10. Tommy
CHAPTER 10
Tommy
I ignored the first two calls from the private number, but Margo encouraged me to answer on the third in case it was a friend calling from someone else’s phone. I left her to watch a middle-aged woman ride the mechanical bull. She was enthralled with the atmosphere, and I can’t blame her. It doesn’t matter how many gross dive bars you’ve been inside, nothing ever stacks up to The Bouncing Bull. It is the pinnacle of if you know, you know. It smells a bit like stale sweat and whatever air freshener they use to try to cover the grime. It sparkles like a million stars, though.
Jogging outside to one of the patios, I answer the call. “Hello,” I say, panting once and then again when the person on the other end remains silent but for breathing. I speak again and walk farther from the bar so I can tune in and hear more clearly.
“I’m inside your apartment right now.” The voice is a warble-like pixilation. I recognize it as a voice changer. I swallow hard and flick back to the threatening letters I’d forgotten about when things picked up with Margo. It’s as if they vanished from my mind. More deep breathing from the other end of the line, except now they sound angry or rushed.
A million responses flit through my mind, but I settle on the only one that matters even though I know the response won’t be truth—not when he’s gone through the trouble of disguising his voice and his phone number. “Who is this?”
“It doesn’t matter who this is. You should be asking what I want.”
My heart rate picks up as I think of who I should call to go over there. Normal folks would call the cops, but they’re not even on my top five. I humor the bastard. “Tell me then, what do you want?”
Something that sounds like a growl precedes, “You stole something that doesn’t belong to you. It’s not my job to tell you, it’s your job to figure out what exactly that could be.” Another pause, and I remain silent hoping he says more. The voice distortion trips every few seconds, and I hear a glimmer of his real voice, but I don’t recognize it. The music gets louder for a beat or two, and peering over my shoulder, I see a group of people ambling out to light up. They’re loud and drunk, and I move farther away. “You live like a teenage boy in a messy apartment.” Another pause. “This cow painting.” There’s the confirmation he’s not lying about being in my personal space.
“If I stole something of yours, why don’t you just take it back if you’re inside my apartment?”
“That’s not why I’m inside your apartment.” He hangs up the call.
I immediately call Fish. I know he’s in town. I rattle off everything the second he says hello, and he stays silent. “Give me a half hour.”
Clearing my throat, I then thank him, but for the second time in a few minutes, he hangs up before saying goodbye. This must be an inside job, or even someone thinking I’m someone I’m not. It doesn’t make any sense. I’d love to wait for Fish to call me back, but I can’t leave Margo in that bar without me. As it is, the second I walk through the door I notice she’s surrounded by three men, trying to chat her up. As I get closer, I hear that it’s a bachelor party starting up, and they were the first to arrive.
Margo exhales noisily. “There you are,” she says before her gaze flicks over my face. “Is everything okay?” The fact she can see it means I’m failing at masking it, or she knows me better than anyone in my history. It makes little sense when even my parents have concerns about not knowing who I truly am. I think it’s part of being a chameleon. Somehow and someway, Margo tripped that wire in record time.
And then because the idea of ruining her night seems blasphemous, I lie. “Everything is fine. It was Fish checking in,” I say, swallowing hard. Even a half-lie feels worse after my last thought.
She furrows her brow. “If you say so.” She turns to the three guys. “This is my boyfriend,” she announces. “So that wasn’t a lie.” Margo smiles and blushes. “Tommy,” she adds on when they stay silent, slack-jawed.
I wrap my arm around her waist. “They called you a liar?” I grin and meet their eyes one at a time.
“No, no, no,” one says before backing away. “Just thought she was using that as an excuse to not party with us.” They pregamed before they got here, and it shows in their sluggish movements and slow speech.
“No means no, no matter if she’s lying about me or not,” I reply, sensing when I’ve put just the right amount of fear into them. “But she’s not lying, and you guys better be getting on.” Before I can finish my sentence, they’re backing away and trying their best to melt into a crowd cheering on the next bull rider.
“This place really is something special,” Margo says. “So, is that the bar where Dani made Ron fall in love with her?” She says it in jest, but I can tell she regrets the joke from the way her smile falls. “Too soon?”
I scoff. “Too soon for what? Ron and Dani jokes? The jokes write themselves after meeting Ron.”
“He really is something,” Margo says, then looks at me quizzically. “Be honest, is she settling for him because she’s just ready to be married, or is there some kind of love there? I don’t know her, but seeing the way she was looking at you made me think twice. More than twice if I am honest. With Ron standing next to you, she realized what she was losing or what she won’t have in her marriage.” She clears her throat. “If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s okay, but your history is so deep, I’m sure there’s some part of you that cares about whether she’s ruining her life.”
I stroke her face gently. “I care about her about as much as I care about her vapid friends, Margo. Everyone makes decisions and mistakes and learns from them. Some just pay a higher price. Do I think Dani is marrying for the wrong reason? Maybe. Maybe not. I do think most of her friends, parents, and family think she’s making a mistake. Let’s not talk about her anymore. She doesn’t matter. I do have to admit to a lie.”
“Come on, let’s get a drink, and you can tell me who was really on the phone,” Margo rushes out, pulling my hand. I marvel at her for a second or two but allow her to whisk me to the bar and purchase a beer, then we head to a side area where there is a floor for line dancing surrounded by high-top tables. It’s not filled yet, but that will change quickly.
“What’s going on?” she asks, setting her drink down after taking a long sip.
Tilting my head to the side, I study her. She’s so fucking perfect. “I think someone broke into my place. He called my cell from inside and said I took something of his. Nothing to panic about because Fish went over there to see if he could catch him and to also clear it to make sure nothing was left behind.”
She asks me to repeat myself and then wants to know exactly what was said. After I give her the word for word, her face looks ashen. “Did your friend find anything? What was he going to look for after the fact?” She also asks why we didn’t report it, but I brush the question away.
“He is en route now. There are some outside cameras run by apartment management that might have caught something. He will check with the office. Mostly he will look to see if anything obvious was stolen or if he left anything behind. Don’t worry though, we’ll get the details and end it. I wanted to have you over when we get back. I planned on cooking for you and having a proper date night in, but I don’t know if that’s a great idea anymore.” Rage simmers just below the surface when I realize the invasion of privacy affects my life—and Margo’s, too.
The days are numbered until I leave for deployment. Every second has to count before I leave. Workup is in full swing, and my training trips have already cut into our time together. This thing with Margo is new and must be protected and secured. I’ll leave for too many months. There’s lore passed around the Teams that if a relationship is new, there’s no way it can survive a deployment. For most of my brothers that isn’t an issue—they enjoy variety and dating around. There’s the exception of a few happily married guys, and I relate more to their mentality. I crave commitment—long for the true companionship I’ve seen with my parents.
“We can use my place for date night,” Margo says, interrupting my thoughts. “Or I can cook. You know, I could use the practice. I could be the sous chef.” Her smile is wary but warm. It’s hard to stay angry when her face is shining up at me like I’m the sun.
“That sounds like a perfect date night,” I say. “Tell you what, you let me worry about the break-in. Don’t let it ruin this night. I won’t forgive myself if I don’t get a chance to see you on that bull.” A little of the rage diminishes, and it’s shocking how the Margo effect happens so quickly. This is something a normal person would stew on for days or weeks until answers came about, and with a sweet shake of her ass, she has me thinking about anything but the home intruder.
Margo swallows hard as she pulls me toward the bull. “Let’s go get in line. Drinks and the bull, and if the mood strikes, maybe dancing on top of the bar?” She licks her lips. “You’d catch me if I fell, right?”
On a million planets, in any time and space, I would catch her.
I grin. “You haven’t fallen yet?”
Her response is a quick flash of her bright white smile. Margo grabs my hand and squeezes. “Touché.” As we walk, she remains quiet in the raucous atmosphere. “He told that story in front of a group of people,” she finally muses. Ah, that’s why she’s been quiet, it’s replaying in her mind over and over.
“For what it’s worth, I could tell she was pissed at him for telling it and not making up something more savory.” She wanted him to serve a fictional tale of forever love, and he served up cold cuts that might have stayed at room temp for too long.
A line to ride the bull formed while we were talking. Margo takes her place in line. “You have to know her better than anyone else in the world. It has to be strange to know what she’s thinking and how she’s feeling given the circumstances.”
It’s true. I wonder if I’ll always be able to read Dani’s face like a book. It used to be my favorite story, but now she’s just someone I used to know. The connection to Margo and the ease with which we melt into one is something I didn’t think was possible. “It’s not so much strange as it is a relief that it doesn’t matter what I recognize. It’s not my problem anymore.” I swallow. I have to deflect a bit of the tension from my past relationship. “Do you feel the same way about your ex?”
If I had to guess, I’d say the whole bar saw her stiffen at the mention of him. She’s spoken of him, of course, and I know what he did to her is the reason she’s imposed the five-date rule, but I don’t know the details of what happened and why.
She clears her throat before she says his name. “Hollis,” she drawls, speaking it like a curse word. “Was good at hiding things from me, especially his emotions. I don’t know if I could honestly say that I ever knew what he was truly thinking.” Margo pauses and takes a deep breath. “At the end, anyway. When a person who supposedly loves you breaks your trust so badly, I doubt there was ever a true understanding of how he felt.” Her eyes look wounded as she glances up to my face. “I don’t think it was the same as what you had with your ex.” There was a stammer at the end, and I think it’s because she didn’t want to say Dani’s name. Fuck. There’s doubt creeping in. I sense it in the air.
We’re almost to the front of the line because the dude running the bull is having a ball throwing people off as quickly as he can. I lick my lips when she exhales noisily. “I wish I could kill the person who broke your trust. You know you can trust me, right? It’s easy to take promises at face value and wonder if they hold staying power. My promises are an artisanal cheese compared to his spray from a can of whiz.”
She smiles wide. “I don’t think I’ve heard anyone compare promises to cheese, but I do love cheese, so I can get on board with it.” She’s up next. “What if I suck at the bull, Tommy?”
“Then I won’t sign you up for the rodeo, darlin’.” I grab her chin. “Do your best.”
The man currently on the bull spins around so fast I don’t know how he’s still on. The operator is chuckling from his little podium of power—his voice narrating the experience through a microphone—quick like a cattle auction. When the man flies off, landing on the soft, blow-up air bag flooring, I walk her out and help her on, then instead of walking to the spectator area, I join the operator.
“If you hurt her, partner, you’re answerin’ to me,” I drawl like it’s a joke, but the look in my eyes is deadly serious.
His dark brown eyes widen, and he presses a few buttons before announcing the start of her ride. Margo is smiling as she watches me—knowing full well exactly what I’m doing, I’m sure. He starts slow but doesn’t try to spin the bull to ditch her as quickly as the others before her. The spotlight on her illuminates her smile and the tip of her nose, and the tops of her thighs, and with one arm in the air, her laughter cuts through the chaos of the country music and loud voices.
She’s beautiful.
She’s magic.
She makes me want to stay. Stay where? Anywhere she is.
He presses a button to slow the ride and doesn’t throw her off. She slides off the side and walks unsteadily on the uneven floor making her way to me as patrons cheer her victory. I slide the operator a twenty-dollar bill and meet her at the edge of the faux arena, grabbing onto both her hands.
Margo’s laugh is infectious as she gives me a seductive smile. Even knowing Fish is dealing with my bullshit back home, and the unknown should make me twitch, I’m undeniably happy here in this moment with her.
“He went easy on me,” Margo says, nodding at my new friend controlling the bull as he announces the next rider to enter and mount the bull. “It should have been harder.”
“It was just as hard as it should have been,” I say loudly enough for both him and her to hear. I wink, and we head to the bar. “What next?”
Margo pulls my shirt and faces me to her. “You want to leave here and call your friend and figure out what happened at your place. I appreciate you giving me a fun time at The Bouncing Bull, but I want what you want. We can’t just ignore this and party all night.”
“Au contraire, my sweet girl, we can, and we should.”
She raises one brow. “But we’re not.”
“Fine, fine. We won’t. I think you got the full experience anyway.” I pause. “The floor isn’t sticky with beer quite yet, but I’m sure you can imagine what that’s like.” She grins and locks her hand in mine.
As we’re making our way to the exit, we run into a few folks we saw at the engagement party lingering at a table near the entrance. One is a friend of Dani’s but not a bridesmaid, just a run-of-the-mill friend. Margo slows, so I know she recognizes her as well. “She lost her mind after you both left,” she says before we say a single word. “Blew up at Ron for oversharing. Did it in front of the entire party. It was like watching a ticking time bomb. Ron looked like a deer caught in headlights or something.” She pauses, ostensibly waiting to see if I have anything to respond with, then says, “I can’t believe you showed up. You know her well enough to know she was going to be a mess seeing you after the breakup.” While I know this woman is a friend of Dani’s, I don’t know her well enough to guess her intentions.
Everyone seems to be shocked that I made an appearance even though I was an invited guest and was given a plus one. Margo is uncomfortable like anyone would be in this situation. I tread lightly. “She’s moved on and so have I. I didn’t think much of it. It was her engagement party. Was I to assume she hadn’t moved on?” I don’t say I knew she was mad at Ron the second he opened his mouth because that would make Margo even more uncomfortable, but I knew. I could see it in the set of her mouth and the glint in her eye. I did not expect her to make a scene, though. She was raised like most folks in the South—you keep all your arguments behind closed doors. Flatter in public, berate in private. That’s the southern way. I swallow hard, release Margo’s hand, and wrap my arm around her waist. “I shouldn’t have gone, I guess.” I lift one shoulder. “It was good seeing you.”
“I wouldn’t be shocked if Dani calls the wedding off,” she says to our backs after we’ve passed. “She wants you back, Tommy.”
I pause mid-stride as her words sink in and shake my head. Don’t respond. Don’t react. This isn’t my monkey, and it’s not my circus. Not anymore. I’m glad. I’ve moved on when I didn’t think it was possible. There’s not a cell in my body that wants to go back to Dani—that would ever go back to Dani.
The relief I feel when we’re alone, safe, ensconced in the vehicle is enormous. Then I turn and see Margo’s expression—tears threatening to drip over the corner of her eyes.
Fuck.