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“What’s it like living with Stella?” he asked Wyatt. It had only been two weeks since his sister had moved in with the bass player, and he was curious if they were still in love, or if toothpaste disputes had already killed the burn of passion.
But Wyatt grinned, his smile so wide and goofy, he rivaled Saxon for a split second. “Dude, it’s amazing. Everywhere I look, she’s there, either literally, or just there in the sense that her stuff is, and her personal touch on my apartment.”
Oh my God. That sounded like hell on earth. Johnny couldn’t imagine looking in every direction and seeing the same woman over and over. It would be like watching The Notebook every day for a millennium. “Can I have that flask again?”
He took a long drink.
Then he forced himself to say the right thing, which was all true, but it didn’t change the fact that his hand was shaking just a little. “Well, I’m happy for you guys, I really am. Stella is a lot looser with you. She’s happy, bro, and I thank you for that.”
Wyatt clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks, man. And your turn will come, you know.”
“I hope not.” Johnny figured he was working on being more responsible and less impulsive, and that was hard enough as it was. Adding a serious relationship on top of all that just might make his head explode.
“Don’t you ever want to wake up and just know that you’re going to turn and the woman you love is lying next to you?”
Johnny stared at his friend, who looked like he’d not only been struck by Cupid’s arrow, but had also eaten it. “I’m moving away from you because now you’re starting to get on my nerves. Go find my sister and cuddle. I’m going to find Drake and then maybe a bridesmaid to flirt with.”
But when he saw Drake, who had been forced to wear a puffy pirate’s shirt at the bride’s request in his role as best man, Johnny decided there would be no picking up women for Drake that night. He’d be better off flying solo.
There was no band, which seemed a little criminal to Johnny, but then again, as far as he was concerned, the best band on the street was theirs, and they weren’t going to play Saxon’s own wedding. Though Johnny could have tolerated the DJ a little more if he hadn’t been alternating between Frank Sinatra and booty-grinding music, neither of which put him in a better mood than his current state. Wandering through the courtyard, ignoring the food that had been set out for the mortals, he narrowly missed getting hit by a leather whip as he passed the head table.
Darting out of the way, he saw that one of Zelda’s bridesmaids was grinning at him, flicking her wrist teasingly, whip in hand. She was wearing a top hat covered in black and red feathers, and she had drawn black tears trailing down her face in makeup and had smeared her lipstick across her cheeks like she was bleeding. There were further fake bloodstains on her substantial cle**age, and as she grinned, he noted that her tooth was blacked out. Or maybe it was really missing. Possibly a whip injury. In any case, Johnny immediately rethought his bridesmaid project. Flirting with a cute girl was usually a foolproof method of improving his mood, but this was one scary bridesmaid. She clearly wanted to hurt him.
Johnny gave her a half smile, then got the hell out of the range of her weapon. He may be a vampire with excellent healing properties, but that didn’t mean it felt good to have his ass whipped.
Turning, he contemplated strangling himself with the leaves of a banana tree, and wondered when the last time was that he’d truly had fun. Probably at his own wake, if he had to be honest with himself. That had involved laughs, gambling, dancing, bull riding, and a spontaneous wedding that wasn’t his. Unfortunately, he was the only one who remembered it. He had been hoping that tonight would be a great night, given the potential of a vampire marrying a dominatrix. Instead it was like cirque du freak meets Lawrence Welk. There were actually bubbles floating down from the misters, and if he wasn’t mistaken, there was a transvestite dressed like Cher making her way across the dance floor with a very determined stride.
And Lizette Chastain was coming through the archway from the street into the courtyard, her posture angry as she marched straight toward him.
Shit.
Johnny contemplated hiding, but she had already spotted him. Besides, he was trying to be more mature. Which meant that when he ditched out on a woman and completely disregarded her rules, he needed to stick around and take responsibility for it instead of hiding. Hey, growing up didn’t happen over night. He was taking baby steps.
“Mr. Malone,” Lizette said, her voice clipped as she stepped right up to him, dressed in a suit that, while a lighter gray, was essentially the same one as the day before, though she was wearing lower heels with a splash of red on them.
“Ms. Chastain, it’s a pleasure to see you again. What brings you to a wedding you weren’t invited to?” He turned so that he moved under the archway, away from the view of the majority of the courtyard. She shifted as well, and they stood under the red, uneven bricks of the arch, the twinkle lights and dull volume of the wedding to his right, the dim light from Chartres Street on his left. Her lips were pursed in agitation and again it struck him at a completely inappropriate time how attractive she was. Everything about her was delicate. Except her expression.
“You are not a gentleman,” she accused him.
He wasn’t sure that he had ever claimed to be one. Growing up potato-poor in Ireland, he had learned that his fists spoke volumes, and that stealing a loaf of bread filled his hungry belly faster than trying to find work that didn’t exist. Then when he’d come to the States with Stella in the twenties, he had taken those lessons and applied them to running with the Chicago mob. In his immortal life, he had set aside crime and violence, and had established a pretty firm personal code of ethics, but that didn’t mean he knew a whole lot about which fork to use and putting out his pinky and shit like that.
So he just agreed with her. “Probably not.”
She gasped. “We had an agreement to meet at seven, and you did not attend our meeting. Not to mention that Dieter informed me you have stolen your drum set.”
“I can’t steal what I already own. Look, I didn’t want to deal with this today. I’m sorry I no-showed on you, but I didn’t want to sit there and answer questions for five hours when I had a wedding to go to. If I have a key to my apartment, and can tell you where everything is, and a couple dozen witnesses can back me up that I’m Johnny Malone, I don’t see what the big deal is. Just take me off the list and we can forget this ever happened. You can even keep the twelve hundred bucks if it will get the VA off my back.” The longer he spoke, the more irritated he felt. Seriously, where did they get off?
