Chapter 9
CHAPTER
NINE
Mercer
The VFW Post smelled like smoke sunk deep into the wood paneling, stale beer in the carpet, and fried food long gone cold.
I’d been coming here regularly for six months, long enough to know which stools squeaked, which taps ran clean, and which old timers never missed a weekday afternoon.
When I ambled in, two of my favorites were already here and waiting.
“Marine walks in, thinks he owns the place,” Earl rasped from his corner. Seventy years old with his spine curved like a question mark, he was still sharp enough to spot me the second I came through the door.
“Good to see you too, Earl,” I replied while claiming a seat at the bar. The bartender already had a longneck waiting. Perks of being predictable.
Beside Earl sat Jack, a big, bearded man who had served as a gunnery sergeant in Vietnam. These days, he looked more like a train conductor with suspenders and a striped blue hat with flyaway bits of white hair poking out from underneath.
Jack grinned, deepening the laugh lines on his face. “Don’t let him kid you, Doc. He’s just sore you knocked him out of the ‘youngest in the room’ spot.”
I cracked the cap off my beer and gave them both a wry look. “Guess I am a bit of a baby. I’ll try not to cry about it.”
Their laughter was a rumble, low and familiar. That was the rhythm of this place: same stories, same arguments about who had it worse in-country, same bitching about bad backs and politics.
I could slip right into it when I wanted to, but today I caught myself drifting.
Thinking about Darby. His smile across the dinner table three nights ago, the way his tail twitched like it had a mind of its own.
I’d thought about him more than was sensible these past few days, and I’d watched him more than was wise when my eyes should have been on the Dollhouse door.
He confused me, and he knew it. Witty banter, flirty remarks—he tossed them out like live grenades, waiting to see if I’d flinch. And because I kept watching, I learned something I wished I hadn’t.
He did it with everyone.
He rolled his hips, shook his ass, and laid his hands on any customer who walked through the club’s doors.
Especially the wealthy ones. It was like he had a radar for money, an internal compass guiding him toward deep pockets.
I couldn’t always tell if the grabs were for attention or the cash tucked in someone’s wallet.
Even at our dinner, I’d seen it. Something vague and coded, but it didn’t elude me. The way that older man, presumably the manager or owner of the restaurant, came over to make a show of greeting Darby. It made a statement beyond a casual “hello.”
Was I really surprised?
Not surprised but maybe a bit… I hadn’t decided yet.
I’d promised myself to keep it professional. I only watched because Darby was small, easy to manhandle or manipulate, and I wasn’t about to let anyone harm him or any of the dolls under my supervision.
That was my job. That, and keeping Antonella informed. Though the memory of the angel’s wicked smirk when she handed me this assignment made one thing clear: sooner or later, I was bound to end up at cross purposes with myself.
“Speaking of youngest in the room,” Earl piped up, his voice gruff from a decades-long tobacco habit. “Where’s Ollie these days? I’ve been missing him for what must be a month.”
Jack grimaced. “Aw, shit. Didn’t you hear? His dog got out. Mailman left the gate open.”
“And?” Earl tipped his drink back with one liver-spotted hand.
“And it died,” Jack replied. “Got hit by a car. Ollie won’t leave the house without it. He’s real torn up.”
Earl gave a low whistle. “Damn. Well, why doesn’t he just get another one?”
Jack shook his head. “Those things cost thousands of dollars.”
“For a dog?” Earl exclaimed.
Their chatter had drawn my notice, but the bartender was otherwise engaged. He leaned against the back counter with his eyes glued to whatever late afternoon rerun flickered on the TV in the corner. Anything but the news.
“It’s a special dog, Earl,” Jack insisted. “It can sense shit, and it helps Ollie with stuff. Haven’t you seen that vest it’s got on? Says ‘Special Animal’ right on the side.”
“Service animal,” I corrected.
Jack turned. “What’s that now?”
“It says service animal,” I repeated, watching drops of condensation race down the side of my beer bottle.
In the pause, I glanced over to see Jack staring into the near distance. His mouth was bent in a look of concentration, and his belly strained against his suspenders.
“Huh,” he said at last. “Guess I never looked that close.”
I chuckled and gazed at the swamp cooler overhead, rattling and clanking as it pushed out stale air. My drink wasn’t the only thing sweating by the time Jack’s and Earl’s attention circled back around.
“Is that all you’ve got to say?” Earl squinted at me with a glimmer of mischief in his cloudy blue eyes.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“You’ve been awful quiet,” he replied. “Got somethin’ on your mind?”
Jack leaned in to add, “Or someone?”
I snorted into my beer. “What makes you think that?”
“Hell, I’ve been married forty years. I know the look.” Jack leaned back, smug as a cat while Earl confirmed.
“It’s lady trouble, all right.”
I shook my head and failed to bite back a frown. Trouble, sure. I had it all over, and there was a lady involved, often in ways I wish she wasn’t.
“My ex has been making noise again,” I said. My thumb worried the beer label, peeling it in ragged strips. “Claims I’m not stable enough and that Molly’s better off without me.”
The humor drained from both men. They’d heard this before, though it usually took more than a few sips of low-point alcohol to drag it out of me.
Jack grunted, and Earl muttered something under his breath. I didn’t catch the exact words, but I knew the gist. He always had a curse ready when my ex’s name came up.
“She’s ten, right? Your daughter?” Jack asked, his voice soft.
“Eleven.” The word stuck in my throat.
Molly was in middle school now. Closer to adulthood than childhood, and I couldn’t help but feel like I’d missed it. Formative years, defining moments, so much time spent without me in it.
The sole upside of my early retirement had been the chance to reconnect. To wedge myself back into Molly’s life. To feel like a parent instead of a paycheck. I was grateful to be able to support her. That was the main reason I’d enlisted in the first place.
I remembered the day recruiters showed up at my high school, throwing an offer like a life raft into the stormy waters of a prom night liaison turned unplanned pregnancy.
My life was over, according to my mother.
“Time to man up,” declared my father.
So it was, and so I did.
I signed on for what seemed like a fortune to a kid who didn’t know better, but it was never enough. Then came the deployments with hazardous duty pay and the family separation allowance… All the bonuses that made Rachel smile more than she did anytime I was actually home.
So I kept signing up. Pinballing between home and away until they were both and neither.
Earl shook his head and took a long pull from his drink. “Damn shame. A man gets shot at overseas, comes back in one piece, and still can’t see his own little girl. World’s gone upside down.”
I didn’t argue. What was there to say? They knew the story as well as they knew that some nights the only thing keeping me from crawling out of my skin was sitting in this hall with men who carried their own scars, trading tales and spreading them around until the burden felt a little lighter.
Yet even with their company, I couldn’t shake the ghost of Darby’s grin, the memory of his tail striking like lightning through the air. He was undoubtedly another source of trouble, but the kind that had me restless in a way I hadn’t felt in years.
Meeting him had thrown more than a few of my former beliefs into question.
My assumptions about demons. About men. About my taste in men—or if I had a taste for them at all.
But four nights of watching the Dollhouse dancers strut around in next to nothing had shattered any lingering delusions.
I could no longer pretend that certain things didn’t get my attention.
Sleek brown skin. Nipple rings. Thigh-high stockings on short, shapely legs…
Most of the things I noticed had Darby written all over them.
What would Jack and Earl think if I brought that up? That their disabled drinking buddy was keeping company with a demon in false lashes and lace? Earl might have a heart attack just hearing it.
Still, it was better than chewing on the same old wounds.
I cleared my throat, peeled the last strip of my beer label free, and set it on the counter. “I met someone,” I said.
Jack’s pepper-gray brow perked up. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.” My mouth twitched. “Goes by Darby. Works at a club on the Strip.”
That got Earl’s attention, and his grin spread. “Now we’re talkin’. Club girls are like dessert. Nobody needs ’em, but damn if they don’t taste good.”
His enthusiasm took me aback, and I floundered for a reply while Jack tipped his mug toward me.
“Good for you,” he said. “Young folks oughta enjoy being young. Go a little wild from time to time.”
Earl jabbed me with his elbow. “You gonna bring Miss Darby around here, or you keepin’ her all to yourself?”
Miss Darby.
I thought about setting them straight, but then what? These guys weren’t mean-spirited, just old-fashioned, and I wasn’t sure how to explain Darby without saying more than was mine to say.
I shook my head, going for subtle and hoping they caught on. “Not sure this place is exactly his scene.”
“His?” Jack echoed then slapped his thigh. “Aww, just a friend, then. Too bad. I was looking forward to seeing some hot young thing on your hip. We could use a bit of eye candy around here.”
I didn’t reply.
“Just a friend” seemed to fit. A coworker. An acquaintance. And while I couldn’t attest to how Darby might look perched on my hip, I knew how he felt pressed against my back with his lithe arms wrapped around my middle, warm and snug.
How long had it been since someone touched me like that?
“You oughta invite him to Bingo night,” Jack said. “Everybody loves Bingo.”
My lips pursed in a tight smile.
The mental image of Darby daubing cards, trying to win an embroidered tea towel or a jar of homemade jam, was ridiculous.
I’d wager he had panties worth more than anything that came across the prize table.
Not to mention the fact that I was still reeling from the shock of what people would pay for a single bottle of wine, and how I had inadvertently become one of those people.
But that had been a one-time thing. A business outing where we hadn’t talked about business at all. I didn’t expect a callback.
“Well, I’ll be there for sure,” I said while lifting my drink. “I’ve gotten a bit addicted to your wife’s strawberry preserves, Jack, and I’m all out.”
That earned a round of chuckles. Jack gave a little shake of his head, and the bartender looked up from the television long enough to ensure nobody’s glass was empty. I tipped my bottle back, swallowed the last fizz of beer, and let the conversation roll on without me.
This wasn’t Darby’s scene—Bingo nights, cheap beer, and old timers puttering around—but it was mine. Just as ridiculous as imagining him fawning over donated prizes was the thought that he would ever have any interest in me. Or worse, the sinking realization that I might want him to.
He was the star of the Dollhouse stage, the performer everyone watched. Complete with a gaggling entourage who doted, drooled, and dragged their fingers all over his perfectly bewildering body.
My hand fell to my knee, pressing against the hard line of the prosthetic beneath my jeans, a permanent reminder of the parts I’d left behind.
I was damaged goods, lacking in body and soul, and Darby and I were worlds apart.