Chapter 2
2
DELUCA, SOUTHSIDE SUBURB OF INVERBORO, WISCONSIN, POPULATION 2 MILLION
Two years later
Ella groped her way through the crowd to meet Rosie at their usual booth. Except it wasn’t their usual booth. Nothing about the mom-and-pop neighborhood bar was usual anymore.
It had been destroyed, the new owner making no attempt at retaining any of the kitschy honky-tonk charm.
The death knell had sounded a few months ago when Ed and Phyllis, owners for the last thirty years, had announced they were selling up and buying an RV. The entire time it had been shut down for refurbishment there’d been an awful feeling in the pit of Ella’s stomach.
The sign going up last week had confirmed her worst nightmares. The Touchdown was a sports bar.
Gone were the slightly shabby, chipped linoleum tables and worn red leather bench seats and the endearing faux flaming torches that balanced on the walls, throwing a comforting blanket of warm yellow light. In their place was horrible retina-detaching neon and big-screen TVs in every direction.
The display of beer cans from around the world had been sacrificed as well. As had the comfortable, wide wooden bar stools that actually supported her ass, replaced by trendy metallic structures that looked like they’d crumple beneath Ariana Grande’s svelte frame.
The cheesy Coolidge prints of dogs playing poker and snooker above the pool tables were gone, too. In their place were framed footy jerseys and other sporting paraphernalia.
And it was dark. Black-hole dark.
The neon may have been bright enough to induce epilepsy but it barely threw the light of a firefly. Ella winced at the slick, shiny surface of the metallic booth table, cold beneath her elbows. An equally metallic song with a heavy bass beat and no discernible lyrics throbbed around the room.
“This is horrible,” Ella bitched.
“Yup,” Rosie agreed, handing Ella a glass of white wine. “I think we’re gonna have to find a new TGIF watering hole, babe. This is more Holy Shit it’s Friday.”
“But I liked it here,” Ella whined then hated herself for whining when it was the epitome of a first world problem. Still, today was going from bad to worse. “And it’s ten minutes from home.”
Rosie quirked an eyebrow. “What’s up?”
Ella took a sip of her drink. “The letter came today.” They’d only just started the new school year for crying out loud. Way to take the shine off.
“Bastards!”
“Uh huh.”
“Pen pushing, bureaucratic, assholes.”
Ella nodded, her friend’s insults music to her ears. Real music, not the techno-crap that was currently vibrating around them. “What you said.”
“That lot couldn’t organize a fuck in a brothel. Screw them. Screw them all.”
Ella smiled despite the heaviness that had settled around her since opening the ominous yellow envelope at 8a.m.
Her bestie’s colorful language was the perfect counterbalance to Ella’s more judicious use of profanity. Growing up around the quirk and color of the midway had well and truly rubbed off and Rosie’s unique way with words was just one of the things Ella loved about her.
Combine that with dramatically dyed black hair, chunky combat-style boots, blood-red lips and eyebrow piercings, and Gypsy-Rose Forsythe was a sight to behold.
Raising her glass, Ella clinked it against Rosie’s. It was good to have such an ardent supporter in her corner. “Amen.”
Ella’s self-appointed champion since the age of seventeen, Rosie had been exactly what tightly wound Ella had needed. People who knew them often wondered what two women of such complete opposites had in common. But Ella didn’t – she knew she owed Rosie everything.
That fateful day when the carnival had driven in to Trently had been a major turning point in her life and she thanked her lucky stars for it, for Rosie , every day.
Two misfits against the world.
“How long have district given you?”
“Till the end of the year,” Ella said gloomily. “If my enrollments haven’t picked up and my truancy record improved, they’re going to shut us down.”
“What?” Rosie shook her head in disgust. “Fuckwits.”
Ella swirled the contents of her glass gloomily. “I never wanted this damn job. I never wanted to be principal.”
“I know.”
She threw a desperate look at Rosie. “I’m a math teacher.”
Rosie squeezed Ella’s hand. “And a damn good one.”
Ella gave her friend a lopsided smile. “How were any of us to know that Kelvin was going to crack under the pressure? This position was only meant to be temporary.”
“It’s not your fault no one wants to work there.”
Ella sighed. “They’re not bad kids. Not most of them. They’re just living really tough lives.” Something that had been further exacerbated by the current cost of living crisis.
“I know,” Rosie murmured again.
And she did know. They both knew how rough it was to grow up standing on the outside, looking in.
To be one of the have-nots.
“But they need Deluca High. The whole community does. Even if they don’t realize it.”
Sure, a small public school in the lower socio-economic suburbs of southside Inverboro, faced its share of challenges but Ella believed passionately that every kid, no matter their circumstances, deserved a good education. The problem for Deluca High was the proximity of two other public high schools and a district office looking to pinch pennies.
“I can’t turn my back on that,” she continued. “Not like Kelvin.”
“What are you going to do, babe?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t know. But I’ve got five months to come up with something.”
“You will.” Rosie squeezed Ella’s hand again. “We will.”
Ella smiled. This was the Rosie she knew and loved. Behind the don’t-fuck-with-me facade, Rosie was a bona fide pussy cat. She gave to buskers – even the terrible ones – she helped in the local soup kitchen, she wrote letters of protest for Amnesty International.
And she collected strays. Including Ella.
“Enough of me,” Ella dismissed, so sick of herself and her constant woes. “How’s it going with preppy boy?”
“He kissed me today.”
“ What ?” Ella’s eyes widened. “How old is he again?”
“Twenty-eight.”
“God, Rosie. He’s a baby.”
“I know. I’m a bad, bad person.” She sighed dramatically. “I’m probably going to hell.”
Ella rolled her eyes. Like the thought of a fiery afterlife wasn’t a turn-on for a semi-Goth chick. “What happened?”
“I dragged him into the stationery cupboard and suggested that we should do something about the chemistry burning between the two of us and that he should take full advantage of my appalling lack of morals and kiss me already.”
“Oh my God.” Ella laughed. Rosie, in complete contradiction to her appearance, worked as a systems analyst at city hall. Preppy guy worked in the same building in the mayor’s office. “So he kissed you?”
“Well, at first he said it was highly inappropriate and broke the rules of workplace conduct from 11a through to 19b.”
Ella gasped. “He did not!”
Rosie grinned. “I swear to God he did. And then I said in my opinion workplace rules were the most fun to break and he should give it a go.”
“And?”
“Let’s just say that man follows directions to the letter.”
Shaking her head, Ella said, “Isn’t he a little… strait-laced for you?”
In Rosie’s quest for the one , Ella had seen a procession of men through her life and none of them would ever be described as preppy. Her men were edgier. They rode motorbikes and got into bar fights. None of them would have given one fuck about the rules of workplace conduct.
“Yeah, but there’s something so endearing about him. He’s so neat and prim. I just want to… mess him up a bit.”
Ella shook her head, wishing for the thousandth time she could have just an ounce of her friend’s faith that Mr. Right was out there somewhere. If Rosie’s life was a song it’d be ‘I Get Knocked Down (But I Get Up Again)’.
Ella’s would be ‘(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction’.
“They’re not toys,” she tutted.
“Well, this one certainly isn’t. His great-grandfather was governor of the state back before World War I. His grandfather was a senator. His father is a fancy lobbyist for the DNC and his mother is some hobnobbing charity queen. He still lives at home with his parents . In Warrington Fields.”
Ella raised an eyebrow at the mention of the exclusive outer suburb known for its mansions and acreage. Rosie getting involved with a wealthy political dynasty? That didn’t compute.
“He doesn’t even cuss. ”
Smiling at Rosie’s horrified admission, Ella cut to the chase. “So, he’s a challenge?”
“Well.” Rosie grinned. “I do love me a challenge.”
Yes, she did. But for the first time ever since she’d known Rosie, Ella saw a brief hesitation before the confident grin. Something told her Rosie wasn’t as sure of herself as usual.
“Hey.” Rosie brightened. “Maybe Simon can use his connections to help with the school thing?”
Ella shrugged. “Maybe.” She was willing to take any help on that front.
“I haven’t seen Curtis at the house all week,” Rosie said, changing the subject.
“We decided it was best to stop seeing each other.”
“Oh, babe.” Rosie reached across the table and squeezed Ella’s hand. “I’m sorry.”
Ella sighed. “Don’t be. I think it was possibly the dreariest relationship I’ve had to date.”
“That’s saying something.”
Ella didn’t bother to protest her friend’s statement. It was depressingly accurate. In the last two years, in her effort to exorcise the ghost of the best sex she’d ever had with the one man on earth she shouldn’t have had it with, she’d decided to only date Jake opposites.
Men who had proper jobs and didn’t give a damn about sport. Arty men. Intellectuals. Bookish.
“Don’t get me wrong, he was great. But in the bedroom department, he was a bit…”
“Dull?”
Ella shook her head. “Too…”
“Boring?”
Frustrated, Ella searched around for the right word that didn’t make her sound like an ingrate. “Nice.”
Feigning horror, Rosie suppressed a smile. “That’s terrible.”
She shot her friend a quelling look. “You know what I mean. Is there something wrong with wanting a man to take the lead for once? A little bit of masterfulness?”
“So you want to be dominated?”
“No!” Well… maybe a bit of friendly bondage would be okay but no red room stuff. “I want… I don’t know what I want.”
Rosie looked at her patiently. “I do. You want head-banging sex without the emotional vulnerability. The nice get too close and, thanks to Rachel, you’ve spent your entire life keeping men at a distance.”
Sometimes Ella hated how well Rosie knew her. She placed her wine glass down. “Do you know what I found myself thinking about when we were doing it last time? Pythagoras.”
Rosie laughed. “Because A squared plus B squared equals C squared is some kind of math nerd turn on?”
Ella groaned and thunked her forehead on the table. “No. But he was being so… considerate. You know, touching all the places in the correct order as if he was ticking them off a list. It was like… sex-by-numbers.”
Lifting her head, Ella took a drink, propping an elbow on the table and slipping a hand under her head for support.
“And he kept talking,” she continued. “Asking if I was okay. Did I like it? Was there anything I needed? Tell him to stop if I wasn’t comfortable. I mean, I know we’re supposed to want that these days and intellectually, I really appreciate it. But… whatever happened to talking dirty? My mind just drifted.”
“To Pythagoras ?”
“Yup.” Typical that instead of conjuring up some filthy fantasy like sex with a boat load of marauding pirates, her mind had drifted to a dead Greek mathematician. “In my defense, I had been trying to explain it to Cam a couple of hours beforehand. And… Pythagoras was apparently a bit of a hottie.”
Dubiousness quirked Rosie’s eyebrow. “Oh yeah?”
“It’s true, I’ve seen busts.”
Rosie pressed her lips together. “Uh huh.”
“God.” She shook her head. “What’s the matter with me? If I have to fake another orgasm, I think I’m going to join a convent.” Ella stopped and frowned at Rosie. “Wait… are nuns allowed to masturbate?”
“I would have thought it a prerequisite.”
“Right?”
“Look. Babe.” Rosie eyed Ella over the top of her glass. “It sounds to me like you need hot jock sex again.”
Ella opened her mouth to protest. Hot jock sex was exactly what she didn’t need. What she’d been trying to purge from her system. But hell, at least Jake Prince had made her come three times in forty minutes.
That was three times more than any other man had made her come over the last two years.
And he hadn’t stopped to ask her what she did or didn’t like, he’d just thrown her on the bed and taken charge. Told her what he was going to do to her in the most smutty, explicit terms possible.
Even now her toes curled at the memory.
“I certainly wasn’t thinking about Pythagoras when I was with Jake.”
“I like Jake.”
Ella rolled her eyes. “You’ve never met him.”
“He made you come, right?”
“A lot.”
“Then I like Jake a lot .” Rosie grinned as she raised her glass. “To multiple orgasms.”
Ella clinked her glass against Rosie’s. “Amen.” But honestly, right now, she’d settle for just one.
Throwing back the contents of her glass, Ella was done with this music. “If I have to listen to one more minute of this techno-crap garbage I’m gonna burst a blood vessel.” She stood. “I’ll get us another round and put something decent on.”
Ella groped her way carefully into the darkened environment, more than a little pleased to find the jukebox was in its original position. Even if it was a different model. It was still old fashioned though, reminding her a little of the one in The Rusty Nail, and she felt curiously comforted by its presence.
Maybe the new owner had a heart after all.
As another synthesized musical monstrosity assaulted her ears, she eagerly scanned the list of songs, quickly growing dismayed. All her favorites were gone. All the country hits were gone as was all the great seventies and eighties rock. All the good music was gone!
The antique shell held a cold neon heart.
Instead there was a who’s who of gangster rap, dance music, hip-hop and electronica. The sort of stuff Cam and half the students at her school listened to incessantly, blaring from their ear buds at eardrum-piercing volumes while vaping.
They didn’t even have Taylor Swift.
Ella shuddered. This had to be a joke! After the day she’d had, messing with her jukebox was unforgiveable. The absolute last straw.
Whoever this new owner was, he was about to get a piece of her mind. She could forgive him the neon and the big-screen televisions but the jukebox ?
That was going too far.
Jake ignored the rough bite of bricks at his back as he leaned against the alley wall and downed half of his Corona.
He was drinking too much.
Perhaps buying a bar hadn’t been such a swell idea, but what else did washed-up sports stars do? If it was good enough for Sam Malone it was good enough for him.
Still, there’d been plenty of commentary from friends and colleagues over his choice of bar location. They’d all urged him to buy a hip place in the swankier northern suburbs where people with money – him included – lived. But there’d been something familiar about the suburban, southside honky-tonk that had appealed.
That had spoken to him.
Sure, he’d erased all that kitschy shit during the renovation but, according to his father, it was the people that made a bar what it was and, although this neighborhood was a far cry from his current lakeside digs, he felt at home here.
Raising the bottle to his mouth again, Jake took a long pull, savoring the cold bitter taste. As a young rookie, he’d learned the perils of alcohol the hard way and had been practically teetotal for the rest of his career. But with that in the toilet and his father’s genes tightening their grip, his fondness for the amber liquid had returned with a vengeance.
A clatter further down the alley disturbed the peace and Jake turned to locate the cause. A sad-looking excuse of a mutt backed guiltily away from some upended wooden crates, eyeing Jake warily. It was some kind of Jack Russell cross, painfully skinny, its ribs well defined beneath mangy fur that was probably mostly white beneath all the ingrained filth.
“Hey, boy.” Jake slid down the wall, the bricks snagging at his black T-shirt. He reached out a hand and waited patiently for the neglected animal to come closer. “You lost?” he murmured as the dog approached tentatively, a slight limp making his countenance even more pathetic.
The poor animal looked like he’d been kicked when he was down one too many times and Jake could relate. The mutt’s steps grew even more hesitant the closer he got and, in the end, it was Jake who gently bridged the distance between them.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he crooned, scratching the soft spot under the dog’s ear. “What’s your name, buddy?”
Jake looked for a collar, not surprised when he didn’t find one. “Are you a runaway, boy? Are you homeless?”
He cupped the dog’s head, noting the gray muzzle as he looked into those sad, mistrustful eyes. Old and down on his luck. “Yeah, life’s a bitch, ain’t it?”
The dog whined and Jake petted the length of his coat, feeling each dip of his ribcage. “You hungry, boy?”
The door beside him opened abruptly and the bass throbbed into the sultry ripeness of the alley. The dog pushed himself closer to Jake as a low whistle emanated from the doorway.
“That’s one ugly dog.”
The dog moved closer again and Jake petted him reassuringly. “It’s okay, this is Pete. He’s an annoying pain in my ass but he won’t hurt you.”
Pete crouched beside Jake letting the dog sniff his hand. “Some woman’s at the bar bitching about the jukebox and demanding to see the heartless asshole who’s ripped the soul out of her honky tonk.”
Jake sighed as he fondled the dog’s head. Running a bar in Inverboro wasn’t like back home. It wasn’t like TV either.
Draining the last mouthful of beer, he stood. “Well, I guess that’s me.”
Pete stood too, clapping him on the shoulder. “That’s why you’re paid the big bucks,” he quipped before heading back inside.
Jake looked at the dog, who gazed up at him with don’t-leave-me eyes and gave the most pathetic tremble Jake had ever witnessed. “It’s okay, boy. I’ll send Petey out with some food soon.”