Pawning my engagement ring the next morning took five hours as I burned gas driving from pawn shop to pawn shop, my stomach gurgling as I ate the remnants of the road-trip snacks, while I haggled with the shops’ owners.
When I finally handed the ring to one of the dealers for the last time, the one-fifth-carat of diamond chips caught a stray beam of sunlight and threw spangles over the dusty bikes, televisions, and computers for an instant before the clerk dropped the ring onto the black velvet tray holding five other discarded engagement rings. She shoved the tray into the scratched glass case and locked it.
So I pawned Jimmy’s ring that I had worn for four years, the ring that had meant so much to me that I had kissed it good night before sleeping while Jimmy was away at college, the ring that had meant I belonged somewhere.
I left it in the pawn shop and walked out the door.
But I kept the white dress.
The white dress was going to come in handy.
CHAPTER 8
the bride
LEXI BYRNE
After Jimmy jilted me,I couldn’t go back to Nebraska.
Nothing remained for me there except a bunch of construction projects withJohnson Construction LLCplastered on the OSHA-approved safety fence and my mother living a few towns over with her new husband and new kids.
And everywhere I went, people would stare at me. They’d whisper. They would believe what the Johnson family told them about me.
Scandal like that was too titillating to question and too much fun to not take part in. People would lean into it.
I couldn’t go back, and I didn’t know how to go forward.
The next day, I called construction companies to inquire about jobs, but Las Vegas was at the bottom of a real estate bust cycle. There was no business construction or even housing starts. Construction companies were laying off people, not hiring HR admins without references.
And I had no references.
I didn’t fool myself. If any of those construction companies had called Johnson Construction LLC to ask about my work history, Jimmy’s dad would sabotage the living heck out of me. The squint-eyed glare Mason had shot at me as he’d stalked away from where I’d fallen to my knees in front of the altar was proof enough that he’d absolutely believed Jimmy andher.
Worse, if Melissa answered the phone, she would probably make something up that was so bad that they would call the police on me.
My employment options were nil. Even if I had gotten another job, they would have had me start the next week and then cut my first paycheck two weeks after I’d worked for them for half a month.
Five weeks before a new job would pay me.
My car was running out of gas, and the cell phone bill was due soon.
Not that I even needed a phone anymore. The group chats with Jimmy’s sisters had disappeared from my list as they’d kicked me out, and even their location notifications had vanished one by one as they’d shunned me.
When you need money right away, a job isn’t even an option.
Which meant it was time to fall back on other skills.
Las Vegas sported a number of theater supply stores. The showgirls and magicians roaming the Strip had to buy their greasepaint somewhere.
A tiny store called Stage and Screen was tucked a few miles away from the glittering lights.
Inside, I perused the kits and individual makeup pots. The peculiar mineral smell of pigments in greasepaint, so much stronger than in street makeup where it’s covered up by perfume, permeated the shop, bringing back flashes of backstage dressing rooms packed with giggling teenagers readying themselves to put on a show.
I didn’t remember the last time I’d giggled like that, wiggling and helping my friends paint exaggerated stage makeup onto their faces, the creamy, whipped colors pressed onto youthful skin.
It wasn’t like I was in high school anymore, though. Expecting unrestrained joy like that in my early twenties was unreasonable.
I was an adult.
