LITMIR.BIZ

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just a bit. “It’s good!” He choked out.

      Floyd chuckled. “Glad you think so. That’ll be seven bucks.”

      “Seven bucks!” Barney’s eyes bugged. He moved his Bud back, front and center.

      A couple wandered in off the street, arm in arm. Summer people, by the looks.

      A gray-haired woman in a black rayon waitress uniform with a dowager’s hump and wearing orthopedic shoes emerged from a doorway in the back to lead the pair to a table.

      “Hey, we don’t even know your name.” A comparatively younger man halfway down the bar spoke up. Of course “younger” was a relative term. He appeared to be in his forties.

      “I’m Priss.”

      “A bartender named Priss? That’s funny!”

      Barney had caught his breath from the drink and the price. “Is that like Priscilla?”

      She winced. “Yeah, my mom had a crush on Elvis.”

      “I had a crush on Priscilla!” Porter said.

      “She was beautiful, and so sweet,” Ian said. “Didn’t deserve the crap The King dished out, messing around.”

      Priss patted her hair spikes. “Well, don’t expect me to go all big-hair. Ain’t happening.”

      The patrons laughed, and an argument broke out over which Elvis movie was the best.

      Floyd asked, “What’s your last name?”

      Priss dried her hands on the bar towel she’d tucked into the waist of her skirt. “Hart.”

      His eyebrows shot up. “No relation to Cora Hart, are you?”

      Her hands stilled. “My mother. Why?”

      He smiled for the first time since she’d walked through the door. “Because she worked here. Until she couldn’t anymore.”

      Priss shot a glance at the ceiling. Oh, very funny, God.

      “Your mom was a stand-up gal.” He pushed away from the back bar. “You can start tonight.”

      She swallowed. Winning the clientele over was the easy part. This was the hard part. She twisted the towel in her fist. “I can only work the day shift.”

      “I work the day shift. The job is to cover nights.”

      “I can’t work nights.” She was not saving Nacho from the clutches of the county only to put him back into his old life. Or her old life.

      Nacho, hell, she wasn’t putting herself back in her mother’s old life.

      She swallowed her fidgets and foreboding along with her spit and stood awaiting dismissal.

      Floyd stared her down. “You came in here for a bartender job and you don’t work nights?”

      She stared back, hoping he couldn’t see her fists shaking in the towel. “That’s right.”

      “What the hell? Why’d you waste my time?”

      Barney broke in. “Ah, give her the job, Floyd, you grumpy old fart.”

      When Floyd shook his head, his jowls flapped. “Why did I become a barkeep? No one wants to listen to my problems.”

      Ian called from the other end of the bar, “You covered nights before, Floyd.”

      Porter said, “We want her.”

      He ignored the peanut gallery. “No.” His cigar wasn’t lit but the fire in his eyes was. “Go home, little girl.”

      A blast of disappointment blew a hole in her chest. All her air whooshed out.

      This job would have been an answer to her problem. Maybe not the best answer, but she’d learned long ago that poor girls didn’t get the best. She bit the inside of her lip and checked her facial muscles to be sure they didn’t telegraph emotion. Another lesson she learned early—predators only took down the weak.

      But wait. The only time he’d smiled was when he realized Cora was her mother. For some reason, the misguided dude thought a lot of her mom. A trickle of hope oozed down the edges of the hole in her chest, sealing it so she could breathe again. She wasn’t above using guilt, or her innocent looks, to manipulate.

      You utilized whatever skills you were given to survive in a jungle.

      She’d grown up being tucked in a corner booth of bars, sipping free endless sodas and doing homework. Surely Nacho had, too. She let the corners of her mouth drop and lowered her eyelids in a slow blink—once, then again. “You must have met my half brother, Nacho.”

      “Yeah.” Floyd’s cigar tilted higher. He wasn’t dumb. She’d have to be careful.

      “Well, I’m trying to spring him from Social Services.” She let out a sigh, carefully moderated to just short of theatrical. “If I don’t have a job, they won’t release him to me.” She lowered her eyes, tortured the towel in her fists and waited.

      And waited. Conversation died. The bar held its breath.

      “Oh, what the hell.” Floyd grunted in disgust. “I’ll take the night shift—for now. You’re not gonna last more than a week, anyway.”

      The old barmaid walked up to the waitress station. “Floyd, I’ll get their BLTs. I need a strawberry margarita with sugar, no salt, and a Coors. With a lime.” Her eyes flicked toward Priss.

      The animosity in the woman’s laser stare practically singed the skin off Priss’s face. Then she turned and shuffled back through the door she’d emerged from.

      What the hell?

      Floyd pointed a finger at Priss. “You. We open at ten. Be here at nine tomorrow. I’ll show you around. Now, scram. I’ve got work to do.”

      She gave a cheery wave to the patrons, and walked out. Happy, yet unsettled at the same time.

      Had her mother just helped her get a job?

      * * *

      ADAM LEANED HIS elbows on the outfield chain-link fence, watching the T-ballers. He’d been on his way home but couldn’t resist watching the next generation learn America’s game.

      He pushed his heels into the grass and felt the muscles in his calves tighten. Being in charge of the senior softball league meant he was the first to arrive on game day and the last to leave, but fitting players onto teams, teams into schedules, schedules into play-offs—he loved it.

      Pitching with the Widow’s Grove Winos wasn’t what he’d hoped for in college. Even if he’d made the majors, he’d be retired by now anyway. He rested his chin on his forearms and sighed.

      The bantam batter pushed his too-big helmet back and, tongue between his teeth, frowned at the ball on the tee.

      The infielders started the chant, “Hey, batter-batter...”

      The kid hefted the oversize bat on his shoulder and swung. The whiffle ball sailed off the tee and over the infielders’ heads, into the grass of the outfield. The yells of his teammates woke the batter from amazement and he took off, little legs pumping for first.

      The entire outfield, plus the shortstop and second baseman, swarmed for the ball, all yelling, “I got it!”

      Despite all the waving gloves, the ball landed in the grass.

      The coach stood at home plate, face florid, yelling the batter around the bases. The parents in the stands cheered loud enough to raise a flock of mourning doves from the power lines.

      The little kid jumped onto home plate with both feet. The dugout emptied and the coach swung him high.

      Carley Beauchamp walked up, hands cupped around her mouth, yelling, “Way to go, batter!” She rested her forearms on the fence and gave Adam a shoulder bump.

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