Chapter Thirty-Four
THIRTY-FOUR
Shepherd knew men like Charlie. You didn’t stand behind a fully stocked bar for years without meeting a few.
Men like Charlie had a chip on their shoulder.
They had to be the Big Dog, even when they were down and out.
Mentally, they were always one good move away from being on top, and if you even looked at them wrong, well.
You risked getting chewed up and spat out so they could keep going.
But Charlie also liked pizza. And Shepherd had a lot of pizza and was no stranger to humble pie.
It was Sunday. He and Ginny had picked up Lex from her friend’s house mid-morning and brought her to the restaurant, because she had a little weekend job where she helped bus tables in exchange for tip money.
That is to say, she wandered around doing close-up magic, badly, and then demanded cash from customers who had little choice but to empty their pockets.
Ginny was working. Shepherd tried to get her back into her apartment upstairs to rest, but she said there was no such thing right now, and at least working kept her from focusing on her family and her mother constantly.
Fresh garlic and roasted tomato scented the air. A table of a family of four applauded Lex’s disappearing-quarter trick. The regulars arguing at the bar were loud enough that he couldn’t hear what Lex said when she bowed.
“What do you mean, you don’t like lasagna?” Regular One demanded, pointing at the TV above the bar. A commercial for an Italian chain restaurant played between Fantasy Hockey Team takes.
Regular Two shrugged. “I’m just not a pasta fan.”
“But lasagna? It’s so much more than just pasta! It’s … I don’t know, man.” Regular One shook his head, his entire universe changing around him. “I’ve never met anyone that didn’t like lasagna.”
Regular Three waved at Noah for another beer. “Gives me heartburn.”
“Well, yeah,” Regular One conceded. “Gives me heartburn, too. Gives everyone heartburn. But that don’t make lasagna less good.”
“I don’t like the layers,” Regular Two added. “I don’t like my food being all structured like that.”
Regular Three turned on Regular Two. Quickly and decisively. “That’s the dumbest fucking thing I’ve ever heard.”
Regular Two was on his feet—but Shepherd had seen this coming. “Hello, guys,” he greeted. He gave everyone a good pat on the shoulder. “How are you today? Need a refill? Round of Dortmunders on the house, Noah.”
They settled as soon as Noah refilled their beers, and Shepherd took his seat at the end of the bar with a view of the door.
The problem was, he should’ve been waiting.
Preparing. Getting ready for talking to Charlie, because he needed Charlie to get money, and he needed money to get Ginny’s mom, and he needed to get Ginny’s mom because …
because he was good at plans! And Ginny kissed him and called him a good man, and yeah, he got to see her naked, and so.
Lots of men had done crazier things for a chance at sex before! He was just a normal, red-blooded man.
The collated list in his binder, color-coded and laminated where appropriate, said otherwise.
If he wasn’t going to work, he could at least prepare for Charlie.
If he wasn’t going to prepare for Charlie, at least he could work.
But instead, he sat at the bar with his—impressive—binder in his lap and stared at Ginny as she took an order from a couple with a giant smile on her face like her entire world wasn’t imploding around her.
If she could lie about that, what else could she lie about?
He rubbed at his chest. The sex didn’t have to mean anything to her to be worthwhile for him.
Maybe the new physical part of their relationship wasn’t about her seeking comfort from him, but about her manipulating him into helping her mom.
And OK, that didn’t feel great. But at least she wasn’t trying to take his money.
Feelings. Bleh.
“Dude.” Noah put a wash rag down on the bar with a wet smack. “Come on. You look like your middle school crush is slow dancing with the kid who gives you swirlies after lunch.”
Shepherd glanced away from Ginny, who stood at the POS station with her notebook in her hand, tapping in the order for the kitchen while her perfect mouth moved silently over the words.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Noah barked out a laugh. “My guy. You’ve been with her every second the last few days. She won’t disappear if you blink.” He leaned closer to him, hands paused in mid-wipe on the counter. “If you’re gonna pine, Boss, at least do it with dignity.”
“I am not pining.” Shepherd glared at him. “You’re fired.”
“Uh-huh.” Noah wiped the bar down directly in front of him. “Maybe one day you’ll say that, and it’ll be true, but today is not that day.”
Lex skipped up to them with a jingling handful of cash she immediately dumped on the still-wet bar. “I’d like a soda, please. A dark one. Extra sugar.”
“Aww, kiddo,” Noah grinned. “You get that for free.”
“I know. I want you also to sort this change and roll it up for me.” She winked. “You’re a good kid, Noah.”
Shepherd laughed. “That’s my girl.”
Noah gave them both a flat look. “Maybe I’ll quit. Huh. How about that?”
The bell above the door jingled. Shepherd nodded at Charlie in greeting.
“Maybe one day you’ll say that, and it’ll be true,” Shepherd said, pushing the change towards his employee, “but today is not that day.”
“Hey, man, thanks for coming,” Shepherd said, putting as much pathetic-ness into his voice as his ego would allow. Which, as it turned out, was quite a bit. He’d have to talk to his therapist about that, once he got one. “Come, have a seat, I’ll get you a drink and a slice of pie.”
“A slice?” Charlie shook his head and gave a light huff. “I’ll take the whole pie. I’m famished. Been working hard all day, you know.”
Shepherd waved to Noah, who had both hands full of coins, and ordered for him and Charlie. Once Noah went away, grumbling and jingling, Shepherd turned on his barstool. “Got everything ready, then?”
“You bet. It’s all handled,” Charlie said. He reached for his coolada with the bravado of a man who didn’t eat cheese out of cans. “You and Ginny ain’t gotta worry about a thing. I’ve been doing this kind of stuff since before you were born.”
“I think we’re roughly the same age.”
Charlie shook his hand from to side. “It’s a metaphor.”
“I don’t think that was a metaphor.”
“So what was it, then?”
Shepherd gestured to Noah for his own drink. “I don’t know. Maybe it is a metaphor. Ginny’s mom told me that my restaurant name isn’t a pun, and that threw me. Grammatically speaking.”
“What? You’re Shepherd and you sell pizza pies. That’s a pun.”
“Right? That’s what I thought. But she was so convincing.”
Noah set down a full cheese pizza and a second coolada with a cold look, and hurried off to the other end of the bar.
Charlie offered Shepherd one of his slices. Shepherd took it. It was hot and greasy, and it folded down the middle. Perfect.
“I met Ginny’s mom, you know,” Charlie said after polishing off a bite. “She scared the shit out of me, and I’ve faced an entire room of armed Canadian gangsters and didn’t break a sweat.”
“Canadian gangsters?”
“They’re more dangerous than you’d realize,” Charlie nodded. “Apologize while shooting your dick off—that kind of thing.”
Shepherd adjusted himself.
“Look, Charlie. Thank you for the hook-up. I mean it. Ginny means the world to me”—that lie burned his mouth—“and she loves her mom.” That lie soothed his tongue.
Charlie waved a hand like he was brushing the praise out of the air. “As I said, her brother’s words moved me.”
Shepherd caught Lex’s eye and gave a little nod. She rolled back her shoulders and then stretched big, touching her toes, touching the air, before skipping over towards them. “Hi, Dad!” she chirped, voice higher than it ever had been. “I love you!”
“Aw, I love you too, sweetheart.”
“Is this your friend? Hi, Dad’s friend.” She grinned toothlessly at Charlie. “I’m Alexis. But you can call me Lex.”
“Well, hi there, Lex.” Charlie wiped his hand on his napkin before offering it to the girl. “How old are you? My son Oliver is almost twelve now, which I can hardly believe. Do I look like I have a twelve-year-old son?”
Lex said, “Yes.” Then she smiled again. “I’m almost ten. But if you tell anyone I’m not ten yet, I’ll find you and your son.”
“Ooo-K.” Shepherd laughed too loudly, patting his daughter on the head. “Thank you, Lex. You were … so, so helpful.”
She gave a bow and then flounced away to bother another table with bad close-up magic.
“Cute kid,” Charlie said, and sounded like he almost meant it.
“Mine is a troublemaker, too. Takes after his mom, eh?” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wallet.
For a wild moment, Shepherd thought Charlie meant to pay for his food.
But instead, he slid out a small picture and placed it on the countertop.
It was a family shot, taken by a professional outside on a beach somewhere.
Charlie was younger, in a white linen shirt and khaki pants, a giant smile on his face, his eyes on the woman beside him.
She was a beauty, with her long, blonde hair tangled in the wind, and her blue eyes crinkled at the corners as she smiled at the camera.
Between them was a boy who looked like Charlie shrunk down into a four-year-old’s body, holding both their hands and waking in the sand.
“He looks like me.” Charlie’s index finger traced the photo, something like reverence in the movement. “But he thinks like her.”
Shepherd stared at the bar top for a while, even after Charlie had taken the picture back and put it in his wallet.
He cleared his throat, raked his fingers through his hair, and tried, very hard, to understand what the hell was going on.
“Charlie,” he said. “Look, man. I got an ex-wife, too. But I don’t keep her picture in my wallet. ”
Charlie said, “Hmm,” like he was judging Shepherd, before going back to his third slice of pizza.
Shepherd fiddled with his pen, clicked it against the binder in his lap. “About this whole thing you have set up. I just … I know you said you’d give me details as needed but, like, I’m the one going in, right? I’d like to be able to have a night to sleep on it—really rehearse it.”
Charlie shook his head. “Better if you’re unrehearsed. You wanna be loose. Quick on your toes.”
Shepherd kept his head down, his shoulders hunched, and tried his best to look forlorn—and didn’t think about how it was such an easy posture for him to take on.
“It’s just, I’ve got Lex to think about.
And Ginny. I’m taking on all the risk. If I could get the outline, Charlie, just the outline—man, I’d sleep a lot better. ”
Charlie sniffed but otherwise seemed unmoved.
“I could throw in a couple of extra meals on the house?”
The ex-mafioso wiped his face with a napkin. “Fine,” he huffed. “Give me your pen.” And then, on the back of the dirty napkin, wrote out a four-step plan.
A. Four. Step. Plan.