It Had to be You Page 23

  Still a C.

  Booker’s mother gives me a tight-lipped, condescending smile. “Yes, I’m sure even trained monkeys can get it right sometimes.”

  “Shut. The hell. Up,” Booker says in the grittiest, most glacial voice I have ever heard. He looks at his father. “Get her out of here,” he says, “before I do something I might regret. I will always be happy to see you, Dad. I hope you’ll stop by whenever you can.” Then he looks at his mother. “You, on the other hand, are dead to me. I will never again step foot in the house I once considered my home.”

  As he stares at his mother, the saddest expression crosses his face. “I always thought you were the loveliest, most gracious woman in Walla Walla,” he says slowly. “And I was so proud to be your son. But I was wrong, wasn’t I? You’re only lovely and gracious to those you deem worthy to be your equal, or, as in the case of Matron Henderson, when it directly benefits you. It turns out the real Edna Jameson is a self-absorbed, mean-spirited bitch, and I want nothing to do with her.”

  For the first time his mother looks concerned. Then she shakes her head. “Nonsense. You don’t mean that. You’ll get rid of this low-class bit of baggage and—”

  “I mean precisely what I said,” Booker interrupts firmly. “You just shattered everything I ever believed about you. Unless you change your attitude, I can’t be around you.” He looks at his father. “Dad, please escort Edna out of my house.”

  “No!” Edna tries to shake her husband’s hand from her arm, but he retains his light, but firm, grip. “I have a great deal more to say!”

  “It sounds as if you’ve said more than enough already, Edna,” Clyde says wearily. “I don’t think you comprehend just what you have destroyed here today.” With a sad smile at me and a soft, “I’m sorry, Booker,” to his only child, he hustles her from the house.

  Leaving their son standing lost amidst the emotional wreckage, with only me to bear witness.

  38

  Susan Andersen

  You haven’t been rough-rough, exactly. But you’re so angry.

  BOOKER

  Leo walks into the office while I’m staring off into space. I’d shrug, if I had the energy. It isn’t the first time this week he’s caught me at my new favorite activity.

  Apparently, he’s grown tired of it, however. Instead of leaving me to wallow in my misery as he has been doing, Leo makes a beeline straight for the partner’s desk he and I have shared since we first started putting the Twilight Room together. Perching a hip on the corner nearest me, he crosses his arms atop his chest. Stares down at me. It’s obvious Sarge’s mood is dead serious. He’s got that pinched together eyebrows thing happening above his nose.

  “What the fiery, fucking hell is going on with you?”

  My first instinct is to snarl back at him. But Leo is pretty much the man I look up to more than any other. I watched him put himself at risk over and over again for the men he led during the war. Watched him treat our company within the 1st Infantry like a disciplinary but benevolent father—or the closest facsimile any of us were ever likely to see, at any rate, given the harrowing circumstances. And this despite the fact he wasn’t more than eight or nine years older than the youngest of our troop. God knows he shepherded me from boy to man during those long, long, damn terrifying, stress filled months we fought side by side.

  He is definitely the man who listened with exceptional forbearance each and every time I cried in my beer over Lena never writing.

  So, I quit acting like a petulant sixteen-year-old and tell him about my dad showing up. Then I admit to the painful stuff as well, filling him in on everything the woman who is no longer my mother has done.

  Sarge absorbs it all in silence. Sits quietly on the corner of the desk for several heartbeats after I quit speaking. Then he shakes his head and climbs to his feet. Gazes down at me. “Damn, Booker,” he says with quiet sincerity, “I’m sorry. That’s rough and it’s gotta hurt something awful.”

  I swivel my chair around to face him. “No fooling. Still,” I continue thoughtfully, “I’ve been brooding over it nonstop since it happened.” A fact I was too self-absorbed to realize until this instant. “I need to get my shit together.”

  I shift uncomfortably, thinking of the sex I’ve instigated with Lena ever since the morning Mothe—Edna—showed up at my door. It’s been more hard, furious fucking than the love making Lena deserves. My fury isn’t directed at her, of course, but Lena has borne the brunt of my rage at my...with Edna.

  God love her though, for being in the moment with me every time. I know I haven’t hurt her and I’m pretty sure my aggression has even kind of excited her. Well, for the most part. I admit I have seen her wide-eyed more than once when I’ve pushed up on my hands, my face no doubt fierce as I pound in and out of her with hard, deep, forceful strokes.

  As if she’s maybe wondering if this can possibly be considered normal.

  If anything could make me smile this week, that thought would damn near do the trick. Lena left the foundling home at eighteen, and has since worked in a number of bars—some of them real dives from what I understand. Yet she’s surprisingly easy to shock at times.

  She’s sure as hell not shy. But she is a woman who likes to know what she’s doing. Hell, who wants to be in charge of anything she finds herself involved in. Add that to having grown up in the B of C, and yeah. Sex is outside her area of expertise.

  If I were a good man, I would cut her loose. Lena is going places and she doesn’t need to wade through my family shit with me. Not that I have the first desire to let her go. Still, it would probably be better for her.

  “I have a feeling it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” I tell Leo. This is the first time I’ve said as much aloud, but it’s a gut feeling I have that’s been keeping me on edge. “Edna is acting crazy. And I don’t mean slightly off normal. I’m talking committed to a state institution insane.”

  Okay, that’s an exaggeration. But the rational mother I thought I knew has definitely gone off the rails.

  “Jesus, Sarge.” I rub at the headache that staked a permanent claim on my temples from the moment Dad unwittingly dropped the bomb mom’s been lying to my face for years. “I always thought Edna Jameson was the gold standard for gracious womanhood. Not in a million years would I have dreamt she could be so vicious.” The bark of laughter exploding from my throat is miles shy of actual humor. “It never occurred to me she even knew such offensive language, and I certainly never would have believed she could turn downright ugly-mean.”

  I scowl at my friend. “She called Lena a guttersnipe gold-digger, a floozy, a slut and a whore, for cri’sake. Then she insulted her education, which Lena pointed out was exactly the same as mine.”

  “Your mother has clearly never taken the time to have an actual conversation with Lena,” Leo says.

  “Yeah, she was too busy working on her agenda to drive the two of us apart,” I agree. “Hell, if she were a man, I would have flattened her.”

  “Damn, Booker,” Sarge says. “I wish I had some words of wisdom to give you. Unfortunately, never having encountered anything like this myself, I don’t. All I can say is continue living your life on your terms.”

  Leaning down, he grips my shoulders in strong, work and battle hardened hands. His thumbs and fingers dig at the tension there as he locks me in the cross-hairs of his steady gaze. “I’m sorry I don’t have something more concrete to offer. Just...take it a day at a time. And like I said, live your life on your own damn terms. Never anyone else’s.”

  I remember Sarge’s words as Lena and I are letting ourselves into the house several hours later. And since it’s three am, and therefore a literal new day, I decide now is the perfect time to take his advice. I follow Lena up the stairs to the bedroom, coming up behind her as she’s removing her earrings by the dresser. I kiss the side of her neck gently.

  A groan of remorse promptly escapes me when she stiffens slightly, and I abandon every thought I had of cutt
ing her loose.

  “Ah, no,” I croon regretfully, straightening up and turning Lena to face me. “Don’t be afraid of me. I’m sorry I’ve been an ass this week. I’ve been rough with you.”

  “You haven’t been rough-rough, exactly. Not like hurt me rough.” She stares at me unblinkingly. “But, Booker, you’re so angry.”

  “And making you feel like you’re taking the brunt of it? I am so sorry, baby. I have been beside-myself furious. But not with you, Lena. Never with you. Hand to God.” I slap my left over my heart and lift the right to the unseen heavens above. “You are the only thing keeping me sane.” Seeing the tension leave her body, I bend my head to kiss her softly on the lips.

  Then I carefully pick her up and carry her to bed.

  39

  Susan Andersen

  Showing him exactly what a girl can do when she’s put in charge

  LENA

  The Booker I’ve grown accustomed to is back. Unlike the past several days, during which his lovemaking was bossy and underlined with anger and unquestionable hurt over his mother’s betrayal, he now is tender. Where his kisses were hard, hot and deep, they now are soft and—

  Okay, the hot and deep part hasn’t actually changed. But his mouth now entreats where the past few nights it was very much I’m in charge.

  When it comes right down to it, I love his kisses any which way I can get them. Oh, but this—

  Booker is propped up on one forearm, casting a shadow down half my body. He’s flung a heavy thigh over mine, and his wide-palmed, capable hands imprison my wrists against his beautiful bedspread. All the while, his amazing lips—oh, my—feel somehow softer and fuller than usual as they delicately press and tug with devastating effect at my own.

  They slide away before I’m ready. I can’t gather the wits to tell him as much, however, because Booker’s mouth is already pressed to the curve of my jaw below my ear. It’s a spot that has drawn greedy moans from me since the first time he kissed me there back in high school. Then he slowly drags kisses, with an occasional hint of teeth, lightly down my throat.

  He licks the delicate hollow at its base. “You have too many clothes on,” he murmurs and removes them from me as if he has more hands than an octopus has tentacles.

  The way I, apparently, possess an equal number of needy, highly sensitized zones. Zones that have me moving to the beat of a pulsating need when he takes sweet his time pinching, tugging, stroking and penetrating with his fingers, his lips, his tongue.

  Without warning, Booker pushes away from me. He tears off his own clothing, then grabs me up again and rolls onto his back. I find myself sitting with my knees on either side of his hips, blinking like a demented rabbit at the abrupt change of positions. He grins up at me.

  “You’re in charge. You know what to do?”

  I shuffle my shins against the luxurious spread on either side of his thighs, glance down at his sex, which is pointing somewhere between the ceiling and his chin, then quickly look back at Booker’s face. “Sort of.”

  “I trust you to figure it out. Unless—” His brows scrunch together. “Would you rather I be in charge?”

  That puts a poker up my spine. “Again? No, sir! You’re right. It’s my turn.” I can feel my face flaming, but I sit a little straighter. Shift forward a bit and strop my girl parts against the rigid length of his cock. And, oh, boy, that feels so good I find myself wriggling for more.

  I manage not to let my eyes roll back in my head, though—I’m darn proud of that. Instead, I look at him through lowered lashes past my snootily raised nose and demand, “How hard can it be?”

  “Real damn.” He raises his hips to nudge me with something extremely hard indeed.

  I cut loose a laugh that ends in a loud, inelegant snort and slap my hands down on his chest. “Give me one of those rubber thingies.”

  He looks pained. “Please. They’re rubbers. Not thingies. Never thingies, okay?”

  I blow a disdainful breath out the side of my mouth.

  Booker laughs, a sound I’m thrilled to hear again, then twists slightly to reach into the bedside table drawer. I ride the movement like a one of those Barnum and Bailey bareback horsewomen.

  He rolls back and hands me the rubber. I carefully rip the packaging, then study its contents a moment. Reaching out, I slide my hand around his man part (Okay, okay, so I still have a little trouble with the language options he gave me) and balance the rubber atop it. It tips slightly, looking like a jaunty little cap, and I blow out an exasperated breath. Then I meet Booker’s gaze.

  “Fine,” I say. “I don’t exactly know how to get this from here—” I tap the little disk atop his tip “to down to here.” I squeeze the base of his sex in my fist.

  “You’re killing me, here.” Booker contracts his hips, dragging a portion of his length a short way through my grip, before thrusting up to push it back where it was. The rubber falls off and he slaps blindly at the spread until he finds it again. He shows me how to put it on and I smile inwardly to see him sweating by the time the job is done.

  He watches me suspiciously. “With all the readying, you’re probably out of the mood. I should get you back up to speed.” He reaches as if to grab my waist and lift me off him.

  I slap his hands away. “Don’t you worry about me, I’m rarin’ to go!” And I am. It’s emboldening knowing I’m wanted this much, and I raise up onto my knees and align my entrance to the upright column in my hand. Carefully, I lower myself.

  And go about showing him exactly what a girl can do when she’s put in charge.

  It’s been several hours since I got to be boss, yet I’m having one heck of a hard time wiping the smile from my face. I can’t help myself, I just feel on top of the world. Because, you know what? Maybe this time I am not going to default to the runner behavior Will accuses me of. I feel as if I’m where I’m supposed to be when I’m with Booker. And danged if he doesn’t seem equally happy to be with me.

  I’ve just finished my final song and am making my way toward Booker’s table where I last saw him from the stage. I’ve gotten better at not being sidetracked by fans, courtesy of the aiming-for-my-goal trick he taught me. But a silver-haired, barrel-chested gentleman, smelling of Brilliantine and expensive cigars, suddenly rises from his table to block my way.

  “Miss Baker,” he says in a mild, refined voice. “I apologize for intercepting you out of the blue, but I’m Chester Moss. I own The Black Door in Los Angeles.”

  Struck speechless, I simply gaze up at him. Everyone in this business knows about The Black Door. It’s the biggest legit lounge on the West Coast.

  “If you can spare me a few minutes,” he says, when I continue to stand there in silence, “I would love to discuss a business opportunity with you.”

  His words scramble in my mind for an instant before I get a grasp on them. “Okay.” I shrug and take a seat in the chair he pulls out for me.

  Ten minutes later, I walk away in a daze. Booker is no longer at his table and I make my way backstage, desperate to talk to him.

  When I hit the deserted hallway to his office, I laugh out loud, do a little dance and hug myself. Chester Moss just offered up my long-time fantasy on a sterling silver platter, all tied up with a big red ribbon. So, isn’t it funny how I find myself with zero interest in accepting his proposal? He urged me to think it over and I’m clutching the business card he thrust into my hand. In addition to The Black Door’s professionally printed contact information is a handwritten phone number of the Olympic Hotel where he’s currently lodging.

  I grin to myself as I approach Booker’s office. I can hardly wait to tell him about this. Maybe I’ll let him wiggle on the line a little before I let him talk me out of it.

  I poke my head in his office and see him sitting at his desk staring into space.

  “Hey,” I say, stepping inside. “You’ll never guess what—”

  Booker looks up at me, and his dull, dead-eyed look stops me in my tracks. I rush across the room.
“What is it? More problems with your mother?”

  “What? No.” He sits up, and in next moment it’s as if that look never existed. He’s once again Booker Jameson, suave owner of the Twilight Room. He flashes me a strained smile. “Sorry. I...might have been thinking about her. I was definitely woolgathering.”

  He’s saying everything right, but something feels off. Before I can pin down what, precisely, Booker says, “So—” An expression I can’t identify flashes across his face. “Were you saying something when you came in?”

  “Omigod, yes!” I laugh like a loon. “You are never going to believe what just happened?”

  “I’m not, huh?”

  “Not in a million years!” I’m laughing myself silly again and, knowing I must sound like a crazy person, I try to get a grip. Still, Booker will just have to excuse me, because I have never received and refused an offer quite like this one before.

  Booker’s still sitting at his desk, so I round it to his side and hop up to sit atop its solid corner. Leaning back on my hands, I cross my legs and twirl my uppermost foot, pretending to be the sophisticate whom, even if I live to a ripe old age, I likely will never be. “I was coming to your table after my set when this man stopped me. He introduced himself at Chester Moss of the Black Door in L.A.” I look at him expectantly, but he merely stares at me with no expression at all.

  What on earth? I falter, but then gather myself. “He offered me a gig there and, Booker, the terms are crAzy.” I wiggle my eyebrows at him, waiting for the negotiations to begin.

  Pushing back from the desk, he rises to his feet. “So, are you leaving right away?”

  “W-what?” I seem to be having a tough time processing this conversation.

  “You should,” he says in a voice so cool we might as well be strangers. “I have found once an employee decides to leave, they don’t work for shit. So, you might as well go pack up your stuff.”