Chick books, though never cracked one open, because even if I loved to read, I never had time for it. I even knew Lottie’s friends and family came to see her dance on occasion.
But they were there for Lottie, as well as Smithie, so none of the girls worked their table (because, first, swinging your ass in Lottie’s friends’ faces: gross, and second, because of that, it would be way weird to work for that tip).
But all this took on new meaning with seeing just how popular a used bookstore with a big coffee bar at the front of it was.
I looked down to the book that lay on the couch beside me only to have Lottie call, “Hey.”
I lifted my eyes to her.
“Outside all the shit you wouldn’t be okay about, you okay?” she asked.
I forced a weak smile.
“Yeah,” I lied.
She studied me.
She was damned savvy and street smart to boot, and since I didn’t want her reading me, I didn’t want her studying me.
Thus, I turned my attention back to the book.
I was on page ten and a little afraid, at the same time very interested to meet Indy’s husband, Lee, when the bell over the door rang.
It was that I was into the book.
It was evidence you got used to that bell going.
Both of these conspired to keep my nose in a chapter called “The Great Liam Chase” instead of looking up to the door.
A mistake.
Because I only had Lottie’s murmured, “Smithie, cool it,” before I heard my boss shout, “What the fuck, Evan?”
I looked up at Smithie, a tall, stout African American man who had a fierce bark, no bite and a heart of gold.
“Smithie—”
“I swung by your place…” he started.
I wished people would quit doing that.
“…and it was a nightmare!” he finished.
“She knows, Smithie, she’s seen it,” Lottie said. “She doesn’t need you shouting that reminder at her.”
“I’m okay,” I assured him with a total lie.
Smithie ran a strip club. He could spot a lie at a hundred paces.
This was probably why he shouted, “You’re okay? Bullshit! Why didn’t you tell me your shit was this whacked?”
Perhaps softening the blow to Smithie last night had not been my best course of action.
“Well…”
I didn’t finish that.
I liked him. He paid well, offered great health insurance and acted more like my father than my father, which was not a difficult endeavor, but Smithie aced it.
So, obviously, I wouldn’t want to drag him into my nightmare.
“I don’t…I don’t even…I can’t…” He was looking around, for what, I had no idea, then he focused on Tex. “Is this shit starting up again?” he asked.
“I hope so,” was an answer that further put up for debate Tex’s sanity.
“Ohmigod,” the customer standing in line in front of Tex breathed loudly. “Is this a new Rock Chick?” she asked no one in particular, speaking while gazing at me.
“She isn’t a Rock Chick, she’s a Smithie’s Chick,” Lottie corrected.
“Do not pin any of this shit on me,” Smithie demanded.
“Commando Chick?” Lottie asked Ava.
“Maybe Dancing Chick?” Ava asked Lottie.
The bell over the door went and I’d learned, so I looked right there.
Which meant I got the whole show when Mag walked in wearing his navy cargo pants, his tight navy tee that shared the mayor should consider giving his chest its own zip code (I mean, that morning when I’d seen it uncovered in all its glory—dayum) and black boots that looked utilitarian, but he was Mag, so he worked them.
“Ohmigod,” the customer again breathed.
Mag didn’t hear her, or a greater possibility, he was so used to women having that response when he arrived somewhere, he didn’t care.
He also didn’t care much that Smithie was there, looking ready to blow his top.
Or about anything.
But me.
I knew this as I watched him say a perfunctory, “Yo,” to Smithie as he passed him to get to me.
Then he bent right down.
Bent right down!
He then kissed my nose…
Kissed my nose!
He pulled back, grinned gorgeously in my face and said words I’d longed to hear my entire life.
“You’re gonna have to eat the ice cream first. It’s melting.”
“I started coming here after all the other Rock Chicks were done and claimed. I cannot believe I’m here at ground zero during a new one!” the customer exclaimed.
Mag’s brows shot together but he didn’t move out of my face.
“She thinks I’m a new Rock Chick,” I told him.
“She’s wrong,” Lottie decreed, snatching the bags out of Mag’s hands. “You’re a Dream Maker.”