Bills were a constant state of concern for us. We were slowly digging our way out, but it would be a while before we would be able to move into a nicer place or buy a better car. For now we drove the ten-year-old Honda my parents had given Ivy when she graduated from high school. For me, the money thing was a non-issue. No sense in rehashing the past. I was glad she was alive. I was glad I was alive. And I was glad we were together.
She twisted her lips into a not impressed with your logic face but didn't have a response.
"Come on." I stood and offered my hand. "Let's try to get some sleep. You can sleep with me."
She heaved herself off the sofa and tugged an oversized T-shirt down around her thighs. It said “West Central High,” and by the size and age, I wondered if it belonged to Finn at one time. I refused to ask, though. I would feel better not knowing.
In my bedroom, Ivy climbed into the twin bed and laid on her side while I stripped off the Riskie's clothes and pulled out sleep shirt and shorts. She looked about ten years old with her blond hair framing her heart-shaped face.
"Was it terrible at Riskie's? Did anyone try to make you do a table dance?"
Because the walls were so thin in our apartment, it was easy to hear her when I went into the bathroom to wash off the smoke and sweat of the night.
"Not at all. I made about three hundred in tips. I had only one person grab me. And the guys from Atra showed up to hassle me." I left out any mention of Finn and him dragging me back to the VIP room.
"And Jimmy?"
"He was kind of in a bad mood. He stomped around, huffed and puffed like the bad wolf he likes to think he is, and then left us alone."
"Did he leave by himself?" She tried to sound like she didn't care, but it was obvious she did.
"I wasn't paying attention," I admitted. I had been too discombobulated by Finn. "I thought he had that no sleeping with the help rule." I wiped my hands dry and returned to the bedroom. Ivy scooted over and I climbed into bed with her.
She snorted. "He has a lot of rules that he likes to apply to the staff that don't apply to him. He's Jimmy Risk, you know. Rules are for peons."
Yeah, there was something there, but if she didn't want to tell me then I wasn't going to press I had my own crush and my own secrets I didn't want to talk about. Besides, Jimmy was bad news in my book and the last guy I'd want for Ivy—not just because he was a strip club owner, but because that was all he owned: nightclubs and strip clubs. For a recovering alcoholic like Ivy, it didn't make good sense for her to be shackled to a guy who had access to thousands of gallons of liquor. It wasn’t ideal that she worked there either, but she needed a job and Jimmy provided the only one since she got out of prison.
"I never saw him hit on any of the girls. He was in a really growly mood." I’d have to tell her about the VIP room thing. Jimmy or someone else was bound to bring it up. Hey your sister went in the back and gave a private dance to a customer! I didn’t want her to hear it from anyone else. Taking a deep breath to calm my suddenly racing heart, I said, "You know who else was there?"
"Everyone? I mean, at some point it seems like every male in this city ends up there."
I ran my tongue over my lower lip, remembering the taste of him. "Finn O'Malley."
She barked out a surprised laugh. "You're shitting me? What the hell was he doing there? His latest girlfriend not putting out enough?"
"He was there with some guys I didn't know and Adam Rees."
"Nice. How'd he look?"
"Good." I paused, and the silence lengthened between us as I discarded several adjectives that would give away how much I felt for him. How could I describe him without talking about how piercing his blue eyes looked even in the dark light and how hard his body felt when it pressed against me? Or how soft his hair looked, and how I wanted to drag my fingers through it and then pull his lush mouth to mine and kiss him until there was no air left in either of us.
"I saw him right after his dad died, did I tell you that?"
I shook my head and tried not to pay attention to the way my heart was squeezing. “Right after or later?”
A sick feeling roiled in my stomach. Had they hooked up? Talked about getting back together? Was this before or after Finn and I had sex at the trailer?
“Right after.”
Relief rushed through me so fast I felt dizzy. I wished he’d said at least one word about this the other night. But then, would it have really made a difference? I hadn’t thought about Ivy before that night and sure as hell not during. I squirmed beside her, but she didn’t notice.
She was lost in her own memory. "I ran into him at the Walgreens on 48th and University. I'd run out of tampons and peanut M&Ms. He was buying bottles of Everclear. I asked him what he was doing and he said ‘getting shitfaced.’ Anyway, he looked good then. Of course, he'd always looked good. That wasn't the problem with us,” she finished with a slight curl of her lip. Was that disgust or dismay?