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“You know those girls are the wildest in bed, right?” This was Kane’s contribution to proceedings.
“That so?”
“Yep. The quiet ones are always thirsty and horny as fuck. Mark my words.”
Chapter 4
Honey
I cradled my caramel latte and questioned my sanity in arranging to meet at Where You Bean instead of at one of the many bars or restaurants in close proximity to the college. What the fuck had I been thinking? I’d far rather have been nursing a margarita while questioning my life choices than a coffee. Maybe it wasn’t too late to change. Beau was almost always late, anyway—I could probably catch him en route if I messaged him now.
As I reached for my phone, I was startled half to death by hands reaching around my eyes from behind, like a blindfold.
I struggled out of the grasp, turning to face my assailant and wondering how much of my self-defense classes I was going to have to put to use to nail them.
Beau raised his hands in surrender. “Hold on, hold on. Don’t get the mace out, or else I’ll probably be tasered—or worse—before I get a chance to explain that I’m your best guy friend.” If it wasn’t so sad, it would be funny, but it was most certainly true, either way.
“For the love of God, don’t sneak up on me that way. I was just working out how I could take you down.”
“I don’t doubt it. You had that Karate Kid-slash-Rambo look in your eyes. But why so jumpy? It’s not like you weren’t expecting me.”
“Karate Kid and Rambo? The eighties called—they want their cultural references back.”
He shrugged ruefully. “What can I say? I’m a film geek, and honestly, I feel that the eighties were one of the unsung golden ages of film and TV.” Which I already knew, as he’d told me no less than a billion times. “But don’t think you can distract me by getting me embroiled in a neo-Kantian rant about cultural relativism. I want to know why you’re so skittish.” Shit. I definitely needed to find something to tell him that spared me the boredom of the aforementioned rant.
“Ugh. You scared me because I was distracted. I was reaching for my phone to call you to suggest that we skip the caffeine in favor of hard liquor. Actually, scratch that, we can combine booze and coffees if we drink espresso martinis. Win-win.”
“Okay, but the question still stands. What’s got you flitting around like a startled butterfly, and wanting to drown your sorrows in the strong stuff?”
“I didn’t say anything about drowning my sorrows.”
“You didn’t have to. That part, at least, is written all over your face.” I didn’t doubt it, if for no other reason than as my oldest friend, he knew me better than most people did and could pretty much read me like a book. If he saw something in me, there was a safe assumption that it was there. “Plus I’ve never known day drinking to be your thing so…” He shrugged.
“You’re right, normally it isn’t, but honestly, I’m increasingly feeling like we’d be better off talking about this over some hard liquor. Let’s go to Raising The Bar. You love that place, and it’s happy hour.”
“Boo, you had me at ‘Hard Liquor,’ let’s bounce.”
A quarter of an hour later, and we were settled at a quiet booth at the back of the bar, relaxing on a low sofa, with a bunch of drinks lined up on the table. Partially because we wanted to avoid making too many trips to the bar—wasting valuable time where we could be talking—but we also wanted to make the most of happy hour while it lasted.
“Okay, so what’s new pussycat?” Beau cocked his head, appraising me as he spoke.
“Honestly, I don’t even really know, and I definitely don’t know what to make of everything that’s going on in my life right now.”
“Well, there’s no better place to begin than the beginning, so spill.”
“Okay. So here’s a hypothetical situation for you. Let’s say that someone—let’s call them ‘B’—had witnessed something kind of by accident, and kind of on purpose. And let’s say that this something was quite a big deal, and could possibly be the making of B, if handled right. Like could literally be life-altering and game-changing for them.
“And let’s say that B was kind of in the process of working out how to handle the situation when more information came to light that suggested that not only was B most definitely on to something, but that they weren’t the only one who was aware of the situation. And let’s say this third party had some antisocial tendencies, and made their presence known in an unorthodox way. Hypothetically.”
“Hmm... well, let’s say that ‘hypothetically,’ I wasn’t following half of the shit you just said, but from what I did understand, I’m guessing you—I mean ‘Honey Bee’—woke up with a horse head in your bed.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. It really wasn’t a funny situation, but it was either laugh or cry.
“Not a horse head, as such, but it might as well have been.”
“Right, now that we’ve established that, I’ll need an explanation in plain and simple English, or else I don’t think I’m going to be able to help you.”
“So imagine this is one of those god-awful noirs you love so much.”
