Page 87 of For Pleasure Or Worse

Wink had girlfriends in the service but nothing that lasted more than a few months. Amy, Megan, Stephanie, Eloise—a revolving door of the same story. The lifestyle in Delta was intimidating to most women. We were gone for half a year at a time, in dangerous conditions, with hardly any communication, and for the vast majority of that experience we didn’t yearn foranything more than a warm body to pass the lulls. Even outside the Army, acclimating back to civilian life and finding a partner who understood that most of the scars were internal was tough. Pike and I had been extraordinarily lucky in that.

“If she’s meant to be, she'll fit right in, Sam,” Tally said.

“Agreed,” I added warmly. “We’ll be on our best behavior.”

“Don’t feed the boy lies,” Echo insisted. “Just like today is a circus, that day will be a more expensive one.”

“I wouldn’t call today acircus,” I argued passively. We may have been drunkenly gallivanting around Las Vegas playing an immature game and ignoring the astronomical elephant in the room that was me and Natalia—but that was neither here nor there.

“A circus is a show,” Mia pointed out with a proud tilt of her lips. Bella had made her way to the front of the line of singers and was flipping through the catalog of song choices. “This is a game, and you are losing.”

“You wish.” I took a beer from the center of the table and tossed it back, the entire goddamn thing in four sloppy, dribbling gulps, and wiped the damp foam from across my mouth with my sleeve. This was the worst idea I’d ever had, but I was quickly running out of them. I left the table and skipped into the line beside Bella as if I’d always been there with no shortage of impatient, frustrated side-eyes aimed at me.

“Hey, sis.” I threw an arm over her shoulder.

Isabella’s brows knitted together, and her short hair tickled the back of my hand. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Karaoke, of course.” I pointed to the list of songs, choosing one that was suitable for a duet on a whim. I gave the DJ a charismatic nod and dragged Bella up the small set of stairs and onto the stage before she could put up too much of a fight. With the spotlights shining it was almost impossible to see theaudience not directly in front of us, but I shielded my eyes and found the table of my fiancée and friends watching raptly.

“You can’t just hijack my spot,” Bella spat.

“Just did. You can either sing with me or forfeit.”

“Do you even know this song?”

There were two microphones beside each other on a stool and I handed her one. “Do I need to know the words if I can just read them off the wall?”

A piano ballad started and the crowd hushed. My nerves were doing somersaults over one another but there was no time to fully panic as the lyrics began moving across the screen. I could do this; I was a natural in front of a live audience. A live audience had seen my balls, for fuck’s sake. Singing a P!nk song was the least vulnerable thing I’d done for the entertainment of someone else.

Bella was unimpressed. She crossed her arms, turning awkwardly away from me as she softly sang the opening line—which was a clear and mortifying confession of love.

Oh, hell…

A hot, uncomfortable burn, like a slap in the back of the neck, hit me as the words continued. It was too late to stop it from happening. I put a substantial distance between us, thinking that might dissuade anyone from getting the wrong idea, but Bella was a phenomenal fucking singer and people were taking notice. She hit the first chorus of the song and turned toward me with wide, and understandably angry, eyes.

“Don’t look at me,” I mouthed.

Her forehead creased down the middle and she threw a hand out to the side as if to say,Where the fuck am I supposed to look, and I realized much like Natalia, the other Russo women had their own unique, cutting language that required nothing but violent intent and the fear of God to communicate.

This had to be rewarding for Tally. It was like thinking all the presents were opened on Christmas morning and then finding one hiding at the back of the tree. My total humiliation was a fun little quirk of the scavenger hunt. Or karma’s fucked-up, sister-wives way of getting even.

The second verse started, and as soon as it was my turn to sing Bella dropped her mic to her side to scold me. “You fucking idiot,” she seethed. “‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was right there!”

I waved her off, staring intently at the lyrics as each word was highlighted, crawling inside my own skin with every shaky syllable I managed to sing. I’d heard “Just Give Me a Reason” a million times on the radio when it was popular but never actually acknowledged what it was about. Standing up here was the worst time to figure it out, as I was seemingly engaging in an intense lovers’ quarrel with my fucking sister-in-law.

“I’m going to kill you,” Bella seethed through the world's fakest smile. “I’m going to find a way to sue you for this. Emotional damages, something.”

I stuffed a hand in her face, meaning to muzzle her as my notes carried on, but the little fucking animal bit the palm of my hand. I ripped it away and the last line of my verse dropped off a cliff.

“Ou-CH.” I shook out my hand. “Do I need a fucking tetanus shot now?”

We were seconds away from throwing elbows at one another when the chorus lifted once more and we both harmonized through our disdain like a musical theater number.

“She’s my sister,” I said into the microphone, pointing toward Bella. To which a couple “eughs” and “what the fucks” returned from the darkened room of people.

“Please stop,” Bella sang.

One day, we would laugh about this. Maybe not one daysoon, but someday, when we were old and sentimental and youth waslost, there would be a story about Las Vegas and a karaoke love song. Maybe by then Bella would even like me, and I’d have paid off that lawsuit she promised to throw my way.

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