Yearnings: A Paranormal Romance Box Set (157 page)

She shook her head, dropping the stem. “I just don’t get it. Love should make more sense than that.”

“
Maybe,” he said, snatching a cherry as she de-stemmed it. “But what would the fun be in that?”

Fun. Nothing had been fun about tonight. Until now. The blue on her straw was turning back to pink. She took a long drink off her soda. “You should know, the zombie apocalypse starts tomorrow.”

“
Is that so? Then we should prepare,” he said and motioned for the waitress to come back.

“
We will need sustenance. Apparently there’s a bit of running involved.”

“
Speed walking, at the very least”

Imagining a herd of zombies shuffling after them, a grin tugged her cheeks. “Yes.”

He grabbed the small happy hour menu. “Onion rings?” he said, handing it to her.

She skimmed the menu. “And potato skins. Oh, avocado rolls.” Bar food. Sweet, decadent bar food.

“
Change your mind?” the waitress asked, all batting eyes for AJ.

“
The lady will have the works.”

The waitress turned to Millie.

“
Yes,” Millie said. “Yes, she will.”

~~

Dear Diary … in Deadwood

by Ann Charles

“
Hey, Mom,” said my nine-year-old daughter Addy, as she burst through my bedroom doorway. “Elvis found this old book in the basement.” She held out a book I hadn’t seen in over a decade—my old diary. The upper corner of the cover had been pecked—leaving it tattered.

Elvis was my daughter’s pet chicken. Long story short, she planned to save the animal kingdom one pet at a time. Elvis was just another in Addy’s long line of birds, mammals, rodents, fish, and amphibious creatures. I’d drawn a line at the garter snake. Indiana Jones wasn’t the only one with a loathing for things that go slither in the night … or day.

“
It has a cool little lock on it. It must be a diary,” Addy said, holding up a paper clip. “Can I try to pop it open?”

I inspected the lock for scratches, wondering if she already had and was just covering her ass by asking. “You know how diaries work, Addy. They are for the owners’ eyes only.”

“
But we don’t know whose diary this is. It could be the long-lost diary of Calamity Jane.”

Being that we lived in Deadwood, South Dakota, famous for a history of gold rushes and gunfights, my daughter tended to think anything older than she was belonged to some famous historical figure. Take the old rusted spur her twin brother Layne, my very own wannabe archaeologist, dug up in the yard last week. She was certain it had belonged to Wild Bill Hickok.

“
We do know whose diary this is, Addy. It’s mine.”

“
Are you sure? It looks really old.”

Shut it, child.
“Isn’t it time for you to take Elvis for a walk?”

“
What did you write about in it?” she asked, ignoring my attempt at distraction.

Your father.
“Just some thoughts on life and growing up.”

“
You should let me read it. I might learn something of value.”

It was ironic how whenever she wanted to get her way, she reflected my words of wisdom right back at me. “I’m not falling for that, Adelynn Renee. This book is for my eyes only.”

“
Come on, Mom,” she whined. “Why can’t I read it?”

“
Because I don’t want you to.”

In the pages of this little book, I’d written the truth about her father, a man she had yet to meet. I didn’t feel like taking a trip down memory lane to visit him tonight, with her in tow. It would only raise questions that were better left for after she graduated from high school—or maybe college. That asshole of a sperm donor didn’t deserve her love and affection before she was able to fully understand what had happened a decade ago.

Addy sighed and threw herself on my bed. “I was hoping we could read it together and bond.”

Bond? I narrowed my eyes. “You need to stop watching the Hallmark Channel.” I picked up a pair of her pajamas that for some reason were on the floor of
my
bedroom and handed them to her. “Go brush your teeth and climb into bed.”

“
Aw, Mom.”

“
Go. Now.” I nudged her toward the door. “I’ll be in later to kiss you good night.”

She trudged out the door, her stocking feet sweeping a cluster of dust bunnies with her.

As soon as I heard the bathroom door close, I picked up the diary and popped it open with Addy’s paper clip.

Property of Violet Parker

Running my finger over my name, I frowned, remembering. I’d been so young, so clueless. I fanned the pages full of loopy cursive writing. Even my handwriting had been different then—flowing and pretty, not the rushed scrawls I used now.

I stopped on a page with a short, sloppy entry:

July 13
^th
:
Crappity crap! I just realized I totally missed my period. It must be the new birth control pills messing with my system. Seems like the nurse said something about this happening. Maybe I should call the doctor.

Ha! If only it had just been the pills making my period a no-show. I’d forgotten all about calling the doctor—thanks to the full load of college classes I was taking, my full-time job, and, of course, my preoccupation with Addy’s father. His blond hair, golden-brown eyes, and hard body had melted my underwear along with my resistance every time he came around to charm me into bed. I’d had a thing for sexy brainiacs back then, especially a science major who talked like Captain James Tiberius Kirk during sex.
Don’t … stop … Violet
.

I flipped a couple of pages, grimacing at the big, bold strokes I’d used on one of them.

July 29
^th
:
I’m going to kill her!!! How could she? She knows how much I like him. I hate her. I fucking hate her. I CAN’T BELIEVE SHE SLEPT WITH HIM!!!!

Ah, yes. My little sister, aka Psycho Susan. I should have known that she was going to be a permanent burr in my ass back when she was four and she cut the hair off all of my Barbie dolls because I’d told her she couldn’t play with them while I was at school. Since birth, she’d lived by the motto: What was hers was hers, and what was mine was hers to destroy.

The night I came home early from work and walked in on her naked and gasping in my bed underneath Addy’s father was the night I had shut them both out of my life. I still feel a slight kick in my solar plexus whenever the image of them together popped into my head. Her game had sunk to a new level. It was no longer about whom Daddy loved more.

Shaking my head, I flipped forward a few more pages. The writing was short and sweet and slightly smudged.

August 24
^th
:
I’m ten weeks pregnant. Shit.

I grimaced, remembering the choking fear squeezing my esophagus when I’d stared at the ultrasound image on the monitor.
A baby. Oh, my God, a baby.

My sister had still been hot and heavy with Addy’s father at the time. We’d become our own soap opera:
The Young and the Pregnant
. So much drama was in the air that summer, especially the night Addy’s dad had come to my door and declared his love for me. When I asked why he was having sex with my sister, he claimed it was only because he couldn’t have me.

I tried to break his nose with the door when I slammed it, but he’d been too quick for me.

For the next few weeks, I’d chewed my knuckles about whether to tell him or not about the baby. Maybe he really
did
love me. Maybe, somehow, we could carve a happy family life out of this mess. Maybe I was delusional from pregnancy hormones.

In the end, Natalie, my best friend, had talked me into giving him a chance to be a father.

I turned the pages until I found the entry about me coming clean with him. Two pages later, I had written down his response.

September 12
^th
:
Psycho Susan called me this morning, crying hysterically. When she finally calmed down enough to make sense, two words rang clear. “He’s gone.” So much for having a loving, responsible father for my child. If I ever see the dickhead again, I’m going to tear his nuts off and turn him into a eunuch.

After our little chat about me bearing his child, the jerk never did contact me to tell me I was going to have to fly solo. Apparently, being a genius didn’t guarantee he was smart.

A bunch of self-pity filled the next chunk of pages. Then I came across an entry I remembered all too well.

October 5
^th
:
TWINS! I’m having twins. Oh! My! God! I’m so screwed. The nurse gave me some information on adoption today after I mentioned that the father had run for the hills, abandoning me to raise two babies on my own. The flyer says that they screen the potential parents, including an FBI background check. I don’t know what to do.

I scanned through the next bunch of pages, chuckling at my attempts to return to the dating circuit with a very obvious bump sticking out in front of me. It had been Natalie’s idea for me to get out, meet some new men, and sniff out a potential father. The only thing I smelled in the dates was a lot of cologne and freakiness.

First, there was the fellow classmate who’d been shocked to learn I was pregnant—he’d just thought I was chubby because I ate like a 300-pound construction worker.

I still wince about the insurance salesman, who after learning why my belly stuck out so far, had wanted to cover my baby bump with olive oil and rub his stubble-covered cheeks all over it. Before I shut my apartment door in his face for good, he tried to sell me whole-life insurance.

Next came the serious college professor who looked like Tom Selleck in
Magnum, P.I.
He turned out to be hiding his true age behind dyed hair, a glued-on moustache, and a fake tan. His gray chest hair gave him away, and I did not fulfill his desperate fantasy of “boinking” a young female student.. My boinking days were long over.

Then there was the angry dentist, the possessed baker, and the narcissistic toy airplane maker. My life had turned into a disturbing nursery rhyme.

Around that time, I finally gave up on men and focused on my new job—administrative assistant at a local engineering firm. I decided to keep the babies, much to my family’s relief. Well, except for Psycho Susan, who suddenly found the spotlight shining on me and didn’t like it that I had toys she couldn’t take and mess up—they were attached by umbilical cords.

December 23
^rd
:
Got fired today, one week before my probationary period was up. When I asked the HR rep what I did wrong, I was informed that my sister was caught making a pass at my boss when she came to visit me yesterday (I’d been at the doctor’s for my monthly checkup, and Susan knew it). “What kind of pass?” I’d asked, explaining that my sister was a perpetual flirt. The kind involving her sitting on his lap in a dress, sans her underwear. “That was probably an accident,” I explained, straight-faced. Susan sometimes forgot she wasn’t wearing underwear—she never has worn them, claiming an allergy to elastic. The HR rep went on to explain that my boss accidentally had his pants down, too. Yikes! Needless to say, after being told that sisters are usually cut from the same cloth and reminded that I was an unwed mother with no baby-father in sight, I was given a week’s severance and asked to pack my things and join my boss at the unemployment office. Susan was at my parents’ place when I pulled in the drive. Had I been able to catch her, I might have given her a fat lip. Stupid waddle. She swears he came on to her first, and I think Mom even believes her. Criminy! Who is going to hire an almost twenty-eight-week-pregnant mother-to-be? I can’t even reach past my belly to the glasses in the kitchen cupboard anymore.

It turned out that the only place that would hire a twenty-eight-week-pregnant woman was a twenty-four-hour gas and carryout store. I’d worked there for a full month before my father pulled me aside and begged me to have mercy on him and quit. The stress caused by thinking of his pregnant daughter all alone in a gas station every night had his blood pressure red-lining. I told him that I had to pay rent. He asked me to consider relocating to his basement. He and my mom had talked, and agreed they would support me for the first six months of the kids’ lives, and then help with babysitting as I got rolling again. My eyes grew misty even now thinking about that conversation with him.