I paused for a long minute, then I nodded.
Terry tapped my shoulder. Like old times. Like last night never happened. Like what I needed didn’t matter.
Chapter Ten
Vanessa
Another day meant it was just about time for another shift with reckless rich people who loved high stakes gambling to take the stress off their otherwise, high pressure lives. Losing a crap ton of money would make me more stressed, not less, but the players and the games were growing on me. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to rooms full of wealthy, reckless men I didn’t know—and worse, stacks of cash. More cash than I’d ever seen at one time.
It wasn’t something I’d ever get accustomed to, being a small town girl from the Midwest, but it was hard to think of them as movers and shakers when they spent most of the night talking smack and giving each other shit like teenage boys. The razzing made each shift fun and honestly, it made them all less intimidating, so the time flew by.
Most nights I found myself surprised when the end of my night rolled around. One of the guys would offer to walk me to my car, except for Evan. He still hadn’t warmed up to me. Maybe he never would if me working here meant I replaced Fiona, the girl who broke his heart. I understood—even if I hated it. I was quickly learning to shake off Evan’s dislike and Provo’s aloofness because those were their issues, not mine.
I had my own worries—too many to name—to bother myself over other people’s problems with me. My goal was to focus on the things I could do something about, which meant working hard to stop thinking of the future I lost when Lance died.
“Easy peasy, right?”
The woman staring back at me in my bathroom mirror with bright blue eyes, thought so anyway. The woman I called Nessa. Tonight, I’d decided to vamp it up in black leather pants and a flowing pink off the shoulder shirt, not for any reason in particular, just because I wanted to look a little different.
Feel a little different.
Be just a little bit different.
The truth was, I felt different. Earning my own money for once felt nice. Not that I ever minded Lance taking the role of provider, but it was nice to know that I wouldn’t flounder without him. I wouldn’t have to run back home and marry some preacher man my mother and father would approve of just to make ends meet. I actually was one of the “doggone independent women” my father used to rant about.
It felt good.
I felt good, and that put a big smile on my hot pink lips because it had been too damn long since I had a genuine smile on my face for more than a flash of a second. I miss you Lance, and I’ll never forget you, but I have to move on.
And I would.
Eventually.
But until that happened, I had to live my life as if I were moving on. I had to get up in the morning and do yoga to keep my mind right and kickboxing to keep my body right. I had to take a shower and get dressed and go through the motions of each day until I was no longer just going through the motions. I also had to get dolled up and go to work with a smile on my face, and I had to do it all as if my heart wasn’t breaking every second of every fucking day.
“That’s just the depressing thought I need before work,” I mumbled to myself. I was tempted to take a quick shot of whiskey before heading out but that was risky and right now, I couldn’t afford any risks. So, I skipped right on past the kitchen, shoving cash, an ID, and lip stick into my back pocket, grabbed my phone and keys, and headed right out the front door.
Ready to face another night as Nessa, the smart-mouthed, confident woman who wasn’t afraid of anything, especially a bunch of rich assholes.
Nessa slid behind the steering wheel, ready to blast some Classic Rock Fighters to pump her up for the night ahead. She turned the key in the ignition and the raspy voice of Dave Grohl blared from the speakers, but the engine did…nothing.
“Fuck!” Nessa also had a potty mouth. Two more attempts and it was official, Vanessa was back.
And my car was toast.
I had about thirty minutes to get to the game and there was no way I’d get myself all dirty pretending to see if it was something I could fix under the hood. Calling Uber seemed like a bad risk and AAA would do like they always did and take their sweet time getting to me, which left me with one option.