Ashes - Book 1 (8 page)

Tuesday finally rolls around and the center is closed and I get to sleep in. Well, I would have slept in if I’d remembered to shut my door. Instead, Onyx sounds the alarm by licking up one nostril and then so far into my ear, she must have touched my brain.

“I’m up. I’m up,” I tell the big bundle of black fur, who gets in one more long lick up my cheek.

Jealous, Ghost jumps up on the bed and then kneads a hole through my chest. I look up into his big blue eyes and listen to his loud purrs. I can almost see his eyes roll back in their sockets when I scratch the special spot on top of his head.

Like Stephanie, I never had pets growing up. My mom is allergic. So having these two wonderfully frustrating creatures cuddled up next to me on the bed is comforting and very welcome. I love when Ken spends the night with Steph, because they always end up with me. Maybe I kinda, sorta leave my door open on purpose.

Thirty minutes later, I’m rolling out of bed and staggering into the kitchen to start a pot of coffee. Then I pull on my running shorts and tennis shoes before hooking Onyx onto her leash. Five minutes later, I’m running down the street, being dragged this way and that by the curious mutt. She’s officially only a teenager in doggy years, but she already weighs fifty pounds. Since I barely weigh one hundred pounds on my fat days, she has no problem jerking me around.

By the time I’m back to the house an hour later, I’m dripping in sweat. I slip off my shoes and socks, but dive into the pool fully dressed. The water feels wonderful and I’m once again grateful that nearly every house in Vegas, even the smallest one, has a pool.

When I pull myself out after swimming a few laps, Stephanie is standing there with a towel tucked under her arm and two mugs of coffee. I grin at her. She’s such a nurturer, a caretaker at heart. I flick water in her face as a show of gratitude and we both sink onto lounge chairs to enjoy the rest of the morning.

“I’m not sure about this,” Stephanie says for the seventeenth time today.

“Stop being such a baby,” I tell her for the seventeenth time and pull her behind me through the doors of the salon and spa I prefer. We’re welcomed with glasses of champagne and I notice Steph tosses hers back in one swallow. I laugh and hand her mine. She tosses it back too.

This is going to be fun.

“Right this way,” the gorgeous blonde with perfectly coiffed hair tells us and leads us to the back rooms.

I notice Stephanie furrowing her brow. I hook my arm through hers so she can’t run away and whisper, “They put us in the back so all the other customers don’t hear us scream.” She stops dead in her tracks and tries to turn on her heel. I laugh and drag her behind me. “I’m only kidding.” I’m really turning into a grade-A liar.

In the small seating area of the waxing center, we sign the appropriate paperwork and wait our turn. Stephanie scratches her legs and I can see the light blonde hair poking out from them. She’d been appalled when I’d told her she couldn’t shave anything, anywhere, because the wax needed something to cling to.

“Miss Vonnegut, this way please,” a tall, leggy brunette says to Steph. My friend slowly rises from her chair like she’s one hundred years old. I give her a little push in the other woman’s direction.

Then it’s my turn and I’m escorted to a room next to Steph’s and I strip down and lie on the table. I’ve done this every six weeks for the past couple years. It hurts like hell, but the rewards are worth the hour of pain. I flashback to the first time I’d done it and feel a moment of sympathy for my friend.

My waxer isn’t a chatterer, thank goodness, so I try to relax and close my eyes.

Riiip. I flinch when the first strip is torn off, but settle back into my meditation. My eyes pop open when next door I hear a scream, then, “Holy mother of God” wafts clearly through the thin walls. I laugh and feel immediately bad. A moment later, Steph cries out, “Shit!” Then, a moment later, “I’m done. I want to stop.”

I pick up my phone and face-time her. On the second ring, her face appears on my screen. “I hate you Beth Richards. You are the worst person on earth. You suck as a human being and a friend,” she snarls in one breath into her phone.

Her face is red and her eyes are watering. I try so hard not to laugh, but I can’t help it.

I hear a riiiip, and Stephanie screams, the sound coming through the walls and also my phone’s speakers. She growls. Growls. She looks like a feral beast trapped on a padded table.

“Listen to me,” I say to her when I’m finally able to talk. “Breathe. In and out. In and out. Find your happy place.”

On my screen, I watch her nostrils flare in her attempts to breathe. She squeaks, “Oh no” then riiip. A string of curse words come from her lips.

Off to the side, I hear the waxer say to her, “Okay, that has the exterior, open your legs wide and let me get the lips.”

Stephanie’s mouth trembles but apparently she does what she’d been told because a minute later, her eyes roll back into her head and small gurgling noises come from her throat.

“One more side,” the waxer says, her voice a cheerful lilt.

Steph sticks a finger in her mouth and bites down. Riiip. Oh dear heavens, she about bit her finger off.

She wipes her hand across her face and smiles the tiniest bit into the phone. “I did it.” I don’t have the heart to tell her what comes next.

“Please turn over on your hands and knees so I can get your bottom.”

Steph’s face morphs into pure horror.

“You can do it,” I encourage her and she snarls at me. But … she puts the phone down and for a moment, all I can see is ceiling, then her face appears again, this time looking down into the phone, her hair hanging down in damp strands on either side of her face.

“We’ll go eat at your favorite restaurant after this,” I promise.

She mouths something. I think it was “fuck you” but I’m not sure.

Riiip. Everything goes dark as she falls down on the phone, howling in pain.

“One more side,” says the cheerful waxer and the screen grows brighter as Steph lifts herself back onto her hands. She’s panting like a dog. I tell her to breathe because I’m worried she’ll pass out.

A tear drops onto her screen and now her image is blurry. “We’ll get ice cream and eat the entire thing and watch chick flicks,” I say.

Riiip. She wails, the most pitiful sound I’ve ever heard and collapses on the phone again. My own waxer has her hands over her mouth, trying hard not to laugh out loud. Each time I meet her eyes, I feel like I’m going to explode.

When I hear Steph’s waxer say, “You can turn over now. It’s time to do your legs and underarms” I click off my phone but can still hear Stephanie’s loud “Noooooooo” through the wall.

An hour later, I’m sitting in the little waiting area, when the door opens and Steph’s waxer comes out. She stage whispers, “You might want to run.” I clamp my hand over my mouth and she stage whispers again. “Seriously.”

Five minutes later, a very rumpled Stephanie opens the door. She’s walking with her legs wide apart and her hair is plastered against her forehead and cheeks. I stand up, wondering if maybe the waxer was right and I should bolt, but Stephanie pulls her shoulders back and waddles to the door, tossing over her shoulder, “That wasn’t so bad.”

Two hours later, we’re back home after the wonderful dinner I promised her. We stopped by the salon first, to have her hair blown out and the mascara washed away from her face.

It had taken her a good thirty minutes to find the humor in the situation, then she finally said, “I can’t believe anyone would do that more than once.”

I promise her that the smoothness and the not needing to shave for six weeks would be worth it, but she glares at me with doubt.

“Plus, Ken’s going to love it.” I wiggle my eyes at her and she looks at me in horror.

“He’ll love it next week when the skin has grown back!” Then she’d waddled off to the kitchen.

I’m sitting on the couch, flipping through channels, when she comes into the living room, her big green eyes shiny with unshed tears.

I jump up. “What’s wrong?”

Her bottom lip trembles. “I have to go to the bathroom.”

“Number one or number two?” I ask her, keeping my face serious.

“Two.” She says the word in a long whine. Then she crosses her legs and I can tell she’s squeezing her butt cheeks tightly together, as if willing the poop to stay put.

I run to my bedroom and grab a box of baby wipes I keep there for quick post sex clean-ups. I thrust them at her. “Use these. Good luck.”

She looks at me like a person facing the gallows and turns on her heel, waddle walking to the bathroom.

I sink to the floor, covering my mouth with both hands and am immediately attacked by the dog and cat.

First there’s a groan, then a sob emanating through the bathroom door. I yell, “You can do it!”

She calls me every name in her very long repertoire of bad words. She’s learned a lot of them since hooking up with Ken. I’m pretty impressed.

The toilet flushes, the sink faucet comes on and I try, really try to get up and make a run for it. But Onyx is on my stomach and Ghost is playing with my hair and I’ve laughed so hard my bones feel like they won’t pick me up.

So I’m lying on the floor when the bathroom door opens and a sweaty Stephanie emerges. She doesn’t look at me, just lifts her nose in the air and waddles to her bedroom, slamming the door.

Chapter 9 - Gage

The range is almost deserted and I move to the far end. I notice Joe, the manager, is moving targets for a couple of guys with rifles. He waves at me and points to Ken. I motion him over.

“Joe, this is my buddy, Ken. He’s learning to shoot.”

The two shake hands and then he squints at me, the wrinkles on his leathery face coming alive. “What did you bring today? I hope you didn’t bring the cannon;
I
can hardly control that.”

I shake my head. “I brought the 9 mm and the .22.” I open the case and hand Ken the yellow shooting glasses and some earplugs.

Joe grabs the guns and puts them on the table, barrels pointed down range. “Ken, you ever shoot before?”

Ken turns slightly red. “I, uh, well, to be honest. No.”

Joe slaps his shoulder. “Everyone starts somewhere. Don’t feel bad.”

Ken glances at me as Joe continues. “Make sure you explain the rules here and go over gun safety. I trust you, but I’ll be checking up on you both.”