ONCE IN A BLUE MOON (BLUEBONNET, TEXAS Book 2) (4 page)

"Ty, what’s wrong?" I tried again to catch his eye.

"Nothing, Betti."

It must be bad. Ty would
never
called me Betti. I could feel a big, dark hole opening up in my chest and sucking me in. I sighed, but it came out sounding more like a whimper. My face burned and my throat was thick with tears. Letting go of his arm, I moved away. "I’m afraid I don’t understand."

"Last night was...I’m just not...Rhea," he sighed, running his fingers through his hair, then replacing the ball cap.

I nodded, lips pursed to hold back the sob building, and took another step backward. My shaky knees failed me. One of my heels got caught in the brick walkway and I stumbled and landed with a smack on the wooden bench behind me.

Ty held out a hand but touching him seemed like the worst form of self-abuse. I stared at his hand for the longest time then forced myself to accept his help up. Now way could I look at him. Instead I focused on tugging my blouse smooth. Focused on forcing oxygen into my lungs.

Forced myself to walk away.

I’d gambled and lost. No need to be a sore loser. Or beg and cry. I couldn’t have gotten a word past the lump in my throat anyway.

Through the beer garden, then the sparsely crowded bar I went, barely able to hold my tears in until I reached the car.

I shifted into reverse and gunned it, then slammed on the brakes at a slap on the trunk. Glancing in the rear-view mirror, I discovered it was Tim.
Shit
.

"What’s your hurry?" he asked after I rolled down the window. I prayed he wouldn’t lean over and see my tears.

"No hurry." I glanced down at my lap. "Just tired and wanna get home. You know, long day."

"So how’d things go with you and Ty last night?"

I could hear the grin in his resonant voice and my stomach rolled over. "Fine. Just fine."

"Yeah? He seemed pretty pleased this morning."

"What did he say?" I could have kicked myself and hoped Tim wouldn’t answer. Not sure if I wanted to know, honestly. Kicking myself for breaking Rule Number Ten:
Don’t Ask Question You Don’t Know the Answer To.

"Nothing really. When he got in the truck I thought I’d need a chisel to get that grin off his face." Tim laughed. "By the time he got home I guess lack of sleep caught up with him, because Dad said he called and gave him some B. S. about not feeling good. He never even said thank you for hookin’ him up."

"You
told
him it was your idea?"
Great. Lovely. Just wonderful!
Maybe next time I’d listen to my own damned rules. Starting with number one! I continued, not bothering to wait for a reply, "And maybe I was right. Maybe a woman wasn’t what he needed last night."

Then I backed up, threw the car in drive and hit the gas, not caring if I spit gravel on Tim. Only wanting to get home and have a good cry. I’d thought...no, I’d hoped. Not that it mattered.
Hopes and dreams are very dangerous things.
I had mine. Apparently Ty had his, too.
Rhea
. I’d suffered worse losses in my life, and I’d muddle through this, too, after I was through mourning.

I got home, broke open a bottle of Llano Riesling and burrowed in the chair for a good cry. If I hadn’t loved that damn chair so much, I probably would have dragged it out back, doused it in gasoline and danced a jig while it burned. His cologne clung to the denim fabric. That made me cry harder. I didn’t want to smell him or love him or anything.

Bad Betti got her hand slapped, again.
Someday, maybe I’d learn to stay away from Bluebonnet’s men.

* * *

Bleary-eyed and a tad hung over, I spent the following morning cleaning the salon. Tara had done most of the work but cleaning was therapeutic.
Who cares if it only lasts a day or less?

Cassi showed up mid-afternoon, breezing in through the back door and scaring the living daylights out of me. Def Leopard’s begging for someone to pour some sugar on them had drowned out the sound of her Tahoe pulling up out back.

"Don’t you have anything better to do, Mama?" I teased, folding the last of the towels.

"Yeah, but that would mean staying home with the kids. What fun is that?"

"Aw now. Girl, you need to find you a nice man." I was a fine one to talk with my less-than-stellar track record.

"Yeah," Cassi scoffed, one sable eyebrow quirked. "Show me a nice man who wants to date a woman with four kids, and I’ll show you ten dozen who don’t. Or better yet, ten dozen jobless, mooching losers."

I laughed. Cassi and I’d met at a hairdressing convention in Dallas about five years ago. Shortly after her divorce, the ex was arrested for embezzlement. Bye-bye child support. She’d gotten her Nail Technician’s license and was trying to support the kids on nothing when we hooked up. I’d convinced her to move south, loaned her some seed money and gotten a great return on my investment. A talented nail tech and a best friend.

"Speaking of nice men, did you hear from that guy you met Friday?"

"No," I muttered before my throat swelled shut.

"That’s too bad. You really sounded like you liked him."

"It was just a fuck."

"Oh, now Betti! Don’t be like that."

"You’re a fine one to talk." I gathered up the towels and headed across to the shampoo bowls to hide my sniffles, but Cassi followed me.

"I might be, if I could get laid." Seeing my tears, she hugged me and tugged the towels I’d been shoving in the cabinet out of my hands. "You really liked him?"

"Shit, Cas, since like the sixth fucking grade."

She hugged me again and I sobbed on her shoulder like a broken-hearted fourteen-year-old. Which was what I got for acting like one.

Once my tears had subsided to a dull roar, we curled up on the old blue velvet couch in my office and opened a bottle of Chardonnay.

"Maybe you could give him some time then, you know, invite him for dinner. Take things slow. You did say his divorce was just finalized. How long were he and his wife together?"

"Since the second grade," I wailed, sipping my wine.

"God save me from small towns. The second
grade?
You’re shittin’ me?"

"No, and they were together all through junior high and high school. Hell, her senior year she practically lived with the Boudreauxes. Frankly, I always thought she was a bitch leading poor Ty around on a leash." Rant over, I emptied my wineglass and slumped deeper into the sofa.

"That’s quite a ghost you’re up against."

"I’m not up against shit! Wanna order some Chinese and keep me company while I pay bills?" Past time for a change of subject.

"Sure. The usual? And what do you mean ‘you’re not up against shit’?"

"Yeah, and I mean," I said, getting up and walking over to my desk, "just what I said."

"So you’re not gonna chase him?"

"Fuck no! Bad Betti doesn’t chase. She gets chased. Get me an order of Crab Rangoon too, would ya? I’m starving."

* * *

Work was my universal cure-all, but in the days that followed, I couldn’t seem to get Ty off my mind or pull myself together. And ten days later I ran into his ex-wife at the grocery store.

I’d been on a roll with my good buddy Mocha Java Chip but found myself running low. So what if it was nearly nine at night. I wanted ice cream.

My impulsiveness now had me wedged between the freezer door and my buggy, a carton of ice cream in my hand, as I eyed her over my shoulder. I suppose rumors of us leaving the dancehall together had gotten back to her. Why she’d care, I have no clue, seeing as how she stood just a few feet away, welded to that asshole, Billy Green.

Just another reason to hate this godforsaken town!
I sent up another silent prayer the house sold soon.

"How’s it’ goin’, Bad Betti?"

Rhea stood there in shorty-shorts and a halter top that showed off her tan and a pierced bellybutton. Her homemade dye job was long past due for a retouch. The hairdresser in me shuddered, eyeing at least two inches of dark greasy roots. She’d once been a very pretty girl.

"I’m fine, ReeRee. How are you?" In the fifth grade, she’d beaten a girl up for calling her ReeRee.
Pretty but not nice.
I was pushing it and didn’t care. After all, she was the reason for my frustrations with Ty.

I set the ice cream in the basket alongside the frozen fruit and yogurt for smoothies and pushed past her, letting the frosty, glass door swing shut behind me. I now had icicles on my ass.

"I heard you were with Ty the other night." From her laughter you’d think someone had shared the funniest joke ever with her. Either that or she was high, and judging from the large assortment of munchies in the basket Billy had a grip on, that was a distinct possibility.

I pushed my own basket up enough so I stood directly in front of her. "And?"

She stopped in mid-laugh, looked me up and down, then laughed again. "I don’t know what’s funnier. Him fucking you or you fucking him."

I had to admit I didn’t look my best—okay I looked like shit—but still. My sweats might have seen better days but they were clean, and
I
wasn’t high. This was the last time I shopped so late at night.

"Ty’s a dickwad," mouthed the overly arrogant Billy.

As if!
I eyed Billy who stood before me in long sleeves. The temperature had hit one-oh-five today, and even after eight at night, it hovered in the low nineties. Not exactly long sleeve weather. He’d been a horrible kid and grown up to be a small time drug dealer who also apparently used. He slung a Neanderthal sized arm around Rhea’s shoulder and gave me a glassy-eyed grin.

"Where’s Melyn?" Maybe they were sharing. I shuddered. How anyone could pick Billy with his twenty-seven brain cells over sweet, sexy Ty I had no clue. But then how could sweet sexy Ty mourn the loss of her?

"Mind your business, bitch." Billy curled a lip, but failed miserably at looking threatening. Maybe it was the zit scars.

"Oh, go snort some cocaine, Billy!" I snapped, my patience thinning like the layer of ice on my ice cream.

Shrugging off his arm, Rhea got in my face. Things were about to get ugly. I smiled. From the corner of my eye, I spotted a stock boy at the end of the aisle, a mop clutched in his hands. Poor thing couldn’t have been over sixteen, and he looked ready to yell ‘dial nine-one-one!’

I glanced at Billy, then focused my attention on her. "You do know the only reason he has such staying power is the cocaine. Don’t you?"

"Fuck you. You fat bitch. Billy’s got the biggest dick this side of the Mississippi!"

She might as well have gotten on the store’s intercom system and screamed, "I’m a sleazy bitch who’s boinking my best friend’s leftovers." From a few aisles over came the sound of laughter and the squeak of a basket rapidly departing.

My turn. I think my snorts of laughter conveyed my doubt.

"...and he knows what to do with it, unlike Ty. That stupid hayseed could barely find—"

That was the last word that came out of her mouth before my fist made contact with an immensely satisfying crunch.

Chapter Four

SAME OLD SONG AND DANCE

Ty felt like a heel. A worn out one with a big hole in the bottom. He hated confrontations and knew he’d really botched it badly with Bettina but didn’t know how to make things right. He’d rambled like an idiot.

More than once over the last couple of weeks he’d driven by her house, worried he’d see "Sold" on the realtor’s sign in her yard.

All of this brought home by the good Dr. Ritter. She’d spent half their therapy session trying to worm it out of—what exactly was bugging him now. He hated therapy, but he’d promised his dad he’d go until the doc gave him a green light. Which was his fault for freaking out and having a panic attack in front of his dad in the first place.

He was thirty-years-old and "suffered from anxiety". He
hated
talking about himself, digging in deep. The doc insisted if he didn’t, things would only fester and grow. Like cancer.

Ty was more inclined to think if he’d leave his battle scars alone they’d heal up with fresh air and sunshine.

With a crunch of tires on gravel, Ty pulled into the parking lot of Mae’s Diner, squeezing his old Chevy between an even older Buick and his brother, Zack’s Dodge.

Ty crossed the parking lot, giving two of his mother’s church biddies who were leaving a cheerful hello, then reached for the door handle, ready to face Mae’s lunchtime crowd. Only to jump back in surprise as the door flew outward at him.

Zack came barreling out of Mae’s, his face ruddy with agitation. "When are you gonna break down and get a cell phone?" his brother demanded.

"When hell freezes over. Why?" Getting a cell phone hadn’t been a high priority after Rhea had cleaned him out.

"I don’t feel like eating here. Let’s go to Carmen’s and have Mexican instead." Zack grabbed him by the arm and tried to steer him toward their trucks but after only a few steps, the diner’s door swung open again, and Ty understood his brother’s sudden craving for Mexican food.

"Well, hey Ty," Melyn Cooley drawled.

His chest seized up at the sight of Rhea beside her, and he forced himself to take nice slow breaths. Walking on glass was easier than handling his ex-wife. Rhea was like those white tigers in Vegas—no telling when she’d get in a snit and turn on you, teeth bared.

Was that a black eye under her makeup?
He opened his mouth to ask her what happened then realized he couldn’t. He didn’t have the right to anymore, but old habits died hard. "Melyn. Rhea."

"Let’s go." Zack tugged on his elbow, but he shook it off.

"Ty." Rhea had bleached her honey colored hair out to match Melyn’s nearly white-blonde hair. It looked like straw. And the harsh sunlight exaggerated their heavy makeup. Rhea’s snug t-shirt left so little to the imagination he could, as Aunt Susie would say, count her beauty marks.

The pretty little girl he’d married was nowhere in sight—and it wasn’t just the clothes and hair that made the difference. But the hard look in her blue eyes and the slight curl to her lip. The thought left him sad, and angry. Because he still hadn’t figured out how they’d gotten here. Gotten divorced. Become enemies. She hated him. And he hated himself for missing her after all she’d put him through.