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Hell’s Belle was crowded with lonely women and horny men, the usual for a spring night in Cook County. Lucky glanced around at the pickings, just as he had always done, but this time his radar didn’t zone in on anyone of interest. Shrugging it off, he made his way to the bar.
Go back home!
Warning himself was never of any use. He’d had this dream what had to be over two hundred times since that night, and it never worked. Still, he mentally screamed the words as he fought to wake from the nightmare, but karma was hell-bent on making him relive that horrific night over and over until it eventually drove him mad.
His dream-self sat at the bar and signaled to Rho, who already knew what he wanted. She deposited the frosty longneck in front of him and sauntered over to the other end of the bar to refill Earl Brown’s empty mug.
Lucky stared down at the bottle before him, contemplating whether he should leave it where it sat and go back home, pack his bags and leave his mother to fend for herself. He was so sick of coming home to the shitty trailer in that disgusting trailer park and hearing her and some scumbag in the middle of one of her sex marathons.
He was even sicker of the men she picked calling her demeaning names. But what really got to him, what pissed him off royally, was the fact that she would defend them over him.
Tonight wasn’t that much different from any other night he’d come home from being on the rodeo circuit, tired as hell and desperate for a long stretch of uninterrupted sleep, only to see that vision go up in a cloud of smoke as he opened the door to the trailer to find his mother half-naked on the couch with a shirtless pig in oil-stained blue jeans dry-humping her.
“What are you doing here?” Charlene screeched, not bothering to grab the shirt that had been tossed to the floor. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen her in worse than the lacy black bra she wore. The woman loved to pour herself into the skimpiest string bikinis she could find and sunbathe nearly every day of the summer.
Still, he turned his face away. “I live here. Left a message I was coming home. You must not have gotten it.” He knew she probably had and had already planned how to spend the money he’d won. “I’ll be in my room, out of the way.”
“That your kid?” the meaty man asked as he left the room. “He still lives at home?”
“You know kids these days,” Charlene said dismissively. “Just can’t leave the nest and make it on their own.”
Lucky bit back every word that came to his mind as he closed his bedroom door behind him. He already knew the fat douchebag was trying to figure out how much money he took from the household funds, which would seriously reduce the amount he himself wanted to milk out of Charlene. He smiled briefly, imagining the look on the jackass’s face if he discovered Lucky was the breadwinner. Charlene hadn’t worked in years. Her “job” was sleeping with men who’d pay the bills, and once her sons came of age, she’d just had them support her.
Chance had tired of it and left for good ten years earlier. Well, Lucky had his suspicions that his leaving had a lot to do with Mark Calhoun’s daughter, but it didn’t change the fact that once he left, he stayed gone. Other than some phone calls here and there and meeting up with him every now and then on the circuit, his big brother had vanished without even looking back.
Lucky couldn’t do that. He couldn’t leave his mother behind in the trailer park, knowing the woman would keep bringing home abusive men. Someone had to protect her from herself. Yes, he was in his thirties and, in a sense, living at home with his mother, but there was no mistake about who was really supporting who. If protecting his mother was considered lowly by people, then screw them. Lucky would rather be looked down upon for that than to live with the knowledge that his mother had fallen prey to the wrong man.
His dream-self tried to tune out the sounds around him as he lay face-first on the bed with a pillow over his head, desperate for sleep, but between the squeaking springs of his mother’s mattress in the next room and the vile things the husky man she’d chosen for the night ordered her to do, Lucky just couldn’t take it anymore.
He pulled the white T-shirt he’d discarded back on, shoved his feet into his battered brown leather boots, and grabbed his keys off the nightstand as he left his room. He’d made it all the way out the front door, one hand on the knob, ready to pull it shut behind him when he heard the unmistakable slap of a meaty hand hitting flesh and his mother’s yelp of pain.
Stepping back inside, he slammed the door shut and ran to Charlene’s room, kicking the door down when it failed to open. Charlene sat in the corner of the room, balled up to protect herself as her flavor of the night stood naked over her with a belt looped in his hand.
“You better start praying to God for my mercy,” Lucky warned before he lunged. The rest became a blur of punches, growls, screams, shouts, and a bone or two snapping.
Without even remembering how he got there, he found himself standing outside the trailer, watching the naked bastard who’d hit his mother crawl to his truck with one hand over his nose, blood oozing through his pudgy fingers. Sound slowly came back to him and he recognized his mother’s voice. He turned to see her standing in the doorway, tying the sash of her red satin bathrobe around her as she screamed at him for chasing the man away.
“What is wrong with you? You ruin everything!”
Lucky turned back around and took in his surroundings. Neighbors stood outside their trailers, shaking their heads and rolling their eyes. They’d seen scenes like this a hundred times. Charlene didn’t seem to even notice. All she cared about was having a man, preferably one dumb enough to support her, whether it be for a night or a year. She’d overlook beatings, police records... even wives, as long as she got something out of the deal. Lucky himself was a con she’d attempted, but the man who’d fathered him hadn’t fallen for it. And Charlene would never stop reminding him of it.
“You are so useless! Why don’t you just stay gone like your worthless brother?” she screeched as the neighbors watched.
“Why don’t I?” he muttered as he hopped into his truck and left.
Chance had asked him that same question many times before. Charlene was a user and always would be. She would never stop looking for the easy way out, would never hold down an honest job and support herself. If not for the fact that he gave her a large portion of his winnings, hoping it would keep her away from dirtbag men like the one he’d just thrown out on his naked ass, she wouldn’t care less if Lucky left like Chance had. But he just couldn’t do it. Unlike Chance, he was born with a need to protect her. She was his mother, and she was weak. So he stayed in the trailer park she refused to leave and repeatedly failed at saving her from herself.
“Penny for your thoughts.”
Lucky grunted, having always hated that expression. It reminded him of his stupid middle name and the reason behind it. Yet, he didn’t tell that to the curvy redhead who slid onto the barstool next to him.
“Hey, cowboy. Why so grumpy?”
Lucky took a long, slow draw off the bottle Rho had served him as he studied the beauty at his side. Long, fiery red hair fell to her mid-back in gentle waves. Sparkling green eyes set in a pretty face with full red lips and flawless alabaster skin. Ample cleavage displayed by the deep vee in her snug pink tank top and jeans so tight if she had a quarter in her pocket, he’d be able to tell whether it was on heads or tails.
“I suddenly find myself unable to remember.”
She smiled and leaned in. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”
“I bet you don’t really mind.”
She laughed. “Buy me a drink, cowboy, and I’ll tell you my name.”
Lucky signaled Rho. He knew this woman’s type, could see it in her eyes she was fishing for a one-night stand and would tell him her name whether or not he bought the drink, but he played the game.
Tell her goodnight, pay for her cab ride home, and leave.
As with all the nightmares he’d had of the night, Lucky didn’t listen. He stayed there, ordering too many drinks for both of them, and when it was time to go, they left together. He paid for the room at the cheap motel just on the edge of town and immediately lost his cares in the comfort of her warm, willing body. Even in the dream, it was quick and emotionless, just two lonely, damaged people finding temporary peace in the arms of a stranger.
“That was amazing,” she said as she draped her arm over him, pressing her breasts against his back.
Lucky agreed in order to be polite. Truth was, he’d had better, but there was no need to share that. “Yeah, it was, Cindy,” he mumbled, sleep closing in fast.
“It’s Sylvie,” she corrected, her tone obviously hurt.
“That’s what I said, sugar,” Lucky quickly saved himself. Nothing worse than a one-night stand going all uptight on your ass when you just wanted them to roll over and go to sleep, or leave. “You misheard me.”
“Oh.” She snuggled closer, attached to him like a barnacle. “I’m sorry. I must have just imagined it. My fear getting the better of me. When you find something so good, you don’t want to lose it.”
Seconds from falling asleep, Lucky grumbled an unintelligible agreement. He’d agree with anything she said if it got her to shut up and let him finally sleep.
The dream fast-forwarded to the moment he woke to her kissing his back and shoulders. Rolling over onto his back, he grumbled, “Time to sleep, honey.”
She chuckled. “Such a grumpy bear. Is this what it’s going to be like when we’re married?”
Lucky’s eyes popped wide open. “Married? What the hell are you talking about?”
She shrank back as if hit, and rapidly blinked, moisture pooling along her lashes. “You said you cared about me.”
“What?” Lucky tried to replay the conversation they’d had at the bar, but the memory was lost in a drunken haze. “We’re both drunk, honey. Sleep it off. Nobody’s getting married. You’ll thank me in the morning.”
The next time he woke up, it was to the sound of water pouring. He looked over and found the bed empty. An awful feeling of foreboding gnawed at his gut as he sat up and looked around the room. All he could see in the darkness was a sliver of light coming from beneath the bathroom door.
Don’t go in there!
As usual, Lucky had no control over the dream, no way of replaying that awful moment when he found Sylvie Case dead in the bathtub.
He rose from the bed and walked toward the bathroom. His feet sank into wet carpet as he approached the door. The gnawing sensation in his gut growing stronger, he turned the doorknob and pushed the door open to see the floor covered in pink water. His gaze drifted over to the sound of water pouring from the tub to the floor...
But where he should have seen a lifeless Sylvie Case staring at him, green eyes wide open in death, he saw the lifeless hazel eyes of his bride instead.
Lucky woke up screaming.
****
“WELL, LOOKS LIKE THE honeymoon is over,” Flo commented dryly as Cammie entered the diner for her first shift since the wedding. Flo had graciously allowed her to take a few days off with pay as a wedding gift.
“Lucky and I are just fine,” she quickly replied, thankful the diner wasn’t busy. The last thing she needed was the rumor mill to churn out that she and her new husband were already on the outs. “I’m just tired, is all.” Which was mostly true. Lucky had been sleeping fitfully for the past four nights, which in turn meant she slept fitfully.
“Hmm.” Flo’s eyebrows bobbed as Cammie joined her behind the counter. “A lot of hot, late nights and long mornings in bed?”
She felt her face flush as she tied her apron around her waist. There was a lot of that, yes, despite Lucky’s bad dreams and refusal to discuss them with her. All he would say was that he still dreamed about that horrible incident with Sylvie Case, and he didn’t want to discuss it with her. As understanding as she tried to be, she couldn’t help feel that the deceased woman was an intruder in her marriage.
Flo’s bark of laughter pulled her out of her thoughts.
“Sheesh, girl. It’s all right to admit you’ve been getting some. You’re married.” The stocky woman shook her head. “Cammie Masters. That’s a name I never thought I’d hear myself saying.”
Me neither, Cammie thought honestly. She still found herself questioning it from time to time, wondering if this was all just a dream she would wake from one morning. It wasn’t exactly the marriage she’d dreamed of. Cammie was sure that on some level Lucky had married her out of fear he’d gotten her pregnant their first time, or out of guilt that he’d been the one to take her virginity. She certainly hadn’t thought she’d marry a man who would spend every night of their honeymoon tossing and turning, dreaming of a woman from his past.
“At least now, maybe folks will stop calling you by your full name instead of just calling you Cammie.”
“Maybe.” She smiled, knowing some people actually thought Cammie May was her first name. Others just called her Cammie May because they liked the sound of it. Even Kenzie and Lucky did from time to time.
The bell over the door chimed, signaling a customer had entered. Cammie waited for the rangy cowboy to take a seat and walked over to take his drink order while he looked at the menu. Her leg ached, but she forced the pain out of her mind, just as she had been doing since the wedding. Stress was hell on an autoimmune disease, and her meds appeared to be struggling to do their job. But she didn’t want to go to the doctor just yet, not while Lucky was going through his own turmoil with the nightmares. She wasn’t a psychologist, but she knew the nightmares and the way he clung to her protectively afterward had to stem from their recent wedding. She wouldn’t add to whatever burden he currently carried.