Mollywood (4 page)

Nodding he raised his beer and directed my gaze to his own wife, who’d just whispered something in Molly’s ear. “It does. The first time I saw the missus, she reached right into my chest and pulled my heart right out. She’s had it ever since. Luckily she takes really good care of it.” He gave an oversized wink as he said the last bit. I grinned back at him.

“I wake up thinking about Molly. She’s on my mind all day. Lately…I wonder if I’m screwing the whole thing up…” I trailed off and stared into the dregs of my mug. I looked up to see Graham watching me over the top of his beer.

“Relationships can be tough. Even the
best
ones. Sometimes it’s hard to find the right path and along the way you lose each other. I know you don’t believe the same as I do, but if you ever want to try it, I’d be happy to—” I held up a hand and nodded. I knew what he was going to say. Graham and I had been dancing a God vs Heathen waltz for so long that the conversation was almost spoken telepathically. I just couldn’t take another heartfelt invitation to visit his church.

“Thanks. I appreciate it. I really do.” Graham looked at me contemplatively for a moment, and then shrugged.

“No pressure, Joe. I just put it out there from time to time so that you know the offer still stands.” Anne swept up and pulled him out onto the dance floor. She always seemed to know when our conversations were at an awkward stage. I waved as they retreated, and turned to look at the head table again. The sight of Molly tugged at my heart hard enough to hurt. The little man who’d escorted her during the ceremony was working hard to chat her up, and I smirked as I watched her shut him down by abruptly turning away to talk to Stacy.

I hated the awkward place we were right now. Our fighting had become like a reflex and I couldn’t see a way out of it. She was so stubborn. To be honest, I was just as bad. I’d begun to worry that we just might be too alike in some ways to be able to make a go of it. Thoughts of that nature tended to lead me to a dark place, and I wanted to try and make it a good day, so I thrust them aside.

Sanchez rose from his place at the table. He waited for the room to quiet and when he spoke it was with a full, loud voice that was startling from the normally soft-spoken man.

“Family and friends, thanks for joining us on our special day. Seeing so many of the people we love here to celebrate with us makes us feel very blessed. I’m lucky to have married the most beautiful and loving woman that a man could ever hope to find. Stacy, every day, for the rest of my life, I’ll work hard to be worthy of you.” He pulled Stacy’s hand up and bent over it, kissing it like a storybook prince. On anyone else it would have looked corny, but somehow Sanchez pulled it off.

Sitting back down, he leaned over and planted one on his new wife. I felt the ghost of pain flare in my chest. It was hard to be at a wedding without thinking back to the day I’d married Jess. I hadn’t been to a wedding since, and that was a decidedly good thing. I sipped my beer and fought a silent battle against the specters from my past.

Mac and Mason had thrown me one hell of a bachelor party. I’d gotten so drunk that I’d nearly missed the wedding. If it hadn’t been for their mom sending over one of their cousins to roust us, we might have slept all day. Jessica had seethed at the sight of my bloodshot eyes when I turned up late for the pre wedding pictures, but you’d never know it. Her pictures from that day were radiant. In every shot she looked like an angel, but honestly the ceremony itself was a blur. All I remember is sweating out hard alcohol, which I’m sure made me smell wonderful. All things considered, my wedding was not the special memory that it probably should have been.

I blinked away the reminiscence and motioned to the bartender over, ordering a sweet tea. It would be quite some time before we’d be able to leave, but I wasn’t about to chance our safety with even a slightly altered state. I saw Molly watching me from the main table with a wistful look on her face. She looked as ready to go as I was The guy next to her, Pablo I think, put a hand on her bare shoulder and turning, she smiled that faux smile of hers-the one that warned she was about to lose her temper. Part of me roared, wanting nothing more than to walk across the room and snap his arm off at the shoulder. This being socially unacceptable, I instead sat and sipped my tea. A moment later, he bent as if to whisper something in her ear, and Molly handled the issue by smashing a cupcake into his nose frosting side first. Her laughter carried across the room to me.

By the time the speeches were finally done, I was long past ready to go. I impatiently watched as the bride and groom danced their first dance. Then the wedding party all joined them. Her obligations discharged, Molly swept across the floor to me.

“Hey there, Tall, Dark, and Ominous. Come here often?” Without moving from my barstool, I pulled her into my arms and nuzzled her neck.

“Right here? No. But I’m sure there must be a door with a lock somewhere nearby.” She allowed me to press against her for a moment before pulling back.

“Behave, caveman. People are watching.” She soothed the sting of her rebuke by planting a sweet kiss on my lips. I let her drag me out of my seat and onto the dance floor.

I held her close as we danced to a couple of slow songs. She felt perfect pressed against me, her head resting on my shoulder. I lowered my face to brush against her cheek, breathing in the citrus scent wafting from her hair. Neither of us said a whole lot. Maybe we were afraid we’d kill the moment. Then she promptly ditched me with Sanchez while she helped Stacy gather her things to leave.

“Joe, the trip to Napa... I told Molly it was
way
too much.” He blushed and I immediately held up a hand.

“Let me stop you there, dude. I had nothing to do with it. That’s one hundred percent her. I got you a gift card to The Home Depot.” He smiled and a surprised laugh tumbled from him.

“She’s awesome.” He admitted, and I nodded in agreement. Molly had a compulsion to nurture that seemed infinite. She was generous to a fault, but I hadn’t bothered to argue when she told me her plans to send S&S on a foodie honeymoon. Sanchez truly had Molly’s back and had even threatened to kick
my
ass when he thought I might hurt her. That made him good people in my book. Stacy wasn’t afraid to stand up for Molly either, as she’d proven when she’d used the stun gun I bought for Molly one night. Some drunk had dared to climb aboard their truck when they were feeding the bar crowd down on Sixth Street. Molly told him to get the hell out, but had barely spoken the words before Stacy lit him up like a Christmas tree. I felt a whole lot better knowing the two of them were on Molly’s team.

Sanchez excused himself to change and I found myself left with Pablo for company. He gave me a machismo onceover. I decided it was best not to test my patience and turned back to the bar. I ordered another glass of sweet tea and had almost finished it when Molly reappeared at my side, her face lit with excitement. We joined the gathered crowd in forming a human gauntlet for the newlyweds to run. Someone pressed a bag into my hand and I found myself throwing glitter at the happy couple along with everyone else.
Glitter.
It was like a stag party exploded on them as they left.

With the happy couple’s departure complete, our obligation to stay was over. I offered to help carry gifts to Stacy’s mother’s van, but Molly shook her head and asked if we could go. She wasn’t feeling well again, which worried me. Over the last few weeks, she’d complained more frequently of being tired. As usual, she’d resisted all of my suggestions that she take time off and rest. She hadn’t even bothered to slow down. That night she looked a bit paler than usual as she leaned into me heavily.

“Come on, big boy.” Her playful lilt lacked its usual enthusiasm. “Take me home.”

Making our goodbyes, I caught Graham and Anne shooting concerned glances in our direction. I figured we were a few moments away from some sort of an intervention and decided that this day needed to be over. Putting my arm around her, I smiled and waved at them as I led her out to the car. After she’d climbed inside, I leaned across and belted her in. She must have been feeling particularly bad, because what normally would’ve earned me a snarky comment barely rated an eye roll.

I thought about bringing up the “Elaine issue” again, but one glance at Molly and I chose to save that conversation for later. Her ex-husband’s new wife had been calling her phone incessantly, and the tension that bitch had created between us made me want to punch something. Easing through traffic, I concentrated on getting us home smoothly with no quick lane changes. It wasn’t an easy feat in Molly’s Mini Cooper which handled so well compared to my truck that it begged to be raced. I tried not to let my concern show on my face, but I doubted I was doing a very good job.

We rode for a good distance in a comfortable, peaceful silence. I decided that tonight I would just concentrate on taking care of her. No fights, no arguments. That plan didn’t even make it all the way off the drawing board.

We were a few exits away from home when her phone went off. The ring tone, Tainted Love, made me arch an eyebrow. It wasn’t a ringtone I’d ever heard from her phone before. The look on Molly’s face said everything else. Flipping her finger over the screen, she sent the call to voicemail. Glancing up from her phone, she gave me a guilty look.

“I texted Dan to find out what Elaine’s number was. She changed it after I moved. I wanted to know when it was her calling.” My chest tightened as rage swelled inside of me. I was still pissed at Dan. He never should have given Molly’s new number to Elaine.

I would never have guessed Dan would betray her trust like this.

“So were you planning on telling me about that?” I fumed. She looked away and it was clear she hadn’t intended to share this information with me.

“I’m not keeping secrets, Joe. Don’t make me wish I was.” I didn’t like her intimating that I was someone that she couldn’t be honest with. Molly kept her eyes locked on mine, not giving an inch. “You may as well just go ahead and say it.”

“Say what?”

“The usual. How I lack common sense. How I’m a bad a judge of character. Whatever other little gems you have up your sleeve.”

“You said it, not me.” I mumbled. I expected an explosion of anger, but she simply shook her head.

“None of it matters. I made up my mind. I’m going to talk to her.”

Frustration consumed me, but I tried to push it away. She was sick and the last thing she needed was me piling an argument on top of that. Then that annoying ring tone started again and I snapped. Reaching out, I plucked the phone from her hand and turned it off. She stared at me in shock and red rose up her skin like the mercury of a thermometer. My heart dropped to my feet.

“Molly, I don’t want to start somethin’.” She flipped her hand dismissively at me staring straight ahead out of the windshield

“Then quit acting like a controlling jerk!” I could see that I’d really upset her. I fought against the urge to verbally lash out. The whole damn point was that I didn’t want Elaine upsetting Molly, and here I was only making it worse.

“I’m sorry.” I held her phone out to her. The abruptness of my surrender seemed to take the wind out of her sails, and she gently pulled the phone from my hand. “This whole situation is surreal. She comes to you for help after what she did to you? I know she
was
your friend, but I don’t understand why you would put yourself through this.”

She blinked at me and I saw tears welling in her eyes. Turning away she wiped her face.

“If it were just her…” Her voice came out soft and guarded. Elaine had been Molly’s sous chef before her divorce. She’d even sold that bitch her share of the restaurant in Seattle, before finding out that Elaine had been Draven’s mistress. Now that he was in prison for stalking and threatening Molly, Elaine was divorcing him. She was building a case for full custody of their baby, and she’d had the balls to ask for Molly’s assistance in doing so.

Molly turned and I could feel the weight of her gaze on me. “There’s a child involved. That bastard has no business anywhere near a little kid. If he gets any sort of visitations or God forbid some sort of custody… Joe, if it will keep Draven away from her son, I’m going to do what I can to help. I’d think you of all people would understand that.”

Her delivery was harsh and biting, and I felt my anger flare again. As what she said rolled around in my head, I pictured a brief flash of “the Jack that might have been”. It’d been a while since I had dreamed about my dead boy, but the image of him dashed my anger out like a bucket of water on a campfire.

We rode in a much less comfortable silence until we got to our apartment. Putting the car in park, I unclipped my seatbelt and climbed out of the car. I went around to her door and opened it. Offering her my hand, I helped her to her feet and pulled her into my arms.

“I’m sorry, baby.” I held her gently against me, stroking her hair. “You should go with your gut. If you think that you need to help then you should. But what if she gives him your new number? It’s hard for me to believe you would give her any trust after what she has done. But I’m on your side, never doubt that. I just worry about you. What can I do to make things easier on you?” I stroked her cheek with my thumb, and the sad expression on her face faded into a devilish grin.

“Let’s see…you could distract me somehow… take my mind off of all my woes.”

I cocked an eyebrow at her and gave her a crooked smile “I think I can help you with that.”

Grabbing our things, we headed upstairs to the apartment we shared over my shop. Dropping our stuff just inside the door, I locked the deadbolt and then turned to see a flash of leg disappearing into the bedroom and I set off in pursuit.

By the time I appeared in our bedroom doorway, she’d lit the two candles that sat on top of my dresser. The flickering glow revealed her kicking off her heels one at a time.

“Unzip me?” She asked, presenting her inked shoulders and back to me. I eagerly did as she asked and watched her pastel gown fall to the floor. She pulled the jeweled combs from her hair, and it tumbled down her back in dark, silky waves.