Last Chance Book Club(2)
Author: Hope Ramsay

Dash chuckled. “As I recall, it blew apart in about a dozen flaming pieces. But yeah, it melted.”

“It was my favorite, Twirly Curls Barbie. And—”

“Cool. What kind of snake did you put in the bed?” Todd asked.

“A garter snake, entirely harmless. Scared your momma to pieces, though. You should have seen her running through the hallway in her baby-doll nightie. It was the—”

“Dash, I really don’t think we have to rerun our entire history for Todd’s benefit, do we?” Savannah said.

“If we’re talking about the past, princess, it’s because you raised the issue.”

Aunt Miriam entered the fray. “I declare you two sound just like you did when you were children. Now both of y’all act like the adults you are and c’mon back to the kitchen and have some dinner. I’ve got one of Jenny Carpenter’s pies. A cherry one, I believe.”

Dash flashed a bright smile in Miriam’s direction. “Yes, ma’am, I will try to behave. But no thank you, ma’am, to the dinner and pie. I have errands to run up at the stable. Aunt Mim, will you be all right if I leave you with Savannah for a little bit?”

“You go on, Dash. I’m fine,” Miriam said.

He nodded to Savannah. “Welcome back,” he said without much enthusiasm. Then he strode toward the front door, his cowboy boots scraping across the oak floor. He stopped at the rack by the door and snagged an old, sweat-stained baseball hat bearing the logo of the Houston Astros. He slapped it down on his head and turned toward Miriam. “Don’t wait up. I’ll probably be late,” he said, then turned toward Savannah. “Princess.” He tipped his hat and headed through the open door.

“Dash, don’t slam—” Miriam’s admonishment was cut off by the loud bang of the front door slamming.

Todd spoke into the silence that followed. “He’s really tight.”

Oh, great. Dash Randall was the last person on earth that Savannah wanted as a role model for her problem child.

“Boy, that was a big mistake,” Dash muttered as he watched the television above the bar. The Atlanta Braves’ pitcher had just served up a meatball, and the batter had clocked it 435 feet.

“Uh-huh. Dash, honey, you want another Coke? You’ve been nursing that one for the better part of an hour now, and it’s mostly water,” said Dottie Cox, the proprietor of Dot’s Spot, Last Chance’s main watering hole.

Dash pulled his gaze away from the spring training game on the television above the bar and looked into Dottie’s over-made-up eyes. Dottie had to be pushing sixty hard, but she was outfitted in a neon green tank top and too-tight blue jeans. She might be trashy, but she had a heart of gold.

“Honey, you want another Coke?” Dot asked again.

Dash took a deep breath. “I guess I’ll have to settle. Especially since I can’t have you.”

Dottie leaned over the bar and gave him the kind of wise look only a bartender could manage. “Dash, if you want to flirt, go find someone your own age. In fact, I have a suggestion—why don’t you find your courage and do something about Hettie Marshall.”

He squinted back up at the television. “They’re putting in Ramirez. Good move,” he muttered.

“I declare, Dash, you’re a chicken. And I don’t mean one of them chickens they process out at the plant. Hettie is a single woman now, and near as I can tell you’ve done nothing about it.”

“She just lost her husband. She’s in mourning.”

Dottie leaned an elbow on the bar. It was a slow night at The Spot. The house band didn’t play on Mondays, so the regular patrons were feeding their pocket change to the jukebox. And since the regulars drank too much, the jukebox was pumping out mostly drinking and cheating songs.

“Honey, you’re afraid Hettie’s going to say no.”

He snorted. “Of course I am. She’s been saying no for decades.”

“My point exactly. You’re so afraid of being alone that you don’t even try. Which, of course, means you’re destined to be alone.”

He frowned. “Dottie, have you been sampling the liquor?”

“No, I haven’t. And you know I’m right about this.”

He tamped down his annoyance. He needed Dottie pointing out his fears and failures like he needed a hole in the head.

“Dottie, the truth is that I love Hettie, but she doesn’t love me.” He looked down at his soda pop and ran his finger through the condensation on the outside of the glass. Hettie was a sore spot.

He’d been carrying a torch for that woman since he was a teenager. They’d had a pretty hot thing going his senior year in high school, and then she up and dumped Dash on the same day he signed his first major-league contract. He was suddenly a rich man, but Hettie broke his heart by walking away from him. She’d left him for Jimmy Marshall.

But now Jimmy was dead. And everything had changed. Dash wasn’t the big man with the major-league contract anymore. He was a recovering alcoholic with a busted-up knee.

He hated to admit it, but Dottie was right. Hettie wanted a different kind of man. And he’d have to change if he wanted to win her love. What if he put himself on the line, and she still said no? What if he let himself fall hard for her, and she walked away like she had all those years ago?

This was why AA suggested that people like him stay away from relationships. Dash had had a few in his twenties. But every time a woman turned heel and walked out, he crashed, hard. And then he’d go looking for a drink.

Shoot, his life was exactly like those stupid drinking and cheating songs on Dottie’s jukebox. It was pitiful.

He straightened his shoulders and turned toward the jukebox, where Willie Nelson was singing “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain.” “It’s a damn good thing I don’t have a shotgun because I might be tempted to murder that thing. Don’t you have any happy songs in there?”

Dottie laughed. “No, honey, I don’t.”

“Don’t you believe in happiness?”

“Sure I do, but on the nights when the Wild Horses don’t play I get patrons who just want to drink and listen to sad music. Ain’t that right, Roy?” She turned toward Roy Burdett, who was, as usual, drunker than a skunk.

“Yeah.”

“Well, I come here most Mondays and I’m tired of it.” Dash pushed himself up from the bar stool and headed over to the jukebox. He didn’t have a shotgun, but he was fully capable of disabling that infernal machine. He searched out the wall socket and pulled the power cord from the wall. Dot’s Spot went quiet.

Half a dozen good ol’ boys looked up from their beers and bourbons.

“Hey, why’d you do that?” Roy staggered to his feet and came toward Dash. “I like that song. You plug it back in.”

“No, Roy, I won’t. And besides, you’re wasted. You should get on home to Laura-Beth. Have you ever thought what she must think of you coming down here every night and drinking yourself numb? Maybe you should think about joining AA. I’ve got the number of the folks at the Allenberg County chapter and—”

“Now, Dash,” Dottie said, “don’t you be trying to sign folks up for AA. That’s bad for business. Why don’t you just go on home to Miriam? You should be with her tonight, anyway. The fact is, you don’t belong here anymore. You know that, don’t you?”

“Don’t belong?” Dash’s pulse kicked up. Folks were always telling him he didn’t belong.

Dottie continued in her sweet voice. “Dash, honey, you’re a recovering alcoholic. A bar is a strange place for a person like you. I think you’ve proved to everyone’s satisfaction that you’re tough enough to sit here surrounded by booze and not give in to temptation. So maybe you should start thinking about moving on. I’m sure Hettie would approve if you moved on.”

“Yeah,” Roy said, staggering forward. “And I really don’t like your taste in music.”

“Well, that’s okay, Roy, because I don’t like yours either. In my opinion, Willie Nelson sucks.”

“He does not.” And Roy Burdett, who had once been a member of the Davis High Rebel defensive line, rushed Dash like he was an opposing quarterback.

Dash might have been sober, but he was hampered by a bum knee—the injury that had ended his baseball career. And Roy was still surprisingly fast, even for a drunk.

Dash didn’t see stars when Roy tackled him. In fact, Dash didn’t even remember hitting the floor.

Savannah rested her head on the back of the rocking chair and cuddled a little deeper into her old cashmere sweater. It was almost too cold to be out here on the porch, but she held her ground hoping her summer memories might warm her up. Darn it, South Carolina had always been hot and humid when she came to visit. And that’s the way she wanted it now. Like her most treasured memories.

Still, she wasn’t about to let the late hour or the cold drive her inside. She wanted to sit here and remember Granddaddy.

But instead of finding the happy memories of her childhood, she ended up obsessing over the enormous thing she had done today. She had actually gotten off her fanny and taken Todd across several state lines. If she decided to stay here, there wasn’t much Claire could do about it.

Of course, if Greg decided he was unhappy about the situation, he could cause trouble. Savannah was surprisingly ambivalent about that. In some corner of her heart, she almost hoped that Greg cared enough to cause trouble. But in her head, she knew that wasn’t ever going to happen. Greg was a lot like her own father, who had walked out on her and Mom when Savannah was three.

So Savannah had faced the unhappy truth. And surprisingly, facing it only lent more urgency to her escape plans. Coming here to Last Chance might be her last chance to really take charge of her life.

She could also follow her dream of finally doing something about The Kismet, the movie theater Granddaddy had left to her. She wanted to renovate The Kismet and bring it back to life.

Accomplishing that dream would take a miracle, of course. Nothing had changed since the big chain theaters had driven Granddaddy out of business. A person like Savannah, with no financing and no business experience, had zero chance of succeeding where Granddaddy had failed.

She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to silence the negative voice inside her head. She wasn’t much for praying, but she winged a little prayer skyward anyway. Help me find the courage.

Just then the sound of crunching gravel alerted her to the arrival of someone in the driveway. She opened her eyes to the glare of headlights. A moment later two backlit silhouettes emerged from the brightness.

“Ma’am,” a voice called out. “Is that you, Miz Miriam?”

“No, it’s Savannah White. I’m Miriam’s niece.”

“That’s the princess I been tellin’ you ’bout, Damian.” Savannah recognized that deep drawl.

An athletic-looking African-American dressed in the buff uniform of the Last Chance Police Department stepped up onto the front porch, followed by Dash, who was pressing an ice pack to his lip. The front of Dash’s shirt was covered in blood.