new game we were playing. I was playing. Nellie Hellstone didn’t back down and cower to any man.
Or three men who looked like dark gods in all their black.