Bad Girls Don't (20 page)

Toni leapt to her feet, her tiara tumbling to the floor as she looked around. “Where is it?”

“At the thrift shop.”

Toni’s face fell.

“I wanted to bring it home, but then decided to tell you about it first.”

“If you tell me, it’s not a surprise,” the ever-clever Toni pointed out. The kid wasn’t even five yet, and already she was brilliant.

“You know how you always wanted a kitten—”

Toni’s shriek drowned out everything else. “YOU GOT ME A KITTEN?”

“Mm-hmm. But you’ve got to prove to me you’re a big enough girl to take care of a kitten.”

“I can. I can do it!”

“That means you can’t run into the street like you did the other day. You must always wait for Mommy or Angel. Promise?”

Toni nodded solemnly.

“Okay, then let’s go get Gravity.”

Toni frowned. “Who’s that?”

“The kitten. Her name is Gravity.”

“She’s a Gravity Girl. Let’s go!” Toni grabbed Skye’s hand and tugged her out the door. As she tried to keep up with her daughter, who faithfully held on to her hand and waited with her at the curb before crossing the street, Skye hoped to regain some of her own lost balance and focus. Because this was what was important to her—her daughter’s happiness.

Not
a sexy and infuriating cop.

“Go, Trojans, go!” the peppy girls along the sidelines yelled in unison as Skye and Lulu took their seats in the half-filled stadium.

“I hate cheerleaders.” Lulu looked morose.

“So you’ve told me. A number of times.”

“It bears repeating. I hate cheerleaders.”

“How about the kicker? Do you hate him, too?”

Lulu shrugged. “He’s bearable. What about the sheriff? Do you hate him?”

Skye mimicked Lulu’s shrug. “Hate creates negative energy.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“Yeah, I know. I planned it that way.”

“Yooo-hooo. Girls!” Sue Ellen was waving frantically at them, a tailgating nightmare in her bright purple Trojans’ workout pants and matching long-sleeved hoodie. “Did you save me a seat?”

They hadn’t, but there was plenty of empty space next to them.

Sue Ellen sat down and plopped two huge tote bags beside her. “I brought stuff.”

“Yeah, I see that.”

Sue Ellen pulled out a trio of “#1 Fan” foam hands, socking the people in the row in front of them. She blithely ignored their irritated stares. “Here, take these.” She shoved the green foam at Skye and Lulu.

Next, she pulled out a giant
D
made of stiff cardboard, followed by a portion of picket fence.

Skye recognized it. “Isn’t that from your garden at the trailer park?”

“Well, the fence part is. I’ll put it back after the game.”

“Why did you bring it with you?”

Sue Ellen held up the
D
and the fence side by side.

At Skye’s blank look, she said, “
D
, fence.
De
fense. Get it?”

Skye nodded.

“Where’s Toni?” Sue Ellen looked around. “I got her the cutest little football helmet.”

“She’s with Angel tonight.”

“Wise move. Remember last fall, how she ran out into the middle of the wiener dog races in Serenity Falls? And then the other day, running out into the street like that. I swear, she nearly gave me white hair. I had to go home and get out the Nice’n Easy as a preventative measure. We certainly don’t need her racing out into the middle of the football field tonight.”

“She might do better than the Trojans’ defensive line,” Lulu said. “They stink.”

“That may have been the case before I tutored them in the ways of yoga,” Skye reminded her. “But now, they are enlightened warriors.”

“Right.”

“You’ll see. Okay, why are they all running off like that?”

“It’s the kickoff. The game is beginning.” Lulu turned to study Skye. “You don’t have a clue about this game, do you?”

“I know that sacks are something the coach wants a lot of.”

Lulu attempted to give Skye a crash course in football for dummies, while Skye waved her foam hand like a wildly overcaffeinated cheerleader, bouncing to her feet to shout every few seconds.

Skye made it to the third quarter before having to take a potty break. So much for drinking all that chilled green tea she’d brought with her in a thermos. That stuff went right through you.

The port-a-potties were located to one side behind the stadium bleachers. Okay,
stadium
might be a bit of an exaggeration. The reality was a bunch of rows of bleachers along one side of a playing field. The other three sides were open.

The word
stadium
made Skye think of the Coliseum in Rome. Or the bizzaro job they’d done on Soldier Field in Chicago, which they’d driven by on their way from California to PA. Skye had liked the rest of the skyline of that city, but the stadium was too out there.

So Rock Falls didn’t have a “stadium” per se, as much as it had a football field with a bleacher stand.

Potty break completed, Skye was taking a shortcut under the bleachers when she heard his voice. Nathan. Wearing a black T-shirt and jeans.

“I didn’t expect to see you here,” he said.

If he had, he probably would have gone elsewhere. He’d done a pretty good job of avoiding her since they’d had sex in her office at the Tivoli almost a week ago.

“Same here.” Her voice was curt. “I wasn’t expecting to see you.”

“As the sheriff, I make a point of coming to the games. What’s your excuse?”

She gave him a scathing look, one closely related to the Sicilian death stare. “If you’re insinuating that I’m here to see you, then you are totally deranged. The team invited me. I taught them yoga, remember?”

“And belly dancing?”

“That was only to show flexibility. I focused on yoga.”

Nathan seemed focused on her mouth. It was pretty dark beneath the bleachers, so she couldn’t be sure. She did know that the sexual chemistry between them was still there, simmering. Like heat shimmers above a blacktop road in the August sun.

They both made the first move, meeting near a support beam. Nathan backed her up against it, kissing her as if she were a cool drink of water and he were a very thirsty man.

There in the shadows, he slid his tongue into her mouth with erotic stealth, while his hands stole beneath her paisley top to caress her breasts. If Nathan was surprised to find she was wearing a bra for once, he didn’t say anything. She discovered that his touch was just as potent with silky lingerie acting as a seductive barrier.

She pulled his T-shirt out from the waistband of his jeans and slid her fingers up his spine. His skin was hot. Was that him panting, or was it her?

He nudged his knee between her legs and lifted her a bit, only to let her slide down his thigh. The ensuing friction, magnified by the denim of their jeans, was incredibly arousing.

She urged him to do it again. Oh, yeah . . .

The cheering inside her body was suddenly echoed by the crowd above them, bringing Skye back to earth with a bump. What was she doing, making out under the bleachers like some Nipplegate cheerleader?

She pushed him away and for once took the easy way out by making a run for it. Yes, fast exits were her specialty, but this ranked as one of her speediest. And shakiest. She just prayed her knees wouldn’t give out before she returned to her seat. Nathan did not come after her.

“What took you so long?” Sue Ellen demanded. “You missed the touchdown! We’re winning!” She hugged Skye while leaping up and down, then she quickly released her. “Oops! My boob just popped out of my lucky bra again.” She wiggled around and got things back in order. “There, that’s better.”

“Brad got a field goal,” Lulu told Skye. “You missed that, too.”

“There was a line to use the port-a-potties.”

Lulu raised a pierced eyebrow. “Really. Meet anyone interesting on your way there?”

“Why?”

“Because I saw the sheriff a little while ago. Did you know he’d be here?”

“No.”

“Did you run into him?”

Did grabbing each other and making out under the bleachers count as “running into him”? Skye didn’t think so, so she said, “No.”

Lulu, the clever cynic, eyed Skye’s kiss-swollen lips suspiciously before saying, “Would you tell us if you did?”

“Doubtful.”

“I didn’t think so.”

The crowd roared. “Look! We won!” Sue Ellen and Lulu hugged each other, sandwiching Skye between them. “We won! Do you believe it?”

Yes, Skye could believe it. What she couldn’t believe was that she’d made out with Nathan again. That kind of behavior made her worry that she might be both bad
and
stupid. Not a real good combo.

 

 

Two days later, Sue Ellen was once again bouncing with happiness. This time, she was doing it in Skye’s living room. In a toga. “First the Trojans win their opening football game for the first time in ages, and now I get the totem party I always wanted for my birthday!”

“Why are you wearing a toga?” Lulu voiced the question, but Skye had been thinking it too.

“Silly girl. Everyone knows you wear a toga to a totem party, right?”

“Not really.”

“Oh.” Sue Ellen didn’t appear too upset with this news. “Well, it’s my party and I can wear a toga if I want to.” She rubbed her hands together eagerly. “I haven’t been this excited since I won the title of Miss Whoopie.”

“What’d you do to win that?” Lulu asked. “Make out with the judges?”

“I thought you were Miss Scrapple,” Skye said.

“I was. But I told you, that was just one of the titles I’ve won.”

Skye didn’t mention the title Sue Ellen had been known by in Serenity Falls—Our Lady of the Outlandish.

Skye knew all about being outlandish. She thrived on it. She’d been born too rebellious and had grown up too outspoken. These were pluses in her book.

Which was why Sue Ellen was her friend. Ditto for Lulu, who today was wearing a bowling shirt teamed with a black miniskirt and black combat boots.

Skye felt positively mundane dressed in lavender pedal pushers from the sixties and a paisley halter top.

“I planned a little something to kick things off,” Sue Ellen said, pointing to the karaoke machine she’d brought with her.

Karaoke was a little unusual for a totem party, but then, so were togas. After all, it was Sue Ellen’s party. Who was Skye to judge?

“I picked this song just for you, Skye.” Sue Ellen grabbed the mike and started singing “Bad Girls” by Donna Summer.

Two seconds later, Lulu and Skye joined her. Of course, little Toni didn’t want to be left out, so she bopped around with Ta the Tiger in hand, mimicking their movements before collapsing in giggles.

Sue Ellen, Lulu, and Skye continued to gyrate to the music, releasing their inner disco divas, with Angel as their audience.

Afterward, Sue Ellen’s diva wanted feeding. “I’m starving,” she announced.

Skye pointed to the set of tangerine-colored Fiestaware, a Serenity Falls garage-sale find. “I got out the good dishes for you,” she said, giving her best Martha Stewart impersonation.

“And you plan on filling them with healthy food, I’ll bet.”

“You were hoping for Cheetos and Velveeta?” Skye countered.

“I suppose that would be too much to hope for,” Sue Ellen replied, “despite the fact that it
is
my birthday.”

“You suppose right.”

Despite her initial hesitation, Sue Ellen was soon digging into the bean burritos, guacamole, and roasted eggplant dip Skye had prepared. Angel had offered to bring some of her yellow-squash cookies, but Skye had diverted her with a request for an organic fruit salad instead.

They all clustered around the kitchen table, Toni perched on Skye’s lap, popping bits of cut-up pears and raspberries into her mouth.

“My birthday is coming soon, right, Mommy? Ta and I want a party like this one. Only with cake. And real tigers. And lots of kittens to keep Gravity company.”

The singing and dancing had sent the kitten under Toni’s bed, her favorite hideout when things got too chaotic for her Zen personality.

“Getting back to me,” Sue Ellen said, “I want to achieve enlightenment and become a radiant being today. Can we get that accomplished in two hours?”

“No,” Skye said bluntly.

“How about if we toss in some yoga?”

“Still no.”

“Why not?”

“Because that’s not how yoga works. You know that. You took yoga lessons from Angel.”

“Yes, but I thought maybe they’d come up with a more efficient version by now. You know, the same way they develop faster computers all the time?”

Lulu just snapped her gum and rolled her eyes, which drew Sue Ellen’s attention to her.

“I’m telling you, if you’d just let me work on your makeup . . .”

Lulu held up the large silver cross she wore around her neck and aimed it in Sue Ellen’s direction. “Stay away from me with your wicked Mary Kay ways.”

“Oh, I don’t want to be a Mary Kay sales rep anymore,” Sue Ellen assured her. “I was thinking more along the lines of a realtor. I mean, I already manage the Regency Trailer Park and do that so well that I really should branch out. I could begin in sales of double-wides. What do you think? Will this totem party tell me if that’s a good idea?”

“No. This party is meant to remind you that we’re all linked to our animal guides, and to accept the power that they offer us. To remind us that we’re part of the Earth, that each creature has a place and an inherent skill of its own. Are you ready to answer some questions to help you chose your totem animal?”

“Sure, but I already know which one is mine.”

“Is it an animal you feel an affinity with?” Skye asked.

Sue Ellen nodded emphatically. “Yes.”