Truth or Beard (Winston Brothers #1)(31)
Author: Penny Reid

She leaned away and gave me a giant grin. “Oh my goodness, girl! You look so great.” Tina squeezed my hand one more time before releasing me. We both slid into the nearest booth, smiling at each other.

“You do, too. You’re looking great.”

She did look great. She looked hot. Like, super hot. Hot in a way I wouldn’t even know how to go about achieving.

Tina wore false eyelashes and an impressive amount of artfully applied eye makeup. She and I looked nothing alike. Growing up, no one ever guessed we were related. She looked more like my daddy’s side of the family, and I favored my mother’s side.

But we both had brown eyes, though not at all the same color. I thought of my irises as plain brown. Whereas her eyes—with all the careful framing and highlighting—appeared to be the color of whiskey. The effect was dramatic. Beautiful. I wanted her to teach me how to do it.

The rest of her makeup was impeccable. She’d dyed her naturally light brown hair dark black, wore it lose in long shiny waves around her shoulders—which was basically a miracle since she’d just been on a motorcycle. Her hair paired with her sun-bronzed skin—another miracle since the sun had been hiding for two weeks—gave her a rather exotic look.

Of course, her clothes took everything to a completely new level of conspicuous hotness. She was in black leather pants, really sexy leather pants, and a white, low cut V-neck angora sweater. Both fit her like a second skin, which was fantastic for her since she was clearly in excellent shape.

Beverly, our server, came by almost immediately with two glasses of sweet tea and water, assuming correctly what we wanted to drink, and we both already knew what we were going to order.

Tina waited until Beverly was out of earshot before leaning forward and saying in a low, conspiratorial voice, “I was a little surprised you wanted to meet here.”

“What? Why?”

She blinked at me as though the answer were obvious. When I continued to stare at her with obliviousness, she laughed lightly and shook her head.

“You know what I do, for a living, right?”

I nodded and sipped my sweet tea. “Yes. I know.”

“I guess I’m just surprised you didn’t mind being seen with me so publically.”

I gave her a sideways glance. “Wait…I think I know what you do. You’re still dancing at the Pink Pony, right?”

She nodded. “Yeah.”

“You haven’t joined ISIS or anything, right?”

“What’s ISIS?”

“I mean, you’re not actively plotting to overthrow the government?”

She giggled and tossed her hair over her shoulder. “I’m not even sure what that means.” Then Tina’s expression turned abruptly sober and she leaned forward, her eyes boring into mine. “But, listen, I have to talk to you about something important. It’s kind of why I wanted to get together.”

“Oh, okay. What’s up?”

Her gaze turned speculative as it released mine and moved over my black, fitted, cotton long-sleeved shirt, then darted to my hair. “I always envied your blonde hair. It’s so pretty, just like your momma’s.”

“You want to talk about my hair?”

“No, silly.” She shook her head, rolling her eyes. “So…you and Duane Winston, what’s going on there?”

I felt my lips part and my eyebrows lift in surprise. An involuntary ache squeezed my chest, making it hard to breathe for a moment. She stared at me while I struggled to find words.

Finally I managed to say, “Nothing. I mean, we went on one date. But nothing now.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You went on a date?”

“Yes.”

“When? Recently?”

“Uh, last Saturday.”

“So a week ago?”

“Almost, yes.”

“But no second date?”

“No. No second date.”

She nodded slowly, still glaring at me through narrowed eyes. “Why no second date?”

I glanced at the vinyl of the booth behind her, trying to figure out how to best explain the situation and be sensitive to the fact we were talking about her ex-boyfriend, an ex-boyfriend for which she might still have feelings.

“We decided that our priorities weren’t compatible.”

She huffed and it sounded impatient. “In English, please. This ain’t a parent teacher conference.”

“Um, I guess he wanted one thing out of a relationship, and I wanted something else.”

Tina pursed her lips, her eyes losing focus as she considered my words. While I waited for her to finish thinking her thoughts, I sipped my tea and glanced at the specials board; Daisy’s pie of the day was apple.

“I’m not jealous.”

I shifted my attention from the list of pies to Tina. “Excuse me?”

“I’m not jealous, of you and Duane. I don’t care who he sees. You’re welcome to him, if I’m the reason you decided to call things off.”

I lifted my chin in acknowledgement, but said nothing. Because I wasn’t sure what to say. Tina hadn’t been a consideration in my decision to date or not date Duane. I wondered if that made me unfeeling. But then I reminded myself that Tina and I hadn’t really spoken in over eight years, the first four of which she’d snubbed me for more popular kids at our school.

Yeah…I wasn’t going to factor Tina into my dating decisions. That would be silliness.

“I just wanted to let you know that,” she said, as though she were being generous. “Duane and I were together for a long time and what we felt for each other, well I just think first love is really special. He’ll always mean something to me. But it’s over now and I’ve moved on. I hate to think of him pining for me.”

Again, I lifted my chin in acknowledgement—higher this time—and found myself without words. Thankfully Beverly interrupted by bringing our salads.

I changed the topic to one I hoped would be much more benign and asked her what she’d been up to recently. This turned into her giving me the oral history of Green Valley gossip for the last four years—who was sleeping with whom, who had divorced, had illegitimate babies, had a drug problem, was in debt. She made Green Valley sound like a sordid train wreck.

Strangely, while she spoke I found myself distracted by how incredibly hot she was. I mean, she was sex personified. Her movements were sensual, including how she chewed her food. Her smile was coy, alluring, captivating. She’d say something like, That little fucker got what he deserved and I hardly heard the venom in her voice because she somehow made it sound erotic.

I was thankful when dinner was over and her biker fella arrived to fetch her, because I was…exhausted. Maybe it was a by-product of my long work week paired with the Duane-funk, or maybe it was just the tidal wave of sexual energy that was my cousin Tina.

Either way, as I pedaled home, I felt bereft and depressed and wished I’d thought to grab a slice of Daisy’s pecan pie before leaving.

***

“What’s wrong, baby sister?”

I sighed, hugged the pillow I was holding a bit closer. I hadn’t been able to go to sleep. The depression followed me home and, though I was tired and tried lying in bed, in the dark, with my eyes shut for over an hour, sleep would not come.

So I took a shower, hoping it would help me relax, and it worked. I felt a bit better when I shut off the water. But then Sir Edmund Hilary—my psychotic cat—tried to murder me with his litter box. He’d pushed it directly in front of the shower door and I’d stepped on it, stumbled, and fallen to the floor with a squawk and a thud.

It occurred to me that, had I been living alone and Sir Hillary knew how to wield a knife, I’d be dead and no one would find me for days, maybe months.

This thought reignited my depression. So I cleaned up, dried off, and went to the kitchen. I made hot cocoa with a liberal amount of Baileys, and channel surfed in the family room, hoping I’d pass out eventually on the couch absent thoughts of my inevitable and lonely death by psycho-cat.

Instead, I was still up at 2:21 a.m., which signified the end of Jackson’s shift. I was never up this late, so I guessed it made sense he’d assume something was amiss.

“Sir Edmund tried to murder me,” I said.

“Again?”

I nodded. “His attempts grow bolder. I think it might be time to confront him, or at the very least move his litter box to the basement.”

“Jess, the cat tries to take your life at least once a week. It’s not the cat. Tell me what’s wrong.”

I sighed again, not sure I wanted to discuss my depression with Jackson. “I had dinner with Tina tonight.”

“Our cousin Tina?”

“Yeah.”

Jackson crossed the room and sat next to me on the couch; he was still in his uniform, though his belt was gone. “She’s still dancing at the Pink Pony,” he said.

“Yes. I know.”

“And I think she’s mixed up with the Order.” Jackson paired these words with a sad sounding sigh.

“Yes. I know that, too…”

“Is that what’s got you down? Are you worried about her?”

I considered the question. I was a bit worried about her involvement with the bikers…but not really. She didn’t strike me as the kind of person anyone could take advantage of. Rather, if anyone was going to do the taking advantage, it would be Tina.