Chapter 3 #2
She laughs. It sounds wheezy and fake. “I’m everyone’s type,” she throws back. “Your big bro included.”
“Did you want something in particular?” I know I’m being rude, but there’s something in her attitude and the way she’s looking at me that’s getting under my skin. This isn’t a friendly visit. I’ve met women like her before.
“The brothers here are friendly, but don’t make the mistake of thinking they’re available. Some of these guys are spoken for, and the ones who aren’t are spoken for in ways they don’t know about yet.”
“Is this like in elementary school, where we all picked boyfriends and forgot to mention it to them? If so, I got tired of playing that game in third grade.”
“You’ve got an attitude, anyone ever told you that?”
“Not that I can remember. Don’t you have somewhere to be?”
When she storms off, I thank God for the year I spent at a private boarding school. It was my last year of high school and the year my brother went into the military, so he couldn’t care for me. The snarky, bitchy comebacks turned out to be worth their weight in gold.
“Don’t mind Candy.” The new voice comes from my left. I turn to find a woman sitting at the bar, sipping a huge margarita. She’s a flashy one, wearing all silver—clothing, jewelry, everything.
“Let me guess,” I say. “Your name is Silver?”
She grins. “Yeah, word gets around about me and my love of silver, right?”
I warm up to her immediately because this woman is totally open and nice as can be. “Yeah, everyone has nice things to say about you.”
“And you’re TJ’s sister. He’s hot. I’ve always had a thing for him.”
My eyebrows fly up. “Really? I mean of course you did. He’s a great guy with big muscles, cool tattoos, owns his own home, and is co-owner of a gun repair business.”
“He’s always nice to the club girls,” she says before taking another sip of her margarita. This woman acts like we have known each other for years. I like her already. I sense she has good energy.
“Candy’s not as bad as she seems. She’s just territorial. When a new girl shows up, she’s got to mark her territory. It’s a whole club girl thing. I used to be that way too.”
“Wait. You’re telling me that the two of you are club girls?”
She nods. “I’ve been here for a few years. Candy’s been here a year or so.”
“You’ve got good style. That’s probably why people like you even when you don’t mark your territory.”
She just laughs, snorting some margarita out of her nose. “Girl, you’re so droll.”
“Am I? I never knew,” I respond, pretending to be surprised.
“Doesn’t matter whether you’re droll or not.
You’re here, you’re young, you’re pretty.
That’s enough to get one of the club brothers to fall for you,” she says without an ounce of shame.
“Once Candy figures out you’re not trying to take her favorite brother away, she’ll cool her jets. If not, I’ll handle her.”
“You can do that?” I ask, not too sure about it. Surely, the club girls don’t keep up this kind of immature, petty drama forever. I honestly don’t think I could deal with that long term.
“I can do a lot of things,” she assures me, leaning back on the bar. She stretches her arms over her head. “It took me a while to figure out how things around here worked. I made some mistakes early on.”
“What kind of mistakes?” I ask curiously.
She sniffs, glancing over her shoulder to see if anyone is listening. “The kind you make when you’re young and stupid and think being pretty is the only thing you’ve got going for you.”
“I think that being a good listener gets you more attention from men,” I say. It is just something I know. Years of sitting across from people while I draw their faces taught me that the most important skill in portraiture is not technique. It is attention. People love to feel like they’re seen.
Silver turns and looks at me with genuine interest. “That’s really insightful,” she says. “I think you’re right about that. I can see how that would be true.” She pauses. “You’re not what I expected.”
“What exactly were you expecting?”
“I expected you to be some scared little college girl hiding behind her big brother.”
“That’s not me, not most of the time anyway.”
We sit there for a while, chatting, and the conversation comes easy with Silver. She tells me about her second chance, how she came to Cedar Falls after messing things up in Las Salinas.
We’re knee deep in every kind of conversation when the front door of the bar opens and Flint walks in. He looks amazing in his black jeans, Sons cut, and intricate ink. His eyes find me and Silver immediately. His expression closes down. He cuts a look at Silver that would stop me in my tracks.
Silver catches it too and just grins. “Flint. Do you ever do anything other than frown?”
“Silver,” he responds in a flat tone.
“You know, everyone likes me except you,” she says, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees, teasing him with a glimpse of her cleavage. “What’s that about?”
He glances away. “I don’t like anyone.”
“That’s sad. You should work on that.”
He doesn’t respond to her lightly thrown barb.
Instead, he says, “Leave, Silver. I don’t want you around Jules.”
She looks like she wants to argue the point but thinks better of it.
His eyes move over me, and for a second, I swear that he’s seeing me as a grown-up woman for the first time in his life. There is a flicker of interest. Maybe the realization that I am not just Tommy’s little sister but a person who exists independently in the world.
“Tommy’s gonna be at the gate for the next four hours or so.”
“Yeah, he told me that already,” I tell him.
“Do you need anything?”
“No, I’m good.”
An argument breaks out at one of the pool tables over what kind of motorcycle engine one of them is putting on their bike. The disagreement is fast and furious, leading them both to throw down their pool sticks on the table and stalk off in different directions.
Flint just shrugs and says, “Cool, a table just opened up. Do you play pool?”
I shrug with one shoulder. “I’ve played before. Tommy and I used to play at the Drunken Barnacle, before it shut down.”
“That was fuckin’ eons ago,” he says. “The Drunken Barnacle was my favorite bar.”
“Yeah, it’s a shame. I loved going there because of all the tanks of exotic fish they had on display.”
Stabbing one finger in my direction, he says, “I blame those fuckin’ shithead customers who were pouring their leftover drinks into the fish tanks.”
My eyes fly open. “What? This is the first I’ve heard of alcohol in the fish tanks.”
His hand drops down to his side. “A bunch of dead fish in an eating establishment was considered a public health emergency. The Health Department called it grossly unsanitary and shut them right down.”
Hearing that makes me sad. “I thought the old guy just up and retired one day.”
“Moose retire? Not fuckin’ likely. That bar was his whole life.”
Flint is so angsty over the Drunken Barnacle, so I try to change the subject back to shooting pool. “So, you were asking me to shoot pool with you, right?”
“Yeah, are you up for a game or two?”
“Absolutely, what better way to spend a lazy Sunday than shooting pool with a hot, tatted-up biker.”
He chuckles. “Slow your roll. Tommy has warned everyone not to flirt with his little sister and I ain’t about to piss off my best friend over a little harmless flirting.”
I freeze. “My brother what?”
The expression on Flint’s face shifts into regret really fast. “It’s not like that. Not flirting with your best friend’s younger sister should have been encoded into law long ago. The fact that it hasn’t just goes to prove the world’s not fair.”
I don’t argue. Instead, I shoot him a disparaging look, driving home how much I don’t care for the two of them deciding what’s best for me. Both of them are assholes in my book for even discussing something like that.
“Come on, let’s grab that pool table before someone else does.”
I feel as though I’ve spent a lifetime following along behind him.
He’s always brushed off anything that could be construed as flirting, which is disappointing but not entirely unexpected.
I reluctantly follow him because I’m fascinated by everything to do with this overprotective bastard. I shouldn’t be, but I am.