Nocturnes (10 page)

But you only live once, so I may as well live fuckin’ nuclear. Rotten liver, crusty cock—man, that’s what rock ’n’ roll is all about. What’s that quote? “Live fast, die young. Be a pretty dead guy.” Or something like that.

My two shots arrive. Salivating, I stare at them, feeling no remorse, no compulsion to change a goddamn thing. I pick up the first glass and salute the waitress.

Bottoms up.
Just the way I like ’em.

Shoot. Swallow. Slam.

I’m the worst kind of junkie.

I laugh and down the second shot.

“Where’s my pussy?” I ask no one. “I need some pussy.” Leaning to the side, I look for Lola again and lose my grip on the table when the room decides to hiccup. I have to catch myself from face planting into the flagstones.

“Shit.” I push up and turn to the window.

Raindrops fall outside.

Naturally. Because I have no car, and it’s looking like I’ve been stood up. Another time check reveals she’s now fifteen minutes late. Maybe she got held up at work.

Or tied down.

Jealousy flares in my gut. The vodka doesn’t help.

That’s when I notice a nearby tote bag hanging off the back of a chair. It reads “Café du Monde.” My stomach takes a tumble.

The waitress comes back. “You need anything else? Hungry?”

“What’s the name of this place?”

“Café au Lait.”

“Fuck. Where’s Café du Monde?”

“That’s down on Decatur. Take Bourbon to Toulouse. Make a right. Go about three blocks and turn left on Decatur. It’s at the corner of Jackson Square.”

I snatch several bills from my back pocket and drop them on her tray. Then I bustle out the door into a full-blown rain shower.

Goddamn it. I run down Bourbon Street, splashing through the growing puddles. I don’t bother trying to keep my hair covered. It’s fucking pouring. Out of breath by the time I get to Toulouse, I dart under canopies when they aren’t loaded with pissy tourists.

Motherfucking fuck.

I keep running. Lack of balance makes it hard.

Please don’t leave, Lola.

By the time I hit Jackson Square, I’m drenched. My feet are swimming in my boots. Hair’s stuck to my face. I’m fucking cold as fuck. I slog a fistful of curls out of my eyes and trudge toward the green-canopied café. Once under the cover, I search the place. Of course she’s gone. She told me not to be late, and it’s almost one o’clock.

I drag my sorry ass back to the rain and stand under nature’s showerhead, arms spread, jacket ruined, smelling like liquor and probably wet dog. “Fuck you, Mother Nature. Fuck you.” Thoroughly
done
with this shit, I drop to my knees in the middle of the sidewalk, bow my head, and thrust up both middle fingers.

Hushed voices sound off as tourists edge around me, clutching their precious little umbrellas and purses. I lift my head. “And fuck all o’ y’all motherfuckers too.” I haul myself up, missing a few steps in the process of getting vertical.

“Rex?” a familiar voice calls behind me.

Music swirls into a lazy tornado inside my head, the staccato raindrops dancing a rhythmic jig like piano hammers striking hidden strings.

Water pours down my skin, along with thick anger and thin frustration. All of it diluted by…her. I turn slowly. Smile.

“Lola. My goddess.”

Covered from neck to calves with a black trench coat, she wanders over to me, hoists her matching black umbrella, and shields me from the rain.

Exhausted—from drinking too much, from running, from every-goddamn-thing—I close my eyes, inhale her subtle floral scent, and wrap my arms around her.

Her palms wriggle between us as if to push me away, but then she stops. Tension ebbs. She relaxes—if only by a hair. I rest my cheek on the top of her head and hold her for a brief eternity. Words form, accompanying the Chopin-like tune still playing in my mind. I hum a few bars and sing the lyrics into her hair:

In the end, when the clouds part

Night’s black talons seize my heart

Without your kiss, my lips are parched

Without your touch, my life is a lie

Tragedy paves the path we march

Your eyes close, but it’s me who dies

I sigh.

I’m too fucked up.

I’m gonna fuck this up.

Too late. I’ve already fucked this up.

Scared shitless I’ve just earned the first punch on my psycho-stalker savings card, I ease away. Lola’s lips part. Targeted on me and ripe with the seeds of a
lot
of questions, her huge icy blues defrost a couple degrees. She swallows as she steps back.

I duck under the lip of the umbrella into the rain. “Awkward.”

Her body language shifts. The temperature between us drops as fast as it rose. “Yes. Awkward.” She stares at me, accusing. “And you’re late.”

I sigh. “I waited for you at Café au Lait.”

She scrutinizes me from top to bottom as if trying to decide whether I’m lying. “‘Fool in the Rain.’”

The Zeppelin reference isn’t lost on me, even as shit-faced as I am. I tip my head skyward, let the droplets do what little they can to sober me up, and laugh. At this point, it’s all I’ve got. “Yeah. More like ‘Dumbfuck in the Rain.’”

We stare at each other for a full thirty seconds—me taking a beating from the elements; her, perfect and untouched, tucked under the safety of the umbrella like a precious porcelain doll. Her white skin is a strong contrast to the dark clothing. Kind of like her personalities upstairs and downstairs at Nocturnes. My balls tighten.

“I like you better in black,” the dumbfuck squatting inside my voice box says as my gaze glides down her black hair to the curves accentuated by black leather and ending at a pair of black patent, five-inch heeled boots. The laces on those bitches alone could keep me occupied for hours. Imagine what you could use them for. Wrists to posts. Hog ties. Nice, slow drag across that flawless, pale skin…

She crosses her arms and nods toward the café. “One cup of coffee, then I gotta go.”

I follow her to the entrance, appreciating her every step. My cock wakes and stretches with a half yawn. Dazed in its semi-erect state, it takes stock of the piece of ass and nods.
Approved.

We snag a table in the corner. On either side of us, clear plastic walls keep the rain at bay. A whisper-thin layer of powdered sugar coats the floor, the marble tabletops, and the chairs. Chicory-scented coffee fills the air, and the unmistakable, mouth-watering smell of freshly made beignets reminds me I haven’t eaten since lunch.

The waiter comes over, drops off ice water, and asks what we want.

“Two coffees and two orders of beignets,” I say.

Lola holds up a finger. “No beignets for me. And no milk in the coffee.”

The guy nods and ambles toward the kitchen.

I gesture to the white dust everywhere. “What do you mean, you’re not eating? It’s beignets.”

“Gotta watch my girlish figure.” She sips her water and shrugs out of her trench coat. Tight black shirt underneath. Her tits strain against the stretchy weave. No bra. My cock wants between her legs. Now.

“One fucking beignet isn’t gonna hurt. Come on. I’m buying.”

“Yeah, I know you are. And it’s still a no.”

“Fine.” I drop my vodka-impaired fist to the table with a thud and sprawl in my chair.

Lola scoots forward and straightens. “So, I have a couple of things I need to say. First, did you find my ring?”

“Yeah, about that. No.”

Her face falls. The impact crushes me.

“Sorry,” I mumble. No clue where the fucking thing is or why it’s so important to her. “I’ll keep looking for it.”

A quick, tight smile smoothes her features back into place, and a second later, a carefree expression replaces whatever disappointment snuck in. She doesn’t fool me for a minute.

“You can’t come back to Nocturnes. After…that night, my boss said he doesn’t want to see you there again. If Duane catches you, he’ll probably break your legs.”

I snort and cover my mouth with the back of a wrist. She’s funny. “Like he could.”

She arches a brow. “I know you’re drunk, but try to stay with me.”

“Now, wait a minute—”

She tips her head. “So, you’re
not
drunk?”

My cock doth protest. I straighten my jeans under the table. “I didn’t say I was or I wasn’t—”

“You’re
way
out of your league, Rex. As in, you’re a three-year-old playing Wiffle ball without padding, and they’re big fucking ballbusters playing Aussie Rules football. These people…” She looks away for a few seconds, and then presses her gaze back into mine like a gentle kiss. The impact from that look is palpable. “They’re not afraid of anyone. You’re not safe there.”

I shake my head. She’s pulling this bullshit to get me to leave her alone. Fuck that. If she doesn’t want to take me for a free spin, we can always go the other route.

“I wanna fuck you, Lola. I know how brash that sounds, but it’s the truth. Ever since Jacksonville…I just gotta fuck you.”

Those aqua blues harden into two nuggets of ice. “You’re a hell of a charmer, Rex. I’m shocked you don’t have women falling at your feet, begging for it.”

I flip up my gaze to meet hers. “I do.”

“Oh, right. Because you’re a rock star. I forgot.”

My attention piques. “Who told you that?”

“One of the dancers at the club. That’s not the point.”

“Then what
is
the point?”

“The point is you’re an asshole.” The exasperated sigh she pushes through her plump lips gets my dick—along with my hair-trigger temper—pumped even more.

“Yeah, and you’re a professional cocktease.”
Shut up, Rax. Just shut the fuck up
. “So how much do you charge for sex? One night. No holes barred.” The Drunken Dick part of me laughs at my stupid joke. The Serious Sam in me has a butt-puckering moment of clarity.
You just fucked up royally, buddy.

I expect her to get up, slap my face, and walk out of my life for good.

She stares me down like a pissed-off mama bear.

My nuts lose some of their swell and begin a hasty retreat into my gut. Yet, I’m not smart enough to take back what I said. Go fuckin’ figure.

“What’s your damage?” Her eye-daggers scrape a long, deep cut from my face down to my waist like a diamond drill carving out a trench. She injects that look with a lethal infusion of disgust and pity. I can’t stand that shit, so I give her what she wants just to make it stop.

“I get that question a lot. ‘Why are you such an asshole, Rax? Why do you whore your way through groupies like a stoner tears through a bag of Cheetos? Why do you treat people like shit?’

“Everyone assumes I got a traumatic past or some fucked-up skeletons hiding in my closet. They think my parents abused me. ‘There’s gotta be a
reason
you’re a cunt,’ they say.” I shake my head.

“The truth is, I’m just a self-absorbed hedonist. Nobody made me like this. No terrible tragedy pushed me off the bridge into the deep end of assholery. My parents never treated me bad. It’s just who I am. A straight-up, 100 percent pure, grade A
dick
. It’s the only person I know how to be.” I shrug.

“To the world, I’m a god. An idol worshipped by thousands. People see the thin layer of gold leaf at the surface and assume I’m a solid twenty-four carats through and through. If they knew the real person under the glam, they’d be sorry they wasted their money.” I lean forward, splashing a proud grin across my features. “I trick them into believing what they see, knowing what’s underneath ain’t nothin’ but cheap plastic. Gilded fucking junk. The illusion is everything, especially when it’s founded on nothing.”

Her lips part, and recognition dawns over her face. She quickly covers what must be an unintentional confession of understanding. “I was more wondering why you’re an alcoholic.”

The words sting worse than a slap in the face with a big, stinky tuna tail. She doesn’t know
shit
about me. Now I’m considering getting up and walking out of
her
life for good. I fold my arms over my chest and lean back, lifting up the front two legs of my chair. “I’m not an alcoholic.”

“First step is admitting it.”

The arrival of coffee and beignets briefly interrupts our dialogue.

“Maybe your first step is admitting you’re a sex addict.” God, the lame defensiveness just oozes out of me. And again, my lack of filter makes for lively conversation.

She smirks. “Hardly.”

My chair legs slam into the concrete. “You have sex for money.”

“Right. Which means I’m a whore, not a sex addict. Big difference.” Her eyes glitter like gems.

And my desire for a taste of that spark reignites. “I’ll pay cash. Give me one night, Lola.”

“If you like me so much, why do you want to cheapen me?” A hint of vulnerability sneaks behind her eyes, but a blink banishes it.

I purse my lips for a long moment. “I guess because you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. And I have no morals. Look, I’m not interested in a date,” I lie. “I wanna fuck you. If you’re not into casual sex, I’m willing to pay for it.”

“So, you’re just like everyone else. Joe Six-pack with an itch you can’t scratch. Money fixes everything.”

“I blame my predilections on this disposable, iGeneration society we live in. It’s like an all-you-can-eat buffet up in here. The world offers me everything I could ever want on a silver platter. Why condemn me for taking it when it’s so damn easy?”

Adrenaline-fueled blood giving me renewed audacity, I lean forward on my elbows and cut loose the next barrage of spout-off-at-the-mouth-now, regret-it-all-later. I’m on a roll tonight. “You wanna know why I’m offering to pay? It’s simple. I like to
own
things. To
use
them until I get bored, and then I throw them away.”

There’s that vulnerability again. “Why? And don’t you dare say—”

I finish her sentence. “Because I
can
.”

Concrete-laden resolve settles into her face, and I’m staring at a brick wall. “Hate to break it to you, Rex, but nobody owns me.”