16
Why did I let you drag me out here?” Thad yelled.
“What?” Von yelled back.
Of course Von hadn’t heard him. The combination of noise from the twenty flat screens tuned to the same Thursday Night Football game, the deejay playing nineties RB from a dais in the corner, and the crush of people packed into the Frenchmen Street bar made it hard for Thad to hear his own thoughts.
“What’d you say?” Von asked, so close to his ear Thad felt spit. He shoved him away.
“I said I’m kicking your ass for dragging me here tonight!”
“Hey, man. We gotta check out the competition.” Von gestured to the crowd with his glass of Crown and Coke. “We need to figure out how to get people to fill up The PX like this once we open.”
Von’s head turned like a slow-moving sprinkler as a woman in painted-on jeans and a shirt so tight it looked as if she was giving herself chest compressions with every breath walked past them.
Thad side-eyed him. “Yeah, it’s the competition you’re checking out.”
“Have the women in this city always looked like this? How did you bear to leave?” Von finished his drink in a giant gulp, then set the glass on the bar. “Be right back.”
Thad rolled his eyes as he settled both elbows on the bar and took stock of the scene before him. He couldn’t deny that this place was lit, especially for a weeknight. They didn’t have any type of gimmick like fifty-cent wings or open mic night either. The bartender told him this was typical, and that if they really wanted to see a crowd, they should come back this Sunday for the Saints home opener against the Atlanta Falcons.
Thad was tempted to come back just to see how they managed to fit in more people without violating the fire codes. There wasn’t an unoccupied seat in the entire bar.
He took a pull on his beer and mistakenly made eye contact with the woman he’d been trying to avoid three spots down. She had done a piss-poor job of being subtle for the past half hour, shooting him a smile every time he glanced to his left.
A year ago, Thad would have been right there with Von, happy to oblige one of the numerous women who hit on him in places like this. But, unlike his friend, he wasn’t in the mood. Hadn’t been for a while.
Should he play dumb and pretend he hadn’t seen her?
Too late. She’d slid off her barstool and was walking toward him.
Shit.
“Can I buy you another?” the woman asked as she approached. She stuck her hand out. “I’m Desiree, by the way.”
“Thad,” he said, shaking her hand. A childhood spent with Frances Sutherland drumming the importance of proper manners into his head wouldn’t allow him to leave her hanging.
“About that drink…?” Desiree asked.
He waited half a second to see if there was the tiniest spark of interest, but there wasn’t even a flicker. Thad pasted on a thanks, but no thanks smile and said, “Sorry, but I’m the designated driver tonight.”
She wedged herself between him and the guy with dreads sitting on the stool to Thad’s left.
“I’ll cover an Uber for you and your friend. Or, better yet, I can bring you back to get your car in the morning.”
Well, damn. Guess she was done being subtle.
“I appreciate the offer—both of them,” Thad said. “But I still have to decline.”
She hunched her shoulders in a casual shrug and slipped away. Thad glanced just long enough to make sure she had taken the hint when he caught another woman staring in his direction. She started toward him, but he held his hand up and shook his head.
He was going to fucking murder Von.
“You handled that well,” Thad heard from over his shoulder.
He turned around to find the bartender changing the stainless-steel pour spout on a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. Thad held up his near-empty beer bottle and the bartender nodded.
He and Von were, in fact, smart enough to have come by ride-share. Though Thad didn’t plan on having more than two beers tonight. After all, this was supposed to be a recon mission.
“I think she would have had a better chance with your friend,” the bartender said as he popped the cap off Thad’s Abita lager.
His friend, the asshole. Thad glanced around, but didn’t spot him. Knowing Von, he’d taken chest compression girl back to his place without telling Thad.
He turned around and faced the bar.
“If you don’t mind my saying, you don’t look like the bar type,” the bartender said.
“I guess I need to change the way I look,” Thad said. The bartender’s brows lifted in curiosity. “My friend and I are opening a place in the Bywater,” he clarified. “That’s why we’re here tonight. He says we’re scoping out the competition, but there’s competition on every corner here.”
“Yeah, if there’s one thing New Orleans can handle with ease, it’s adding another bar. Where in the Bywater?”
He told the bartender the address and the man nodded.
Thad caught sight of what looked like an anchor peeking from the hem of his shirtsleeve. He took a sip from his bottle, then pointed it at the bartender’s arm.
“You serve?”
The bartender glanced down at where Thad had pointed. “Did my twenty years,” he said.
Thad held his hand out. “I made it to fifteen.” They shook and Thad automatically felt more at ease.
He had been cautioned upon leaving the military that it would be too easy to fall into the routine of associating only with like-minded people. Von had accused him of falling into that trap—it was one of the reasons he harped on Thad about spending so much time on the military message boards.
But he couldn’t help it. This was where he felt the most comfortable. It was why he was itching to get The PX up and running, and his own self-serving reason for making sure they employed and catered specifically to military. He loved his family, but this was different. He missed the camaraderie he’d found with his fellow brothers- and sisters-in-arms.
“The bar we’re planning to open, it’s specifically so those in the military will have a place they can feel at home,” Thad said.
He spent the next half hour explaining the concept of The PX to the bartender, who’d introduced himself as Rob, and talking about his time in the service, pausing only when Rob had to step away to grab bottles from the back shelf.
“You know, I make a good living here, but if you need someone behind the bar, I’m willing to help you guys out,” Rob said. “I like the sound of what you’re doing. There’s a lot of those I served with who could benefit from it too.”
“That’s the whole point,” Thad said. “We want to create a place where vets and active duty can have a good time, but also feel safe enough to reach out to people who understand what they’re going through. It’s been nearly a year for me, and I’m still having a hard time adjusting.”
“It’s been five years since I left. I’m not sure that feeling ever goes away,” Rob said. He wiped his hand on a towel and stuck it out to Thad. “I’m pulling for you guys. And I meant what I said about helping you out. Hit me up when you’re ready to open.”
Thad shook his hand again. “Thanks, man.”
This is what he had been missing. That warm, feel-good rush that washed over him. He didn’t want to say that he needed this to feel whole, but…
He needed this to feel whole.
“You still here?” Von said, coming back to where Thad sat. “I thought you said you wanted to be home by ten? I figured you’d left.”
Thad looked over at him and narrowed his eyes. “Did you even get her name?”
Von’s shit-eating grin was all the answer he needed.
Thad could only shake his head.
“Hey, she didn’t ask for my name either. Didn’t stop either of us from having a good time. You ready to bounce?”
Their Uber driver was waiting when they exited the bar. Von had left his car parked at Thad’s since Thad’s house was closer.
“That bar was okay, but I wasn’t impressed with the vibe,” Von said as they settled into the back seat. “I don’t want the kind of place where you can fuck in the restroom and no one notices. Excuse the language,” Von said to the Uber driver.
“No problem, dawg,” the guy replied. “Sounds like I need to check out that bar.” He reached back and fist-bumped Von.
Thad wanted to throw them both out of the car.
He clicked into his messages. Nadia had sent a bunch of fuming-face emojis with a promise to pluck Thad in the middle of his forehead the next time she saw him for not telling their grandmother about Puddin’s television debut.
She followed the threat with a video of his nieces’ reactions when they discovered that the dog in the viral video everyone at their school was talking about was Puddin’. She said they’d watched the twenty-second clip at least a hundred times.
He replied that she needed to do a better job monitoring their time online.
Thad clicked over to his email. His jaw tightened the moment he saw the first one.
“What’s up?” Von asked.
Thad glanced at him. “Nothing.”
“I don’t think so,” Von said. “I can tell something’s wrong.”
This clairvoyant motherfucker over here.
They arrived at his house just in time to avoid Von’s questioning. But, of course, there was no avoiding Von’s questioning. He picked it back up the moment the Uber driver pulled away.
“What’s going on?” Von asked. “I know you aren’t pissed that you didn’t get any at the bar, because you had the opportunity. You still do.” He retrieved a folded napkin from his pocket. “One chick slipped me her number to give to you.”
“Still not interested,” Thad said.
“Such a waste.” Von shook his head as he stuck the napkin back into his pocket. “So, what’s up with you?” he asked as he followed Thad into the house. Puddin’ greeted them with a bark, then gave them his bare ass as he snuggled back into his doggy bed.
“Wait. Before you tell me, is it the kind of news I have to sit down for?” Von asked. “Did you lose all your money shooting dice or something?”
“When have you known me to shoot dice?”
Von shrugged. “I never pegged you as the type to put a sweater on a dog either.”
“My grandmother made me put that sweater on him,” Thad groused.
He considered his options. He could try to continue evading Von, or he could broker world peace. Both would require the same amount of effort.
“I got an email from this woman in Alabama saying she’s a long-lost family member,” Thad said. World peace would have to wait.
“Hmm, according to my emails, all my long-lost family members are broke princes from Nigeria who need me to send them some cash.”
“Yeah, that’s usually the case with these schemes, but this woman is just a few states away. If she’s really in Alabama.”
“Who cares, man. Don’t waste your time on some rando claiming to be family.”
“I care. It pisses me off when grifters like this try to take advantage of vulnerable people. It scares me too. What if I wasn’t here and this woman approached my grandmother?”
Von nodded. “Yeah, when you put it that way, it is scary. So, what are you going to do about it?”
“I was going to ignore her message, but now I think I’m going to answer. I’ll string her along, wait for her to ask for money, and then turn it over to whatever agency handles this kind of stuff.”
“You do know that most people just delete the email, right?” Von asked.
“And that’s why these scammers continue to do it. I’m here to protect Grams, but the next target may not have someone to help.”
“You should tell her the Sutherlands have a family reunion coming up and invite her to join in. See how she reacts to that,” Von said. “I’m gonna grab a water from the fridge, then jet.”
Thad toed his shoes off and put them in the small closet next to the door, then he checked Puddin’s water bowl to make sure it was full.
“I’m meeting Delonte Johnson and Micah Samuels at the Bywater house in the morning,” Von called from the kitchen. A couple of seconds later he came back into the living room with two bottles of water and a bag of Doritos. “Delonte and Micah were both working for a contractor in Gretna, but the job just ended. They said they have a few other guys they can bring in on the demo. All vets.”
“That sounds good.” Thad nodded at his hands. “You know there are several convenience stores between this house and your apartment, right?”
“Yeah, but then I’d have to pay for this stuff. Nothing convenient about that.”
Asshole.
“See you tomorrow,” Von said.
Thad locked up and headed straight for his bedroom. He hadn’t even considered moving into his grandparents’ room, even though it was bigger.
For one, there was always the possibility of his grandmother spending the occasional night in her house, especially when Nadia and her girls came to visit. But Thad was more comfortable in the room he’d grown up in. The familiarity of it had helped him to adjust during the first few nights he’d been back.
He undressed, tossing the dirty shirt, jeans, and socks in the rattan hamper in the corner. Then, wearing only his boxer briefs, fell back onto the mattress. He stared up at the ceiling, pushing thoughts of that email out of his mind. He’d figure out the best way to catch that scammer in her lie later.
He closed his eyes and Ashanti Wright’s face immediately appeared. Thad groaned. His night out with Von had been tortuous enough, he didn’t need reminders of what he wanted but would never have adding to it.
Thad heard the pitter-patter of paws a few seconds before his bed shook with the weight of a fifty-pound poodle jumping into it.
“Out of the bed, dog.” He opened his eyes to find Puddin’s elongated nose two inches from his. “Move!”
The dog walked in a circle three times, then plopped onto the pillow on the right side of the bed.
“This ain’t cool, Puddin’. That’s my side.”
The pom-pom at the end of Puddin’s tail began to swish back and forth.
Thad was too tired for this shit. He folded the other pillow in half and slipped under the covers.
“Stupid-ass dog,” he muttered before using the remote on the fancy ceiling fan and light combo that had been installed—no doubt his sister’s doing—and going to bed.