Chapter 14
MALLORY
“I got arrested.”
I was sitting, awkwardly in my dress–the one that I thought was sexy when I put it on the night before–on the Las Vegas courthouse steps. I had the worst case of walk of shame ever. The dark green halter dress and strappy heels only looked slutty and sad in the bright morning desert sun.
Bridget laughed in my ear. “What was it? You felt up a Chippendales dancer? Stole chips off a whale at a baccarat table?”
I didn’t know what a whale was, but I didn’t really care. I didn’t care about much of anything right now. I was hungry, dehydrated, broke, and humiliated.
“I know! You were counting cards,” she continued, enjoying her own jokes. She knew very well she was the one who could count cards.
“Prostitution,” I muttered.
She laughed even more. “You? Prostitution? Good one.”
I frowned at a crack in the cement step.
“Good enough to be handcuffed on the casino floor, put in the back of a squad car, fingerprinted, had that fun photo taken, and put in a holding cell with a few others arrested for solicitation who I’m now social media friends with until my appointed time in front of the judge and was told my case would be bound over and had to pay bail for my release.
” I said that in one long rush, the worst run-on sentence ever.
She was quiet.
“You’re serious.”
I sighed. “I’m serious.”
“You were arrested. For prostitution. Your friends, too?”
I raised my face to the sun. The past two days, the warm weather had been amazing. Now, all I wanted to do was cry. This was the worst trip ever.
Lindy had been here back in August, returning married to Dex without remembering it, broke up with him and lived on my couch for a week. That had turned into a happily ever after, but I didn’t think this was going to have the same outcome.
“No, just me.” Alana, Megan, and Lia had been at the craps table with some cute guys from Georgia and I’d gone to the bathroom. And never came back.
This morning, they were already gone. Their flights home had left first thing.
I hadn’t even been able to say goodbye in person.
I’d been able to send Alana a text before the fingerprinting and they took my things away.
I’d only just learned they’d left my suitcase at the hotel concierge for me because she’d left a freaked-out voicemail in response.
“You didn’t really do it, though, right? I mean, I know you wanted to have sex with a guy and all, but this is–”
“Sh–sugar, Bridge. Of course not!” I sighed.
“Then how–”
I realized something and my eyes flew open. Panic shot through me, and I cut her off. “Please tell me Mav isn’t right there. You can’t tell him about this. He can never, ever know.”
“What? No, he took Scout for a hike.”
Meaning they were back in Hunter Valley. I wanted to ask what the outcome was with her dick professor, but I didn’t have it in me.
I sighed. “Good. But promise me. You can’t tell.”
“Mal.”
“I didn’t tell anyone when you stole those tampons at the drug store by sticking them up your hooha.”
“I was twelve, had my period and it was epic and I thought I needed three at once and I went back and left five dollars on the counter later that week. There’s a big difference in vagina stories here.”
“No Mav,” I threatened, although I was the one stranded in Las Vegas.
If Mav knew, that meant the others would hear about it. Lindy, Dex. Silas, probably. Theo. Not that any of them would blab, but I was a flipping first-grade teacher who went to Vegas and got arrested for prostitution.
And while Theo might not have found me skilled the other night in the restaurant parking lot, I didn’t think he was looking for a woman to be on the other end of the experienced spectrum either.
“I could lose my job over this,” I said, dropping the big one which scared the shit out of me. There weren’t tons of teaching jobs in town and if word of this got out, I’d never be employable again, even if they didn’t yank my teaching certification.
“Shit. Yes, fine. No Mav. Just come home and you can tell me about it over wine and ice cream.”
I stood, paced. “I can’t. Bridge, I’m stuck in Vegas.”
“What do you mean you’re stuck? You’re still in jail?”
I shook my head, but she couldn’t see.
Two women came out the courthouse doors.
Their names were Trixie and Annie and actually were prostitutes who’d been in the holding cell with me.
They were gorgeous and sexy and really nice.
Somehow–because the police officers thought I was as gorgeous as them to be considered a call girl–I’d been swept up in the same undercover raid or whatever it was that they had.
High-class hookers who made more in a weekend than I made in two months.
To pass the hours in the cell between the late-night arrest and our court appearance times this morning, we’d talked about everything from sex moves to lipstick colors.
Boy, had I learned a lot. I even got their contact info to meet up when we had our court appearances in nine days.
On their way to an awaiting car, they gave me a wave and I offered one back, completely unfazed they were leaving jail. Jail!
Me? I was about to lose it. “No. I’m out.
I went before the judge and I’m free to go, at least for now.
But I missed my flight this morning and it’s on that cheap airline where you have to pay for a carry-on and water and a seat belt.
I have to buy a new ticket without any notice, and I maxed my credit card to pay my bail.
I have something like twenty-six dollars in my wallet and I covered my parents’ rent this month and…
Bridge, I have no way to get home. If I ask Arlo for the money, he’ll think I’m turning into my mother and that is something I absolutely can’t do.
I may have to stay here and sleep on one of my new hooker friends’ couches.
I don’t want to ask, again, because I’m not my mother, but I’m literally stuck in Nevada. ”
Like the bestie she was, all she said was, “On it.”