Page 54 of Painted Scars
CHAPTER 15 - KATE
“Friday girls’ night!” I raise my martini glass and toast with the two badasses flanking me at our once-a-month book club dinner, a tradition we stitched together with glitter, gossip, and a questionable amount of cocktails.
We’re two short tonight because Nicki has a family engagement and Becca’s mom bailed last minute for babysitting duty. I’m gutted for her. She deserves a night off with a newborn keeping her up around the clock. We’re catching up for lunch this weekend to make up for it, and her husband can wrangle the little human then.
My book babes stare and wait for me to make the toast, wine hovering.
Oh, yeah.
I give them a wicked smile and lift my glass higher. “To our bookish empire, masked villains who kiss like they mean it, lots of cock, and men who don’t leave towels on the bathroom floor.”
Glasses come together in a resounding clink.
“Here, here, Glitter Flaps!” Harper crows, tossing back half her glass.
Ms. Anti-color is dressed in black faux leather pants and a cropped corset top that shows off a sliver of belly button piercing and stomach tattoos. She looks criminally hot with whistle-worthy curves.
I’m a kaleidoscope of sparkle in a backless knit mini dress that flashes pink and silver, depending on the light. Curves rolling everywhere. Hair voluminous and makeup on point. Boobs staged for drama.
Booze and a night of dancing will make me forget my job dangling by a thread, and the mountain of unpaid invoices waiting at home.
At dinner, Charlie’s quiet at first, twisting her napkin in her lap, smiling a beat too late, and flinching at the sudden scrape of a chair behind us. Once the laughter starts, and Harper makes a joke about toxic men and duct tape, Charlie exhales, her shoulders drop, and her hands still. I place a hand on her thigh and smile reassuringly at her. Finally, she reaches for a slice of garlic bread like her body remembers it’s safe to eat.
“Spill.” Harper points a black-tipped nail with a skull on it at me. “You’ve been dreamy-eyed since we sat down. If you start drooling hearts in your fettuccine, I’m staging an intervention.”
I pause on my garlic bread and lick dripping butter from my hand. “What makes you think I haven’t already named my vibrator after him?”
Charlie chokes on her food and swipes her glass, washing it down. “You saw your mystery man again, didn’t you?”
“Stalker,” Harper corrects, tone dry as a martini. “Don’t let her romanticize it before I’ve eaten.”
“Excuse me.” I raise my manicured purple finger. “I prefer to call it cautiously investigating a morally ambiguous man who may or may not be my soulmate.”
“Who puts spying devices in your lamp.” Harper raises a brow. “You didn’t serenade me through the wall with your moans of moral conflict.”
That’s what she thinks. She wasn’t home last night. Or home on a lot of nights for that matter. I suspect she has a secret fuck buddy she hasn’t let on about. Now she sits across from me with her heavily ringed fingers, staring at me like there’s something new behind her thick eyeliner.
I shrug with my hands. “You weren’t even home for the duet.”
She shrugs and downs more of her Black Widow cocktail. “Don’t deflect.”
I laugh and pick up my Poisoned Apple. “I’m redirecting like a good book boyfriend in denial.”
Charlie giggles into her mojito, eyes darting between us, trying her best not to grin. She’s useless at hiding secrets, yet the look in her eyes spells something I don’t know. I’ll pry it out of her at our next spa night.
I stretch out my hand and admire my manicure. “Yeah, I had a night with my grumpy stalker.”
Harper throws an olive at me, and it lands on my plate. “Tell. Me. Every. Filthy. Little. Detail.”
Charlie nods, backing her up, then gives me one of her soft looks that says she’s worried but trying not to show it. “Are you sure you’re okay with this? After everything?”
The waiter delivers our mains, me the Gnocchi alla Sorrentina, Harper the seafood risotto, and Charlie the Scarpariello Pasta.
I stab a cherry tomato. “He’s unpredictable, but he’s never crossed a line. He actually… took care of me. Like real care. Gave me a semi-home-invasion fantasy with loose bindings and a blindfold.”
Harper and Charlie exchange a glance with something flickering behind it.
“What?” I swallow the gnocchi dipped in basil, tomato sauce and dripping in mozzarella. “Why are you both smiling cats who caught a canary?”
