Shaken (2 page)

Trust Tony to mix a sweet martini with a kick. They could all use it that night. Zip pursed her lips. Alcohol would numb, but they didn’t need to get sloppy drunk. “Sampler platters?”

“On it.” Tiffany sailed away, tray high as she weaved through the rapidly filling lounge. The cold chased the regulars into the room where Frank and Dino soothed the week’s stresses.

Kaley wrapped an arm around Veronica and gave the Valkyrie a side squeeze. “We’re sorry, Ronnie.”

“No worries.” Veronica’s too-tense grimace twisted her lips white beneath their pale gloss. “I am so the hell better off without him.”

“His loss.” Lucy retrieved her glass.

“Hope his secretary ties his balls in a knot,” Jem offered by way of a toast.

Zip raised her glass, and Kaley mirrored the action. All five clinked their glasses together and rinsed the bad taste in men down with a whoosh of alcohol. Zip coughed as the alcohol detonated like a cherry bomb of fire in her belly. “Whew, that’s strong.”

“Hell, yeah.” Lucy laughed and pulled out her phone, aimed it right at Veronica and snapped three quick pictures, capturing for posterity the twisted grimace of bitterness and the wince of tartness that wrinkled her face.

“Thanks for that.” Veronica watered down her dry tone with another swallow of the martini.

“Just want a reminder if you start getting nostalgic for the cheating son of a bitch in a few days.” Lucy waved her phone and tapped her glass to Jem’s. What else were friends for, but to remind one of god-awful mistakes made in the past? Veronica may have been the worst when it came to terrible mistakes. She’d already divorced Cheating Bastard Number One a few years before, and she had been on the fast track to wedded hell with Cheating Bastard Number Two.

“Anyway.” Veronica waved a manicured hand. “What’s with the flowers?”

“It’s our anniversary.” Zip relaxed, content. Camaraderie, friendship, bitchiness, and laughter defined their Friday nights. Tony working across the room—his gaze colliding with hers in between mixing drinks—revved her system more than the alcohol. Surrounded by her four besties made the evening perfect. No matter how bad the week, those few hours were worth it. Through thickening waistlines, eating disorders, bad boyfriends, two failed marriages, and Kaley’s miscarriage the year before, they’d held the line against life’s body blows for more than a decade. Their weekly ritual involved drinks, laughter, male-bashing as needed, and the kind of encouragement and support only estrogen could provide.

“Anniversary?” Veronica’s perfectly plucked eyebrows gathered together in a frown. “Who the hell is celebrating an anniversary?” She pointed her way around the table. “Single. Single.
Painfully
single. Single, and now single.” Zip ignored the biting reminder that she’d been single the longest.

In her defense, she had the worst taste in men, but she indulged Veronica because bitterness stung the open wound of betrayal—which was as much about her pride as her feelings—and if lashing out, even in little ways, helped…. Well, Zip had her big girl thong on; she could handle it.

“We are, blondie.” Jem polished off her first martini and reached for the pitcher, careful not to slosh any of the decadent treat. She offered refills to everyone. “Five years we’ve been gathering at Coveted, and the management noticed.”

“Actually, I think it was Tony. You know, the lick-him-up-one-side-and-down-the-other bartender who keeps staring at Zip like he could eat her up?” Lucy smiled beatifically.

“Why do you think it’s Tony?” Zip sat up a little straighter, covering her discomfort with another drink. The martini joined the wine in a waltz through her senses.

Kaley snorted, and Jem shook her head.

“Hopeless,” Jem muttered. “She’s hopeless.”

“We’re all hopeless. Maybe she should get a job here. Then she’d have to notice the gorgeous guy. You like ’em when you work with them.” Veronica bit off the last word and then sighed. “Sorry, that was bitchy.”

“At least it put some glitter in your bitchiness.” Zip grinned around the sting. But she couldn’t say Veronica had it wrong. Her taste in men always seemed to extend to the ones she worked with, shared a class with, or had been bribed into tutoring. It always seemed to lead to mediocre sex and oxygen-sucking implosions. Fortunately, her last mistake had taken a job elsewhere, leaving the very married senior partner and his two gay associates in her office. All were definitely off limits to her imprudent affections.

True to form, Zip's friends noticed her distraction, and Kaley stretched an arm around her. Easily the most affectionate of their circle, Kaley gave hugs that were warmer than a mom’s and offered just as much comfort. “I say we toast to friendship, laughter, and the best sisters a woman could have.”

A round of
hear-hears
followed, and they clinked glasses again. Veronica caught Zip’s gaze and mouthed an apology, and Zip winked. All was forgiven. The laughter began to flow as freely as the alcohol. Tiffany swooped in, delivering platters of steamed veggies, diced cheeses, chicken fingers, and more. She carried away the pitcher, returning with another round.

Jem lifted her glass. “Let’s say farewell to losers with their deflated egos and tiny cocks, and hello to better prospects deserving of women like us.”

That speech received another resounding
hear-hear
and the ladies clinked glasses for the third time. Zip swallowed down another wave of unhappiness with the toast. The pleasant buzz of friendship and alcohol soothed a lot of hurts.

“You know”—Kaley reached for a fried mozzarella stick and stroked it through the marinara sauce—“since we’re all single, we could sign up for a dating service….”

“Oh, no. No. No. And, no.” Lucy vetoed the idea. “Steve and Jim were both dating services disasters. Never again.”

“We could swing for the other team.” Veronica plucked a fried zucchini from the platter. “I’d definitely go for any of you.”

“Ugh.” Jem shook her head. “Why ruin a great friendship for some tawdry sex? If you just need a good time, I have a sweet little button toy I can give you.”

Bawdy humor rebounded through the group, and Zip chuckled into her glass. It was almost sad that they’d all been on the hunt for Mr. Right since college and barely been able to latch onto Mr. Right Now.

Happy hour stretched into the dinner service, and Frank was crooning to them about pennies from heaven when Jem waved a piece of Manchego from the plundered appetizer platter. “So, guess what bomb they dropped on my desk an hour before the weekend?”

A marketing associate, she thrived in the last-minute world of advertising campaigns and product reinvention. She wouldn’t bring the subject up if she weren’t completely enthused about it.

“Viagra?” Veronica snarked.

Kaley choked on a chuckle, pressing a hand to her lips to contain the martini before she snorted it over everyone. “Lube.”

“Hmm….” Lucy pinched one eye shut, a mellow smile on her lips. “I’m thinking something boring, like cereal.”

Zip hiccupped, crossing her arms as Jem stared at her expectantly. “Erotic Candyland.”

“So close, and yet so far.” Jem mimed a drum roll. “The Magic 8 Ball.”

Another round of silence met her pronouncement, followed by barely suppressed giggles.

“You know,” she continued blithely, ignoring their amused derision. “The shake-it ball that answers all your questions?”

“We know.” Zip leaned her head back against the seat, watching Tony through the half-golden glow of the restaurant’s lighting. They’d dimmed it as evening ticked into night, giving the room a more intimate atmosphere. Tony tilted his head to the side while he listened to another bartender and polished a glass with a white cloth. His fingers moved, sure and easy, and he never lost his rhythm.

“What are you supposed to do with it?” Of the five of them, only Kaley wasn’t tied to her career. She enjoyed a more bohemian, artistic lifestyle. “They sell them in dollar stores now.”

“Reinvent it for the digital age. They want to push the product as an app for smart phones, digital tablets, and as a web browser add-on, kind of like Google’s
I’m-feeling-lucky
button, only it would work on all the sites you visited and give you feedback.”

Lucy’s mouth pursed into a moue. “Yeah, I’m not seeing that.”

“Me neither.” Jem sighed. “But there it is, and I have to present some concepts first thing Monday morning.”

“Well, happy weekend to you.” Zip felt for her friend. Weekends were supposed to be downtime, not marathon work sessions. But since her own job had begun to spiral rapidly into the twenty-four-seven portion of the year, she could sympathize.

Veronica slapped her hand gently on the table. “All right, what do you need from us?”

“Ideas. Thoughts. Jokes.” Jem made another face. Her cocoa-kissed skin and lightly tilted eyes were a gift from her Asian-African mother, while the too-blue eyes were an electric heritage from her Dutch father. As much as Veronica resembled the perfect Barbie, Jem definitely won the genetic lottery for exotic beauty. Her short black hair was accented in white tips that she occasionally dyed dark blue, purple and, one time, sunny yellow.

“Well, what did we use them for?” Ever practical, Lucy traded off her next round of martinis for a glass of water. Zip would bet money Lucy was on call in a few hours. When she waved Tiffany over to order some espresso, Zip’s hunch was confirmed.

“Does he like me?” Kaley offered. “Does this dress make me look fat?”

“Should I still be a virgin? Will his cock fit?” Veronica snickered, her eyes glittering with an apology, but the attorney was probably their most uptight member and a sloppy drunk. They’d all forgive her the overindulgence tonight, particularly if it kept her pain at bay.

“Will someone ask me to the prom? Should I ask him to the prom?” Lucy traded her glass for the demitasse cup. “Or better, will I meet
him
at the prom?”

“Zip?” Jem nudged her.

As entertaining as those ideas were, Zip had no fun experience to share. Tracing a pattern in the moisture gathering on the exterior of her glass, she shrugged. “I never had one. I asked for one a couple of Christmases running, but mom always dismissed it as frivolous.”

“Well, so the fuck what?” Jem shook her head. “I swear your mother makes cardboard seem interesting.”

“She’s just practical.”
With no signs of a mushy soul or an ounce of whimsy.
Zip had lost her father to a drunk driver before she’d turned two. She only knew him from the photos that occupied a prominent place on her mother’s mantel. But, rather than fall apart in grief, Zip’s mother went to work, put herself through school, and raised Zip and her older brother with no family support. Everything in their life served a practical purpose or they didn’t have time for it.

“Pfft.” Lucy’s raspberry sent them off in another round of merriment. “We love your mom, Zip. But I think her last act of whimsy was your name.” If naming her after Moses’ wife, Zipporah, could be called whimsy.

“You could be right.” She grinned and drained the remnants of her drink. The lazy sense of relaxation curling through her dulled the need to defend her mom. The woman turned practical into an art with a capital
P
and was proud of it. Zip had inherited more than her mom’s auburn hair, brown eyes, and freckles. She’d inherited that need for steady and reliable, even if it lacked spark and sizzle. “Wouldn’t it be great if we could just ask the Magic 8 Ball to solve all our woes?”

“That’s it. You need whimsy.” Veronica stabbed a finger in her direction. “We need a Magic 8 Ball.”

“Fortunately”—Jem scooched sideways, reached under the table to retrieve her bag, and pulled out a black sphere—“I happen to have one.”

She thrust the ball toward Zip. “Indulge your whimsy.”

Zip stared at the Magic 8 Ball and then at Jem.

Oh, hell, why not?

Chapter Two

Tony concentrated on wiping down the glasses. The rhythmic activity kept his hands busy while his mind continued through the countless possibilities his lawyer gave him.

Derek shifted forward on the stool, his expression equal measures sympathetic and resigned. “Hey, Tony, I get it. But we presented a strong case, and now we have to trust the Family Court judge.”

“I just wish he’d lifted the restraining order.” He sighed, polishing away the dishwasher spots as though he could erase Robin’s lies from his life. Across the room, a sparkle of mirth erupted. As he often did, he glanced at his favorite Friday night patrons.

The auburn-haired beauty in their center captivated him. Her gaze collided with his, and he couldn’t resist her wide-open and affectionate smile. No matter how exhausted she might be or how much work she carried in that oversized backpack, she always had time to smile at him. She’d even given him a birthday card that year. Coming just hours after Robin destroyed his world, the little Hallmark greeting meant a hell of a lot more than he would willingly admit.

Dragging his attention away from the women, he looked at his attorney and rock-climbing buddy. “Thanks for doing this, Derek. I know you’re putting in more hours than you’re billing.” Another point of contention, but the man refused to bill him for more than two hours a week and took the rest out in pick-up games and climbing sessions. With most of his savings earmarked for his own bar, the intense physical activity was Tony’s only outlet.

But he’d gladly part with every dime if it meant getting to see his little girl again.

“Let it go, man.” Derek stood with a stretch and dropped a few bills on the bar. “Cynthia’s waiting for me uptown. If I hear anything, I’ll call. Until then, just hang tight, and try not to think about it too much.”

Easier said than done. But Derek was already on his side and didn’t need to listen to the sob story, so Tony just waved him off with an ease he sure as hell didn’t feel. Scooping up the cash and empty glass, he set the latter in the bus bin while carrying the bills over to the register. He closed out Derek’s tab and counted the cash into the drawer. A wallet-sized photo of a tousle-headed redhead grinned at him from where he’d stuck it to the register. The toddler’s wobbly smile and tear-stained face blended the perfect contrast of sweet and sour. Brushing his thumb over her cheek, he forced his eyes away and dropped the change in the tip jar he shared with the rest of the bartenders.