Chapter 2 – I Just Can’t Catch a Break
72 Hours and 30 Minutes
(11:30 p.m. Friday)
I walked out of the bathroom, putting one foot carefully in front of the other and fighting the odd tilt of the floor that I hadn’t noticed earlier. Grace watched me leave without comment. I passed a group of beautiful people who I was sure had never been told they didn’t belong in a place like this. Marek was standing at my vacated barstool and didn’t so much as glance in my direction as I left the nightclub. He and Grace would probably have a good laugh at my expense later tonight.
I paused in the hotel hallway to get my bearings. When I leaned against a wall to steady myself, a crushing wave of self-pity with a strong undertow of loneliness threatened to swamp me. Here I was, minutes away from turning thirty, with every penny I had sunk into a business that might never open. I couldn’t stand up to another woman in a bar bathroom and, for the life of me, I couldn’t get laid. Another thing I couldn’t do was spend the night in this hotel by myself. I would be miserable when I woke up tomorrow morning and had to do the walk of shame home. Only my shame was that I couldn’t find a man to spend the night with.
Screw my stuff upstairs. I checked my watch. The numbers swam, but I had enough time to make it back to The Madam before I turned thirty at midnight. Hell, since I’d only had one of my two drinks, I could afford to treat myself to a taxi. I turned resolutely toward the lobby, but had to put a hand on the wall to keep from falling down.
Damn! Foiled again! Grace O’Malley was standing between me and the lobby, staring at me with a fierce scowl. Apparently, she intended to follow me to my hotel room and tuck me in.
“Grace!” The friendly greeting hailed from behind her.
I was stunned by the sight of the man walking towards us, a broad smile on his face. A smile that froze as quickly as a rabbit caught in a cobra’s stare when he saw me. I wouldn’t normally consider myself a cobra, but this man had sat in my home just two days ago, supposedly to help me get my business open. Now he was having chummy late-night meetings with the people throwing up all the roadblocks? If I hadn’t been so woozy, I might have felt a little venomous.
I didn’t know who was more shocked: Grace O’Malley or Dallas City Council member Austin Crockett. Me? I wasn’t that shocked. I had known all along that someone powerful must be behind my problems opening The Whine Barrel. I had been shocked when Council Member Crockett, with his too-wide politician’s smile, expensive suits, and haircut—not to mention his rugged good-ole-boy good looks—swooped in from out of nowhere to help “our poor little widow.” I hadn’t wanted to look a gift horse in the mouth, but his help had seemed a little too good to be true.
“I’ve told you never to come here.” With one last look over her shoulder at me, O’Malley grabbed Crockett by the arm and practically dragged him back towards the lobby.
Exhaustion and sadness washed over me. I couldn’t think about this tonight. More than anything, I wanted to be in my own bed, curled up with my sweet pit bull Bo. I wouldn’t even begrudge her stealing the covers like she always did.
Now that I couldn’t leave the hotel through the lobby, I would have to find another way. I turned and saw an exit sign floating over a door. I was a little fuzzy on the layout of the hotel (I seemed to be fuzzy on a lot of stuff tonight), but I thought it opened to the street out front.
No one was in the hall to see the drunk girl stagger along the wall and then practically fall out the exit door.
An exit door that clanged shut behind me, stranding me in a creepy parking lot on the wrong side of the hotel.
