The bus came.
The driver tossed my beat-up, second-hand suitcases underthe bus and I climbed in.
There weren’t a lot of folks there, which was good.I didn’tfeel in a friendly mood and Miss Annamae had taught me that a lady can make astranger a friend in no time flat…and sheshould.
I picked a seat at the back by the window.
I rested my head against it and stared out, unseeing.
I heard the bus start up and felt it pull away from thecurb.
When it did, I also felt the wet drip from my eye, rollingdown my cheek.Then some more from the other eye.
I let myself have that.Just for a spell.Doing it, liftingmy hand and touching my fingers to my neck where the pearls I’d worn every dayfor the last two years no longer were.
They were at Quick Swap.
The time had come when I needed them.
I knew Miss Annamae wouldn’t mind.I understood her now.Iunderstood a lot of things.Most of it I wished I didn’t.
They were gone, all I had of her.She gave them to me on mythirteenth birthday and I’d pawned them on my nineteenth.
I’d miss them.
But not as much as I missed her.
When it was time to be done crying, I made myself be done.Iopened my purse with its cracked fake leather and fished out my hankie (becauseSouthern women carried hankies).I also pulled out my compact.I dabbed my eyesand carefully, swaying with the bus’s movements in order not to make a mess ofit (but I’d been doing it now for some time and I was good at it), I fixed mymakeup.
I returned everything to my purse, kept it tucked in my lap,and looked down the long bus out the front window.
We were headed west.
It was going to be a long journey.
I rested my head back on the seat and closed my eyes.
Passing the time as the bus rolled over the miles, I builtcastles.
Chapter One
And Everything
Marcus
Marcus Sloan stood at the window in Smithie’s office,staring down at the floor of the strip club, a quarter share of which he owned,but even so, he rarely came and he never did so when the business was inoperation.
He didn’t need to.
Smithie, who started the club, owned the rest of it and ranit, knew his business.He was serious about it.He was also honest.And he hadthe right reputation for the job—a man you didn’t fuck with, but a man thattook care of his business by taking care of his customers as well as his staff,from cleaning ladies to bouncers to bartenders to talent.
That was the first time Marcus had been there in over ayear.
It was morning.Early.They didn’t open until one.Therewere no windows to the building so the lights inside were on.Three women weremoving through the space, one wiping down tables, the other two mopping thefloor.
And two women were on the stage.
It appeared one was training the other.
