Whiskey Sharp: Unraveled

And they didn’t know Maybe at all, damn it.

Bitterness surged, even as she tried to pretend it didn’t matter they believed she’d be capable of anything to cause deliberate harm to Rachel.

“She’s a grown woman who makes her own choices. I’ll let her know she’s invited.”

“Just get your life out of the bar for five minutes and put someone else first for once in your life,” he said.

The tone he used in private with her, a hard, mean voice full of disdain was so totally different than how he spoke to Rachel. It still startled Maybe after a lifetime of hearing it.

It sent her back to a time when she didn’t have any choices. When she’d been far more helpless than she was now.

It was that knowledge, despite the pain of his treatment, that gave her the nonchalance to bat away his nasty swipe. “You have a fantastic night,” she said right before ending the call.

Boy oh boy, what a night it’d been. Horrible date with horrible, slightly paranoid dude and then a slap fight with her dad. All before 10:00 p.m.

Maybe started the car and headed home.

* * *

“VIC TOTALLY HAS a thing for you,” Maybe told her sister as she walked into the kitchen. She’d tell her about the phone call once she’d stuffed some food into her face.

“I don’t know why you’re not too busy to be up in my lady business.” Her sister’s dry response made Maybe smile.

“Because he’s so cute, Rach. And he has great hands and he smells good. Today he smelled like cinnamon rolls. Imagine that. He’s like a lifetime source of carbs. Take one for the team. Jeez.”

Years of iron-fisted lessons meant she hung her coat up in the hall closet and placed her bag on a nearby hook before cruising back into the kitchen to see what was in the fridge.

“Selfish is my middle name,” Rachel said as she set her sketchbook aside. “Since you’re digging around in there, I’m guessing the date wasn’t good?”

Maybe sighed. “He looked at his phone at least a third of the time. So I asked him if everything was all right and then he got all pissy about my asking. Said I was accusing. Which uh, no I was thinking an emergency or whatever. But once he’d said all that I was guessing he was up to something shady or had a huge anger management issue, so I was like, okay then, and got out of there before the food even got to the table.”

“Dreadful. There’s pizza. I brought it home from the shop.”

Since she was busily eating a slice of that pizza, Maybe just grunted her thanks as she put another piece on a plate and put the box back in the fridge.

“Alexsei’s mother is in town. I’m not going to lie, I’m beyond curious about her.”

Rachel snorted. “The way Irena talks about her sometimes. Ouch.” She shook her head slowly. “Or, to be more specific, it’s the things she doesn’t say.”

“She’ll tell us more when she’s ready. Or we’ll see it ourselves. I forgot to ask if she was staying with the Orlovs or not.” If so, she’d be right next door so they could get a gander. “Alexsei was bunched up today. More than usual. He barely even complained when I cut his hair.”

“They have family all over the place here. I’m sure she’ll be fine. Why are you so fascinated with this?” Her sister sent a look that said she knew Maybe’s game.

“Are you new here? It’s not like we just met yesterday.” Maybe rolled her eyes. “I’m totally nosy.”

“And you have a hard-on for your boss.”

“Well, I mean, I guess that’s true too. If you want to be so vulgar about it.”

“Vulgar is my middle name.”

“I thought selfish was your middle name?” she teased Rachel.

“Depends on my mood and the day of the week. Duh.”

“I love your goofy ass, you know that, right?” Laughing, Maybe cracked open a beer.

“When are you going to let him see your boobs already? I feel like you two have been giving one another googly eyes for years now.”

“It’s not happening while his mother is visiting from Russia, for goodness’ sake. When she leaves, then I’ll maybe investigate a little further. Probably. I mean, it’s dumb. He’s my boss. I really need to talk myself out of this. Tell me what a terrible idea this is.”

“No. I’m going to tell you what a good idea it is instead. He’s not your boss. Not really. You work in his barbershop. But you earn your own living with your clients and make him a lot of cash. You’re a total asset to his business but neither of you needs to pretend to feel anything out of fear of reprisals. And before you bring up the fiancée, she’s gone and he’s had his rebound time. Get some of that.”

Maybe groaned. “That heifer isn’t gone. She’s like herpes, Rach. She keeps coming back. Alexsei and Vic were talking about her earlier. She claims she needs him to go with her to get a replacement phone.”

Rachel curled her lip. “She can’t have him back.”

“When they were talking about her, they broke into Russian. Alexsei was super annoyed. But they were talking way too fast for me to get more than an outline.”

“For your purposes, she’s gone. She’s not going to marry him anymore. If she ever was. I still can’t see them as a couple and they were actually a couple. But now they aren’t together and won’t be again. That dumbo will be around for years because she’s besties with his cousin, but as long as they’re not involved, so what? Anyway she’s not you. And he seems to dig that fact. You need to get in there and cockblock any bull on her part.”

If only things were as simple as Rachel thought they were. She wanted to retort that Rachel should take her own advice and finally realize she could do more than bang a dude and kick him to the curb ten minutes after she came.

But she never would say that because you didn’t make fun of someone’s weaknesses. You built them up. And punched them if they stole your eyeliner, yet again.

“I got a call from Mom and Dad.”

Rachel groaned. “What do they want?”

“Thanksgiving’s coming up and they want us there.” No use mentioning the real reason to have Maybe invited was because she was their way to their oldest daughter.

Maybe always made sure to be around to stand between them before they could hurt her sister. But the truth was, she’d had a vastly different relationship with their parents. One Maybe thought her sister deserved to still enjoy. Especially if it gave her more emotional support.

“Huh.” Rachel sighed heavily.

“We’ll do whatever you want. I’ll handle them either way.”

“Why do you keep taking them on for me? You don’t have to. I’m a big girl.” Rachel was indeed a big girl, but she’d been the protector for most of Maybe’s life, so it was her turn to do the protecting.

Maybe just wished their parents saw that and appreciated it instead of reacting to it as if it was a personal attack. Wanted, so very much, not to care how they saw her, but really she wanted them to be proud of her. To see what she did in a positive light instead of always so damned negative.

She was stable. Someone Rachel could count on.

“It was just a phone call about Thanksgiving. People deal with that mundane family stuff every day. No one’s family is perfect.” If she said it often enough she might believe it.

And most important, Rachel needed Maybe to be the buffer. She wouldn’t always, which was why she didn’t say the words aloud.

“Robbie traded Thanksgiving for Christmas so they aren’t doing a big dinner at their house. But you know we can head over there and hang out. Just to be away from here. We can eat turkey here at home too. Or go there. Whatever. As long as turkey is involved I’m pretty much good to go.”

Robbie, their aunt and the woman who was far more a mother to Maybe than her biological one, was a cop, like their father had been. Like a whole truckload of Dolans had been or currently were. Cops worked over holidays, and now that Maybe was grown and didn’t live in Eastern Washington near them, Robbie traded her holidays to be around for more time in the summer for Maybe’s annual visit and Christmas or Thanksgiving when she and Rachel would come over to celebrate.

“Next year you can handle turkey dinner with them on your own. But for the next little while it’s easier for me to thwart them. Thwarting is in my constitution, remember?” And they already disliked her. They wouldn’t try to manipulate her the same way they did Rachel.

And if Rachel was around, they tended to behave better toward Maybe as well. They might actually get through dinner and have a decent time.

Rachel’s laugh sounded rusty, but genuine. “True. You’re a champion thwarter. But you’d cut them off totally and wouldn’t be in contact if not for me.”

She scoffed. Pretty much, yeah. “Well, if you and I weren’t living here, I’d probably still be in Spokane, happily existing two states away from them. Yes. That’s true. Look, they came up here to be near you. They’re not always awful.” Just most of the time. “They worry about you.”

“It’s all the times they are awful to you I have a problem with.”

Her sister had no idea the true extent of damage between their parents and Maybe. She’d seen enough to feel the way she did, to understand why Maybe had run away and gotten herself a new life and kept her parents away from it.

Maybe saw no reason to get into specifics and make Rachel feel bad. She couldn’t have changed it, or stopped it, so it would have only made her feel guilty. Maybe kept her childhood in a box marked Past and that’s where she wanted it to stay.

“Look,” she told Rachel, “nothing is perfect. But you and me? We’re a team. So until you’re ready to handle this, I’ve got it. And even when you are, I’ll still be at your side. She’s a good cook. Turkey day isn’t that bad if we go shortly before dinner and leave right after.”

Her mother would frown at them not helping in the kitchen. But she’d just tell Maybe she was doing everything wrong anyway. The kitchen and her garden were the only places totally under their mom’s complete control. Their dad ran everything else.

It was one of the few things Maybe missed about living in Spokane. At least then they didn’t really expect her to come to Thanksgiving. Once she’d left their house and moved in with her aunt and uncle, her parents generally found it unnecessary to deal with her unless they had to.

She made her own domain. On her terms with the guidance and love of her aunt and uncle. It had transformed her life, made her realize her worth in a way she hadn’t growing up.

But after Rachel and Maybe had settled in Seattle instead of Rachel moving back to Los Angeles where they’d been from, their parents had sold their house and moved up to the Northwest, and their ugly, dark need to control came back into her life again.

It made her harder, it made her stronger and in the end, if she didn’t view it like that, it would have eaten her alive.

“We’ll go, but we only stay on our terms.” Rachel’s voice had gone cold and hard. A glimpse of the woman she’d been and was working her way toward once more. Following the rules was one thing, but Rachel had never been one to get manipulated or maneuvered into anywhere other than where she planned on going.

Rachel took her hands, squeezing them a moment. “What was on that meme you sent me the other day? Oh yeah, Do No Harm, But Take No Shit. I think I need that on a cross-stitch to hang over my damn bed. Anyway. It’s time I start pushing back harder about what I want and for them to get off your case.”

“It’s cool to want to be comfortable and safe and drama free except for the dumb crap at the shop or whatever.” Maybe kept her voice calm. Rachel hated pity and she was always careful to bury it far out of her sister’s way.

“I know what it costs you to run interference with them.”

“You’re going to make me cry so stop this now,” Maybe warned.

“Thank you.” Rachel said this with utter seriousness. “I needed it and now I need to stand on my own more often. Especially with them.”

“I’ll call them back to let them know and get the details.”

“I’ll do it. Don’t argue.” Rachel gave her the stink-eye. “It’s my turn. And I can gauge how strong their when will you get serious and find a real job and stop consorting with those people game is.”

“Good luck with that. They’re world champions and you’ve fallen in with your shiftless sister and her loser friends.”

“It doesn’t matter what they think. I know you.” Rachel waved a hand, but her face was serious.

“It’s cool. I can use it in my art and shit.”

Rachel saw through the bravado, but she let it go with a smile. “Pain is prose, baby. And it pays the bills. Barely, but I’m okay with that for now. I’ve got this and I’m not arguing about it another moment.”

Maybe shrugged and held her hands up. “Okay then. Call in an airstrike if you need it. You know where I am.”

CHAPTER FOUR

EARLY THE NEXT AFTERNOON, Maybe headed to have her regular Friday lunch with her best friend Cora and Rachel at the tiny deli just a few doors down from the tattoo shop where they both worked.

Rachel had been up and out first thing that morning. She still had regular doctor and therapy appointments, though the frequency had dwindled and would continue in that direction.

But she was there, along with Cora, at a small table where a bottle of soda already waited for her.

Cora Silvera had been Maybe’s best friend pretty much from the first day she’d shown up at Whiskey Sharp and stopped by this same little deli for a soda before she went to work. Cora had grabbed the last orange fizz, but when she’d taken note of Maybe’s disappointment, she’d handed it over with a smile.

Then, it turned out she worked at Ink Sisters with Rachel and was related to Rachel’s mentor and new boss. In the next months she’d ended up being besties with both Dolan sisters.

“You’re my favorite,” Maybe said as she sat and took a swig of orange fizz.

“Of course I am. Why do you look so sexy today?” Cora asked. “Snug shirt to showcase the knockers. Red lipstick. The way your hair is standing up extra high. Are those streaks new?”

“Okay, so at eleven last night after telling Rachel the story of my date and talking about my undeniable thing for my hot boss, I decided to add them because I figured I finally need to see what it could be between me and him.”

“Well, I think the silver really pops against the red and I love it. I’m glad you had a shitty date so you finally allowed yourself to jump on Alexsei’s bones.”

“Penises don’t have bones,” Maybe deadpanned.

Cora giggled and Rachel just shook her head with a grin. “You’re a woman of loose morals, Maybe Dolan. By the way you look ridiculously hot and I’m thrilled you finally found a way to get around the whole he’s-my-boss thing. If you date a bit, have some sex and it’s meh, you two aren’t going to flip out. You’ll still be friends and coworkers. But I don’t know, he seems to look at you...really look at you. He watches the way you move. You have the hots for him too. So why not see where it goes because it could be something super delicious and hot? And to be honest, Rachel and I have decided we need to have sex with him vicariously.”

Maybe snickered. “I should never leave the two of you alone to talk about me.”

“This is totally true.” Rachel winked. “Too late though.”

They made some plans to meet up later and, buoyed by Cora’s opinion, Maybe bounced into Whiskey Sharp—after brushing her teeth and reapplying her lipstick—with a few minutes to spare before her first appointment.

* * *

ALEXSEI PRETENDED HE didn’t realize how often he found himself looking up at the door. She liked to work the late afternoon into evening several nights a week to couple her schedule to take advantage of the happy-hour-booze-and-a-haircut specials at the bar, which opened and began serving at four in the afternoon.

Smart.

She knew her clientele. Knew they enjoyed a drink after they left their jobs in the offices crammed downtown. It had been her idea to do the happy hour shave and drink specials they were now famous for.

He liked to see Maybe in the afternoons. Liked the way the sunlight would hit her while she worked. Essentially, he liked seeing her whenever she was around.

It was thinking of her that had gotten him through what had been a truly monstrously awkward late breakfast with his mother and aunt. There’d been posturing, as always, between the two sisters. Lots of passive-aggressive commentary. He and Cris had eaten and tried to talk around all the tension.

He frowned, thinking of it all over again, but this time when he looked up from his work, there she was standing in the doorway, always pausing just a moment as she came in like she greeted the walls and floors as much as everyone else.

Another thing that got to him. She seemed to love the physical space as much as he did.

She looked extra...that is, very whatever it was she exuded when she wore those pants. Maybe was a jumble of old and new in all the best ways. Hard and soft. She looked feminine and fierce and it set his heart pounding.

“Afternoon, class.”

Why he loved it so much when she was ridiculous and irreverent he wasn’t sure. But it was true anyway.

She glided around the shop, taking her coat off, touching base with their office manager and the other barbers until she stood at his station, a hand on her hip.

“I have no treats for you today. Sorry,” she told him with a pretty smile.

She was his treat. One he’d decided to let himself enjoy.

“We had a family breakfast so Irishka was with me instead of loading you down with food.” She’d mentioned Maybe in front of his mother several times. Alexsei was pretty certain it was her way of encouraging him toward Maybe and probably also rubbing it in that she was able to give him advice on something his mother hadn’t known about until right then.

He expected to hear all about that at some point from his mother, who’d hoard it until she needed it as ammunition to lob at him.

Alexsei had, for long moments, wanted to tell her, wanted to share with her this delicious new thing he’d planned to pursue. It had been right there on the tip of his tongue but then he’d realized he didn’t know if he could trust his mother the way he did his aunt. Which made him sad, but he had only so much time for sadness.

“I love it that you call her Irishka. It’s very sweet. I haven’t had bread from a grocery store in years. I’m not sure I could go back now. How is your mother’s visit so far?” Maybe headed to her chair and began to set up.

“Fine.” She’d been annoyed to have to go to breakfast so early. If you could call 10:00 a.m. early and his aunt most assuredly did not. And his mother had insisted on a hotel downtown so they’d gone to meet her there where some sort of bizarre one-upmanship had begun between the sisters.

“How long is she here for?” Maybe asked.

“Three days. She needs to get back because my youngest sister has something, an event of some sort in Moscow. She’ll be there on a school holiday.”

“That’s right. You have two little sisters.”

He nodded.

“Too bad they’re not with her on this visit. This is one of those Seattle Novembers all the tourism guides will be using to sell vacations here for years.”

Alexsei didn’t know his sisters very well, though he and his brother certainly wished they did. They were far younger—fifteen and sixteen years—and products of his mother securing her place at the side of her third husband, who happened to be a gangster as well as a vulgar asshole.

“Have you given your mom a tour of Whiskey Sharp? I can’t recall ever meeting her in the time I’ve worked here. I bet she was so proud when you did.”

In the sixteen years since he and Cristian had arrived at SeaTac to move in with his aunt and uncle, their mother had visited six times. The last time she’d been in town, four years before, he’d driven her over, so proud to show off this business he’d begun to build.

She hadn’t bothered to do more than glance through the front window, comment on the neighborhood and get back into the car after telling him she hoped he had good insurance or could she give him a loan for a better location.

All he said was “She’s seen it.”

The understanding on Maybe’s face might have made him uncomfortable a year ago and it certainly did right then. Only in a way that was new. More intimate, therefore a lot more terrifying.

That was, he thought, what being with her would be like. She saw straight to the heart of things and of people. An attractive quality, but a fearsome one too.

Maybe’s client came in and she waved him her way, their conversation done for the time being, but she gave Alexsei a look over her shoulder that told him she saw through his bullshit.

And though she’d asked him more questions than usual, she’d understood he didn’t want to say more and didn’t push.

She didn’t have to really because he couldn’t stop thinking about her. She worked efficiently as always, flirting and laughing with her clients. As the afternoon stretched into evening, Whiskey Sharp filled up with people drinking and getting shaves and haircuts. The sound level rose but it never got so raucous he was worried.

In fact, he used it to hide behind as the time for him to leave for dinner at his aunt and uncle’s house approached.

Slower than usual, he cleaned his workspace and his tools as the light wisped into full dark.

“So.”

Startled, Alexsei focused on Maybe, who stood so close he could smell her. Today it was what he liked to think of as her autumn scent. He’d never say that aloud, naturally, but she changed up her products over the course of the year. In the summer she smelled of heady, luscious flowers and sometimes of coconut and mango. Autumn she was always spicy and rich.

“Hello?” she asked, getting his attention back from where he’d been imagining leaning in and taking a sniff.

“I apologize,” he told her. Why was she so close? He had no ability to be in a space where she was like that because it shredded the control he normally used to keep himself firmly in the friend category.

His breath was full of her. Of her scent. Her heat. The soft sound of her breath was suddenly the only thing he heard.

If he dodged, just a step in either direction, he’d put himself firmly back into that friend spot. He knew it to his bones that she’d assume he wasn’t interested and move on.

Instead he opened the door to more-than-friends. He’d decided to wait until his mother was gone to make his move, but he had no plans to resist now that the opportunity presented itself. “Is there something you need to tell me?” he asked.

She stepped even closer to speak in his ear. “I’ve been waiting for you to ask me out for drinks or something and you haven’t. And I want to go out for drinks or something with you so I’m going to move this along and do the asking because, God, you take forever to get to the point.”

Startled, he laughed, pulling her into a quick hug.

He shouldn’t have, because she felt so fucking good he got dizzy with it. And then he didn’t want to let go but it’d already gone into a little too long for friendly territory so he released her.

Maybe stepped back and the way she looked struck him in the gut. Eyes heavy lidded, a carnal smile on a mouth he wanted to kiss so badly the only thing stopping him was the crowded bar full of their friends and coworkers.

“I can’t. Tonight I mean,” he amended when her face fell. “I need to... I have dinner with my family.”

“Oh that’s right. Irena said something a few days back about that.”

“Tomorrow night after work.”

Her smile was back. “I’m off at nine. You can take me to eat after. Now, go give your aunt a hug for me. I hope it’s a good dinner.”

* * *

HE’D HOPED IT would be a good dinner too.

Continued hoping as he parked his car at the curb in front of the house he’d come to think of as home.

The little house Maybe and Rachel shared sat just next door and he allowed himself to look over as he headed up the front walk. So much outdoor light over there. His aunt had been annoyed at first, saying it was too bright. But after a while she and his uncle had come to like it, and feel it made their part of the neighborhood safer because it was so well lit at night.