Ann Major - Shameless

“Take your time. It’s hot out there,” he warned.

July. In Texas. Of course it was hot.

“No hotter than Vegas,” she replied.

From the frying pan into the fire, she thought as she got up, gathered her guitar and stumbled out of the bus in her low-cut black dress and strappy high heels. For a long moment she just stood there in the dust and the baking heat. Then lifting her torn skirt up so it wouldn’t drag in the dirt, she slung her guitar over her bare shoulder. Cocking her head at a saucy angle, she fought to pretend she was a star even though all she was doing was limping across an empty parking lot toward the café that was Mission Creek’s answer for a bus station.

The historic square with its southwestern flair hadn’t changed much. With a single glance she saw the quaint courthouse, the bank, the post office and the library. She was back in Mission Creek, the town she’d almost chosen to be her home. She was back—not that anybody knew or cared.

Inside the café, she hobbled to the ladies’ room before she selected a table. It was a bad feeling to look in the mirror and hate the person she saw. The harsh fluorescent lighting combined with the white glare from the bathroom window revealed the thirty-hour bus ride’s damage and way more reality than Celeste could face this early. Shutting her eyes, she splashed cold water on her cheeks and throat.

What would Phillip think when he saw her? Her eye-liner was smudged. What was left of her glossy red lipstick had caked and dried in the middle of her bottom lip. Her long yellow hair was greasy and stringy. She didn’t have a comb, but she licked off her lipstick.

When she was done, she had a bad taste in her mouth, so she gargled and rinsed with lukewarm tap water. Oh, how she longed for a shower and a change of underwear and clothes.

Just when she’d thought she couldn’t sink lower than Harry’s, here she was at the Mission Creek Café in a ripped evening gown with a sprained ankle. Mission Creek Café. Phillip had brought her to lunch here once. The café was noted for its down-home country cooking. Oh, how Phillip had adored the biscuits.

Carbs. Celeste hadn’t approved of him eating so many carbs.

She glanced at her reflection again. She was thirty-two. There were faint lines beneath her eyes. Faint.

Seven years later, and she was right back where she started. Still… Someday…

“I’m going to be big! A star! I am!”

A girl could dream, couldn’t she?

The smell of biscuits wafted in the air.

Biscuits! In between dreaming, a girl had to eat. She was starving suddenly, and she had nearly four hundred dollars tucked snugly against her heart—more than enough for breakfast. After all, this wasn’t the Ritz in Paris. This was Texas where carbs, and lots of them, the greasier the better, came cheap.

Celeste found a table in the back and ordered. When her plump waitress with the mop of curly brown hair returned with platters of eggs and mountains of hash browns and biscuits slathered in butter, Celeste decided to work up her nerve to ask about Phillip.

“More coffee, please,” Celeste began.

“Sure, honey.”

As the waitress poured, Celeste bit her lip and stared out the window. Not that there was much of a view other than the highway and a mesquite bush and a prickly pear or two.

Celeste could feel the woman’s eyes on her. Still, she managed to get out her question in a small, shy voice.

“Does Phillip Westin still hang out at the Lazy W?”

The coffee pouring stopped instantly. “Who’s asking?” The friendly, motherly voice had sharpened. The woman’s black eyes seared her like lasers.

Celeste cringed a little deeper into her booth. “Can’t a girl ask a simple question?”

“Not in this town, honey. Everybody’s business is everybody’s business.”

“And I had such high hopes the town would mature.”

“So—who’s asking about Phillip?”

“Just an old friend.”

“Westin has lots of lady friends.”

“He does?” Celeste squeaked, and then covered her mouth.

“He meets them out at those fancy dances at the club.”

“The Lone Star Country Club?”

“You been there?”

“A time or two.”

“What’s your name, honey?”

“Forget it.”

“You’re mighty secretive all of a sudden.”

“Last I heard that wasn’t a crime,” Celeste said.

The waitress’s smile died and she scurried off to the kitchen in a huff. Watching the doors slam, Celeste felt morose with guilt. She was running from killers, deliberately putting Phillip in danger. He’d moved on, made friends with real ladies at that fancy club he’d joined as soon as he’d moved here permanently.

He was wealthy. She was the last thing from a lady, the last thing he needed in his orderly life.

Her appetite gone, she set her fork down with a clatter. What was the matter with her? Why had she argued with the waitress like that? It was just that she felt so lonely and scared and desperate, and so self-conscious about how cheap she looked. And then the woman had told her Phillip had lots of classy girlfriends.

Oh, why had she come here? Why had she ever thought— If she was smart, she’d catch the next bus to San Antonio. Then she’d lose herself in the big city.

Celeste should have known that wouldn’t be the end of her exchange with the waitress. Not in a nosy little town like Mission Creek. Before her eggs had time to congeal, the plump woman was back with a cordless telephone and a great big gottcha smile.

“He’s home,” the waitress said.

“You didn’t call him—”

The waitress winked at her and grinned slyly as she listened to Phillip.

“Oh, no…. You didn’t. Hang up.”

“She’s got long yellow hair. It’s sort of dirty. And a low-cut black dress with a rip up the left thigh. Nice legs, though. Sensational figure. And a great big shiny guitar that has a booth seat all to itself.” She hesitated. “Yes, a guitar! And…and she’s hurt… Her ankle….” Another pause. “What?” Again there was a long silence.

Celeste stared out at the prickly pear and chewed her quivering bottom lip. Then she buried her face in her hands.

“He wants to talk to you.”

With a shaky hand, Celeste lifted the phone to her ear. “H-hello…?”

“Celeste?” Phillip’s deep Marine Corps-issue voice sliced out her name with a vengeance.

“Phillip?”

“Mabel said you’re limping.”

“I’m fine. Never better.”

“You’re in some kind of trouble—”

She bit her lip and coiled a greasy strand of gold around a fingertip with chipped pearly nail polish. What was the use of lying to him? “I—I wish I could deny it.”

“And you want me to rescue you….”

She swallowed as she thought of The Pope and Nero. If they followed her and killed Phillip, it would be all her fault.

Her throat burned and her eyes got hot. She squeezed them shut because the waitress was watching.

“How do you intend to play this? Sexy? Repentant? Do you see me riding into town on a white horse and carrying you out of the café in my arms?”

“Don’t make this harder.”

“What do you want from me then?”

Not to end up in some back alley with my skirt tossed over my head, my panties shredded and my throat slit.

“Just to see you,” she said softly.

He laughed, but the brittle sound wasn’t that deep chuckle she’d once loved. “You want way more than that and we both know it.”

He knew how she hated that military, big man, know-it-all tone. She couldn’t bear it any more than she could bear to answer him when he was feeling all self-righteous and judgmental.

“I wasn’t born rich…like you…. Maybe if you’d gone through even half of what…” She stopped. That was a low blow. “I—I’m sorry.”