Thirty-Two and a Half Complications
Page 38

“Hey there, stranger,” Neely Kate practically purred, leaning close to him. “You look like you’d be more at home at the Trading Post.” Obviously, we were on the same wavelength.
“Neely Kate!” he said, sounding happy to see her. “I’m just waitin’ for a friend.” He leaned back on his barstool and almost fell backward. Lucky for him, the body of the woman he’d just been trying to pick up stopped his downward momentum.
The woman spun around, her long, dark hair whipping him in the face, some of it landing in his open mouth. He coughed and sputtered, his tongue thrusting out of his mouth as he batted her hair away with both hands.
She jerked away and shot him a glare. “What the hell do you think you’re doin’?”
“What?” he asked, holding out his hands and appearing genuinely confused.
Yep, it looked like he’d downed plenty of beers while waiting for his friend.
He shuddered, then turned to Neely Kate. “Long time no see.” He eyed her up and down, or at least I thought he did. His eyes were unfocused, and they were doing wonky things. “I haven’t seen you in ages.”
Her mouth twisted into a condescending smirk. “Not since your wedding to Samantha Jo a few years back.”
“Two-timing bitch,” he snarled, picking up a beer mug and taking a swig. When he drained it, he slammed it on the bar with more force than necessary, shouting at the bartender to get him another. He reached for his wallet in his back pocket, nearly falling off his stool again in the process. “Can I get you loverly ladies a drink?” His gaze shifted to me, as though seeing me for the first time. “Neely Kate, you didn’t introduce me to your friend.”
“Rose, this is Toby Wheaton. Toby, Rose. But she’s very taken, so hands off.” His grimy hand was reaching toward me, but she smacked it with her manicured fingers as if he were a misbehaving school boy.
Toby snatched his hand back. “Oww.”
I couldn’t help but compare his dirty fingernails and stained knuckles to her pristine ones. I’d seen hands like those before. When Joe was undercover as a mechanic.
Neely Kate plastered a cheesy smile on her face and returned to her interrogation. “That’s not how I heard it, Toby. The way I heard it, you were the cheater.”
His mouth puckered in disapproval. “Well, she cheated first. And even if I was unfaithful, she didn’t have to set my fishing boat on fire. Who does that?”
“Crazy bitches,” Neely Kate muttered. “Do you talk to Samantha Jo much since you two split? I heard she was working at the bank.”
“Why do I give a damn where she works? I still have to pay the bitch alimony.” He leaned forward, his face inches from Neely Kate’s. “Can you believe that?”
Neely Kate waved her hand in front of her nose, her face turning pale as she swallowed. His alcohol fumes seemed to be setting off her upchuck reflex.
Oh, crappy doodles.
Ever the trouper, Neely Kate pressed on. “Rumor has it that you haven’t been paying your alimony and Samantha Jo is hurtin’, especially after you racked up charges on all her credit cards before you did the naked shimmy with Lyla Dumont.”
His mouth opened like a fish’s and he started to say something, but nothing came out.
“I heard she’s pretty desperate, movin’ in with her cousin even. I’ve heard she’s lookin’ for part-time employment.” She winked. “If you know what I mean.”
He shook his head, frowning as he handed the bartender several bills in exchange for his refill. “Ain’t nobody in this town making part-time money since Crocker met up with the grim reaper.”
“I heard Skeeter Malcolm was taking over Crocker’s pot business.”
It was my turn to look surprised. She hadn’t told me that.
“Maybe. Maybe not.” He shrugged, trying to look disinterested even though the smug look in his eyes proved otherwise.
I wondered what it all meant.
“So if Samantha Jo needed money and couldn’t find part-time employment, do you think she’d be capable of robbing the Henryetta Bank?”
Toby busted out laughing, guffawing and slapping his leg. “Samantha Jo?” he asked when he finally settled down. “She’s dumber than a cat drowning in a puddle. There ain’t no way she could plan a bank robbery.”
“But she’s really pretty,” I interjected.
Neely Kate cast me a curious glance.
“I bet she had dreams of bein’ an actress,” I added.
“Hey.” His eyes lit up. “How’d you know that?”
“I saw her in the Henryetta outdoor theater production of Romeo and Juliet two summers ago.” Momma had pitched a fit when I left her to go see the play with Violet. It had been a disaster from beginning to end. The sets looked like they’d been painted by preschoolers, and the acting was even worse, Samantha Jo’s included. But she seemed to take her part very seriously, oblivious to her lack of talent. Of course I’d paid my dues with Momma afterward, enduring her temper for two days for my disobedience—never mind the fact that I was a twenty-two-year-old.
“We were still together then.” A wistful, faraway look filled his eyes and he grabbed his beer and downed a good portion of it. “She would practice her lines with me. She kept telling me it was her big break. That she was going to be discovered and taken off to Hollywood.”
Judging from her performance as Juliet, Hollywood would have barricaded the doors before she showed up. Samantha Jo had a better chance of starting a new reality series, Trashy Housewives of Henryetta. “Do you think she’d take an acting job on the side?”