Scars of Yesterday (Sons of Templar MC #8) - Anne Malcom Page 0,62

Laura Maye smiled. A sad smile, full of pain.

“She said that being beautiful was a gift. That it would get me places with men. That I could use it to my advantage, as long as I never got attached. Never let myself end up like her. My daddy wasn’t a bad man. Least I don’t like to think so. He’d been the same as Momma. Thought the world had more to offer him. Quarterback in high school, meant for big things. Then he blew his knee out, and his future went up in smoke. Momma’s too. He had to work in a factory. Back breaking, soul crushing work. Dawn till dusk for crappy pay. He was tired from work, tired from life, angry with everyone, most of all himself. Although he did love me in his own way.”

“Here you go, ladies,” Donny said with a smile, setting down two amazing looking plates of food. The smell reminded me that I’d had nothing but coffee and a bite of Lily’s oatmeal today.

Laura Maye grinned at the man. “Thank you, sweetheart.”

He winked at her and made his way back to the kitchen.

“Fried food and booze are the best ways to get through stories of a damaged past,” she said with a cheerfulness in her voice that amazed me. It was genuine, as was everything about Laura Maye. Except her nails, and her eyelashes.

I picked at the nachos while she continued.

“I wasn’t too great at school, except math. I liked numbers. Numbers are always reliable.” She smiled wistfully. “But people didn’t see much more than dumb, blonde trailer trash when they looked at me. And if people think that about you long enough, you start to believe them. Especially when the momma who used to tell you how beautiful you were is more concerned with a bottle than anything else.”

She popped a chip into her mouth.

I sipped my drink while I waited, watching the beautiful Laura Maye, sitting in the bar she built. The life she’d earned. As if I didn’t already have enough respect for the woman.

“I got out at eighteen, only ‘cause I had to. ‘Cause I knew that I’d fade away just like my momma if I stayed. Me and my boyfriend—I always had one of those—decided to up and leave. Decided to go to Dallas. Figure I’d wait tables while I tried to become an actress or model. Something like that. I hadn’t decided. Just needed the world to tell me I was beautiful because I didn’t believe it anymore.

That’s how it started. Well, it truly started because we didn’t have much money to our names, lived in a shitty area and it was hard getting jobs. I waited tables at a shitty bar. The boyfriend didn’t do much of anything but get himself tangled up with the wrong crowd. The kind of crowd that made him eventually convince me to work at a strip club. More money for us. Convinced me I was so beautiful that I’d make the most money.”

She laughed again.

“It took some convincing on his part. Before her fall from grace, my mother had taught me how a lady acted, conducted herself. I listened hard about that because I wanted nothing more than to be a lady. Wanted to be one with a nice house, handsome husband, beautiful kids. But I didn’t listen hard to her warnings about falling in love. I didn’t really know what love was, so when he showed it to me, I was willing to trust him with anything. And if he thought stripping was a good idea, then it must’ve been.

I earned a lot of money. Good money. But not enough. He worked on me. Quietly. Subtly. Figuring out my weaknesses, how to control me, how to make me listen to him. Sometimes he used his fists, but most of the time, his words worked just fine. So soon I wasn’t just stripping. There were private lap dances. There were ‘dates’. Nice hotel rooms. Then sleazy motel rooms. My body wasn’t mine anymore. It was his. It was up for rent.”

She drained her drink, and I did the same, needing it. Although I knew that Laura Maye’s life hadn’t been easy, I’d known that she carried around demons, I couldn’t have imagined this. Especially from Laura Maye, who I’d considered to be so strong, so sure of herself. Confident, like she’d never let anyone take anything from her. But those were rarely qualities a woman was born with. Those were