Hell's Belles

Della’s brother Jack hadn’t been behind the bar since his summers spent home from college. He’d moved to Atlanta fifteen years ago to start a career as a private investigator. Mattie could never seem to reconcile the quiet athlete she knew with her image of a PI, though Della assured her it was less gumshoe and more corporate inquiry than the books that filled the mystery section of the bookstore led one to believe. Still, the job sounded dark and mysterious and only fueled the fantasy.

As if her fantasies about Jack needed more fuel. They had been simmering since she was the ripe old age of thirteen. Though she knew he often made it home for the holidays, the Murphys were a tight clan and Mattie made certain not to intrude on their family time. She’d run into Jack a time or two, though, her knees turning to Jell-O and her brain becoming sixteen again.

Thirty-eight-year-old knees and a sixteen-year-old brain. A scary combination.

Muffled voices from the far end of the bowling alley caught her attention. Mattie froze. She could have sworn she was alone. She glanced around, still feeling like a trespasser. Mattie grabbed her purse and thumbed through it to distract herself from the acid burning in her gut. She found her envelope in the side pocket of her purse and tossed it on the table as if it contained flesh-eating bacteria.

She’d experienced absolutely nothing written inside. But the moment of truth was here.

She wasn’t anxious to admit her failure. So why was she here, trespassing, wishing her friends had remembered their childish pact?

“Long time no see.” Della’s familiar voice rang out as she sidled up to the table and slung her ten-pound purse atop it.

Della was still beautiful, despite the fact that there was more of her to love these days. She’d styled her platinum-blond hair in an ultramodern cut picked up from a recent hair show in Birmingham. It barely brushed her shoulders, the ends moussed to messy perfection. Everything about Della’s appearance spoke confidence. Tight, black capri pants said, “Love me as I am,” and a spaghetti-strapped tank peeked from beneath a colorful mesh blouse, flashing glimpses of ample cleavage.

Mattie was so shocked that Della had showed up, that she was speechless. But Della didn’t appear to notice. She lifted her well-padded hips onto the vinyl seat across from Mattie, sighing heavily.

“You little sneak. I thought you’d forgotten.”

“Ditto.” The knot in her stomach loosened considerably and she smiled. “I thought… You had so many clients waiting.”

Della waved a dismissive hand, nails the identical shade of red they’d been twenty years ago. “I gave them to Kimee.”

“You did not!” Mattie suddenly pictured hordes of Haddesians walking around with Goth haircuts like a scene from The Night of the Living Dead. “Oh my God, please tell me you didn’t leave old Estelle Ashworth with Kimee.”

Della grinned a grin so mischievous that Mattie had only seen it on one other face—that of Della’s three-year-old son, Trevor. “I did.” She giggled. “I can’t wait to see what she does to her.”

“You mean Kimee or Mrs. Ashworth?” Estelle Ashworth was no shrinking violet. She ran the local dry cleaners and had a reputation for being gruff. She kept a candy jar full of Dubble Bubble and handed pieces out to the children along with a fierce pinch and a smile. Half left crying and the other half knew to refuse the offer politely. “I don’t know which one to be worried about.”

“Good point. It should be worth showing up in the morning.” Della laughed, then opened her purse and began sorting through the contents. “Estelle gripes every time I cut her hair. Maybe after Kimee gets through with her, she’ll appreciate my talent. In fact, I’m going to consider it a crash course in Della appreciation.”

Mattie nodded. That course should be mandatory for a few people she knew. Namely, Donald. But she kept that observation to herself.

“So have you heard from anyone else?”

Mattie knew the “anyone else” Della was referring to meant Shay and Erica. She shook her head.

“I have a feeling we’ll be the only attendees at this little party.” Removing a sandwich bag filled with what Mattie hoped were raisins and a Hot Wheels car, she continued fishing until she extracted her envelope, placing it atop Mattie’s. “Last I heard Erica was out of the country and Shay was out of her mind.”

Mattie chose to ignore the comment about Shay. It hurt that Shay had withdrawn from their lives, but her reasons were certainly valid. She’d left Haddes to free herself from an abusive marriage, and despite the fact that her life was totally unconventional—maybe even a little weird—Mattie understood. And what was worse—making every poor choice available, as her friend had, or taking no chances at all, as she’d done?

She lifted the corner of the sandwich bag and examined the contents. Was it possible for raisins to shrivel? She gave Della a questioning look and dropped the bag. “Last I heard, Erica was covering the war in Iraq.”

Della ignored her silent commentary on the state of the raisins. “If a war breaks out without someone there to snap a picture, does it really break out?” Della slipped from her chair and sauntered to the bar, smiling at her humor.

Mattie considered the caustic comment. Okay, so maybe she wasn’t the only one feeling a little ordinary. Besides, she knew Della well enough to realize that the comment was sheer bravado. Sarcasm was easier than worrying about Erica’s safety.

“Do you have any red wine back there?” Mattie asked. She’d only recently learned to tolerate alcohol in the form of wine. Half of the articles in the medical magazines she stocked at the bookstore were now claiming that red wine was beneficial to your heart. But in all honesty, holding the stem of a graceful wineglass while she read in bed at night made her feel more like a literary connoisseur and less like a lonely spinster.

“No, no red wine,” Della answered absentmindedly, ducking beneath the bar in search of something.

“Are you sure?” Mattie eyed the dozens of bottles on the shelf.

“No.” Her friend’s blond head popped up. “Besides, today I’m making margaritas.” She shook a canister of salt for emphasis, cha-chaing her hips to the beat, then held up her hand when Mattie started to protest. “Don’t be a wimp, Mattie.”

She snapped her mouth shut. Tonight she was not a wimp. She was a successful small-business owner, single and still a size six. She bit her lip. Well, a size six most of the time. If she wasn’t retaining water and if she held her breath. At any rate, she was going to drink a margarita without grimacing, dammit.

After sipping and perfecting, adding various potions and revving the mixer to a deafening RPM, Della returned to the table with the drinks, leaving a half-full blender on the bar.

Mattie took a sip and managed not to grimace. A muted burst of male laughter erupted from the direction of the conference rooms. Della waved her hand as she sipped.

“Chamber of Commerce meeting in the back.”

Mattie was about to get the details when a soft rustle from the entrance caught her attention. Shay stepped out of the shadows, her tall form gliding gracefully toward their table.

“Shay!” Mattie jumped to her feet, scooping her friend into a hug as she neared. Della was next in line for a hug, though Mattie thought she detected a guilty expression, at least one that looked as close to guilty as Della ever came.

“We never dreamed you’d come.” Della hesitated. “How are you?”

Shay took a seat and met their eyes, hesitating until she had their full attention. “I’m great,” she answered, her voice breathy. Shay always gave the impression of being delicately out of breath, as if she’d just breezed in from somewhere important.

Mattie shook her head in amazement. Shay looked like some misplaced Celtic princess. The crushed silk sheath she wore came nearly to her ankles, the effect no less than stunning. Auburn curls wound to her waist, and her ivory complexion was ten years more youthful than it should have been. Cut crystals hung from her ears, matching the crystal pendant that swung between her breasts. The New Age garb was the only hint that Shay’s life had taken a turn down the road less traveled. Mattie sipped her drink and suppressed a surge of jealousy. Did everyone else have to be so damn interesting?

“Cough up that envelope.” Della got right to the point.

Shay opened a delicately crocheted handbag and removed her envelope. Mattie eyed her own pedestrian-looking purse, then Shay’s. Heck, she’d probably grown the cotton—organically, of course—spun it and crocheted herself, all the while chanting good thoughts for the universe. Mattie sat her drink down with a thud. Was it the alcohol or was she just becoming a middle-aged bitch?

Shay added her envelope to the growing pile in the center of the table, her expression serene but not entirely natural. The envelopes themselves told part of the story. Della’s was ringed with coffee stains, Shay’s rumpled but clean, and Mattie’s pristine, having survived its twenty-year wait pressed between the pages of a dictionary.

Mattie thought about what her envelope contained. This was the one that had started them all, the first time one of her fantasies met paper. And for twenty years it had been her little secret. Proof that she could be naughty when she wanted to. But now she wasn’t so sure. What had been deliciously wicked twenty years ago suddenly seemed a little, well, stupid.

There was a feeling Mattie got when she was about to do something colossally dumb. It was a creepy creeping sensation that started at the base of her spine and worked its way to her chest like a big hairy spider. It was crawling now. And once it got to her chest, she wouldn’t be able to breathe. She flexed her shoulders as if she could dislodge it. It didn’t work.

“Jack!” Della’s voice shouted in Mattie’s ear. “Come say hi.”

What? What? She followed her friend’s gaze to find the silhouette of two men frozen in the shadows of the entrance. One was thin and rather short. The other was obviously Jack. The shadows fell across his face but she’d know that perfect silhouette anywhere.

“He and his partner are moving back here from Atlanta.”

Partner… Mattie’s tequila-laced mind turned the word over, trying to make the puzzle piece fit.

Jack’s posture spelled r-e-l-u-c-t-a-n-t as he crossed the distance to their table. Mattie’s stomach clutched, then froze in a spasm of denial as Jack stood before her. He was wearing a charcoal-gray suit, a stunningly shy grin and…bronzer? She squinted. Mother-of-pearl, he looked like the local news anchorman after last season’s disastrous brush with self-tanner. And to make matters worse, his black hair was spiked and so thick with gel that it could put out an eye.

“Y’all remember Jack, of course.”

Shay stood and embraced Jack without hesitation. Mattie watched her friend’s ample breasts flatten against the lapel of Jack’s suit, strained to make out her breathless greeting. Unlike Shay, Mattie was frozen in place, cemented to her seat. Something was off kilter, something—

“And this is Cal,” Della said, as she motioned the second man to the table. “Cal is Jack’s partner.”

The smaller man literally seemed to pulse with energy as he approached. His head was shaved smooth, the shiny dome interrupted only by a pair of goggle-like glasses perched atop it. He wore a casual white shirt tucked inside eye-popping striped pants. Mattie felt her eyes go round with realization. No straight man she knew would wear tight white denim with wide brown stripes. She cocked her head, thinking for a moment that the vertical stripes had a great slimming effect. She blinked, forcing herself to focus as her gaze traveled upward, finally resting on a diamond stud that winked in one earlobe. Cal smiled in response to her scrutiny. He had blindingly white teeth and one perfectly manicured hand resting possessively on Jack’s shoulder.

Oh God.

“E-excuse me.” Mattie stood.

“Mattie? Mattie Harold?” Jack held out his arms and her stomach lurched. “My God, you haven’t changed—”

Neither have you. The normal response formed in her brain but ended as a strangled noise in the back of her throat. “I— I’ve got to…” She stammered, then reached for the obligatory hug. The sound of a million and one fantasies shattering was deafening. “Excuse me for a moment.” Mattie swiped her drink from the table and dashed to the ladies’ room.

As Mattie hightailed it, Della shook her head. Her gaze fell on her brother, sweeping him from head to toe before settling on his face. “What,” she said slowly, “on God’s green earth happened to you?”

Jack’s jaw twitched and his eyes narrowed. “Kimee happened to me.” He tried to flatten the spikes on top of his head but they only bent, instantly standing up again like a tinsel Christmas tree.

Della burst out laughing. “You look like Dennis Rodman and Peter Pan’s love child.”

“I can’t believe you left me with her.”

“You showed up out of the blue. I had no choice.”

Jack’s face was turning a threatening shade of red. “You told Kimee I was on my way to get a photo made for the chamber of commerce.”

“I did.” Della pretended to swoon, pressing her hand to her chest. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry. What was I thinking?”

Jack raised an eyebrow, then pointed to her drink. “How many of those have you had?”

“Not enough. Now please explain to me how telling Kimee that you needed a haircut so that you could get your picture made has caused you to look like—” she wavered a little under Jack’s glare “—like a tanning salon mutant.”

“Because, dear sister, little Kimee was convinced that the photographer’s lighting would…how did she put it?…fade me out.” He rubbed at his face with his knuckle. “She put… What was it called, Cal?”

“Bronzer,” Cal offered with a sly grin.

“Yeah. That’s it. She put bronzer on me with a weird little sponge.”

Della looked at Cal. “And you were…?”

“Reading Cosmo.” He shrugged, a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “What can I say?”

“Yeah, about that,” Jack interjected. “Try Field and Stream next time you’re in public.” He glanced at Cal’s slacks. “I know subtle isn’t your nature, but you might want to let people get to know you before you break out the tiara.”

“Oh, please.” Cal rolled his eyes. “This is Haddes, not Green Acres. I think they can handle one gay man.”

Jack looked serious. “This is Haddes, not Atlanta.” He shrugged Cal’s hand off his shoulder. “And cut the touchy-feely stuff before you give everybody the wrong idea about us.”

Della straightened. “A tractor and a head of cattle wouldn’t hurt, either.” She fell into a fit of laughter. Shay muffled a giggle.

Cal winked. “Cows. I’ll get right on that.” He looked at Shay, then gestured toward Della and Jack. “Can you believe these two?”

Shay smiled, laughter replaced by her usual Mona Lisa serenity. “Haddes is pretty good at taking folks in.” She met Della’s eyes for a moment. “Even people who are different.”

“So.” Della jumped back to her brother. “Why did you let Kimee do this to you?”

“I didn’t let her.”

“Then why are you, uh, tan?” Della leaned forward to get a closer look.

“Because when I said no thank you, she started to cry.”

Della laughed. “Kimee does not cry.”

“I can assure you that she does.”

Della was horrified. “Why? Why would that make her cry?”

“You left the poor kid with a gazillion people waiting. When I got there Estelle Ashworth looked like she was going to a Pink concert.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Uh-oh is right. Kimee was in over her head. I thought putting up with this stuff—” Jack scrubbed his jawline with his knuckle again, but the uneven color appeared to have adhered permanently “—until I could get to the car and wipe it off would make her feel better. But now it’s not coming off.”

Della smirked. “Well…uh…it’s kind of a stain.”

Jack looked puzzled.

“Self-tanner. It’s what we use in the salon. It’s a semi-permanent application. It won’t wash off, it has to wear off.” Della flinched and jumped behind Shay when Jack straightened his six-foot-three frame to full height. “It may take a week.”

CHAPTER 2

Mattie burst through the ladies’ room door, stopped at the sink and stared at her own horrified expression. The tequila swirled in her stomach, threatening to swirl in the sink. Fighting fire with fire, she threw the rest of her margarita down her throat, sat the empty glass in the sink and headed for a bathroom stall, opting for a good pee instead of a good cry. What was the use, anyway? Jack wouldn’t be any less gay if she burst into tears.

Jack is gay…. Jack is gay…. How could she not have known this?

Mattie zipped her pants and straightened with new resolve. She knew one thing: there was no friggin’ way she was going to read that fantasy letter to her friends. The idea of sharing her thoughts on sex was like a bad joke. Nope. Unlike Jack, she was going to keep her secrets in the closet.

Only one time in her life had she considered herself sexually active. And even then, she’d probably been more inactive than active. Despite the fact that she’d been a virgin, she’d instinctively known that Brad, her college boyfriend, was a sexual underachiever. She squeezed her eyes shut, wincing at the memory of Brad pounding away while she sort of flopped about, her back pressed against the mattress, her expectations withering along with her passion. It hadn’t been the kind of experience she’d dreamed of, definitely not the sort penned in eighteen-year-old handwriting and sealed in an envelope.

It hadn’t been with Jack.

And all these years she’d been certain that, if it had been, it would have been perfect.

Not.

Mattie felt as if someone had just jarred her from a deep sleep. One that she’d been in for, say, about twenty years. She’d written down every passionate thought she’d ever had and had sealed it in that envelope. And there it had stayed, safe and sound, pure and unmarred. Looking back, she doubted that even Brad had gotten the benefit of that passion. How could he? It had been sealed away in an envelope and flattened in a dictionary.

The sense that she’d waited too long flowed over her, and her shoulders slumped. She looked at herself in the mirror. Defeat lined her eyes, softened her jawline. Mattie looked away.

Too late, too late, too late, the tequila taunted over and over in her brain.

She envisioned herself marching out of the bathroom and to the table, snatching up the envelope and breaking the seal. And then what? What would she find? Would the glue crumble, would the pages be yellowed?

The sense that this was not all about Jack was pretty obvious, and yet… How could she not have known? Jack had never been too involved in small-town life, or small-town girls. She had always assumed he was destined for bigger things, had his sights set outside the city limits of Haddes. Of course, it had been easier to fabricate the perfect life for Jack rather than face her own. And in doing so, she’d somehow missed the obvious.

But now… Now she was beginning to feel entirely too sober. Mattie washed her hands, retrieved the margarita glass and gathered her courage. She willed the hinges to stay silent as she eased open the door to the ladies’ room and peered out. Relief washed over her. Jack was gone. She marched straight to the bar, refilled her glass with the melting margarita mix and returned, none too coordinated, to her chair. She stared with hostility at the ominous pile of envelopes instead of making eye contact with Shay and Della. Surely fragments of shattered dreams were still clinging to her face.

“Jack said to tell you that he hopes to see you again now that he’s back in town,” Shay said.

Heaven forbid. “I didn’t know that Jack was—” she hesitated, mentally rephrasing “—that Jack had a partner.”

“I thought you did.” Della shrugged. “Cal’s great. They’re opposites. Sort of yin and yang. A great fit.”

Mattie flinched at the image Della’s words conjured.

“I didn’t tell you that they’re moving back to Haddes because I just found out myself— Oh my God!” Della interrupted herself, her gaze glued to the entrance.

“Erica?” Mattie and Shay said in unison as they followed Della’s gaze.

Erica’s normally athletic gait was slow and as she neared, Mattie realized her friend’s arm was in a cast. The three women hesitated, as if not quite sure what to do with the injured, solemn-faced woman in front of them.

Erica grinned then, her face transforming into a familiar expression of bravado. She shrugged. “Land mine.”

The comment broke the ice and the next few minutes were filled with swapping comforting hugs and laughter.

Shay helped Erica into a chair with characteristic sympathy. “What really happened? Were you in an accident?”

Erica looked momentarily confused. “Land mine,” she restated, her brows arching.

“You mean a real line mand? Land mine…” Mattie corrected, hoping no one else noticed the tequila-slip.

Erica nodded, her face serious. “It was activated by a humanitarian relief crew I was following in Afghanistan. They were killed instantly.” Her gaze appeared distant before she straightened with a weak smile. “I’m okay, though. Just a few bumps and bruises.” She held up her arm. “And one minor fracture. I’m taking a month or two off to recuperate.”

“Here in Haddes?” Della asked.

“Um…maybe.” She pulled a tiny black purse into her lap and unzipped it. The envelope she produced had been folded accordion-style, no doubt to fit.

Erica always did travel light, Mattie thought. Friendships and relationships included. Without fanfare she tossed the envelope into the pile.

Della brought a drink, but Erica declined, holding up her injured arm. “Better not mix it with the meds,” she explained.

Mattie’s gaze slid from Erica’s arm to her face. She’d changed very little during the years that had separated them. Still strikingly beautiful, her dark hair spilled over strong tanned shoulders, and the calculated movements of her body fell somewhere between athletic and graceful. If you didn’t look into her eyes, it would be easy to assume she spent her days on a tennis court. But there were new lines at the corners of Erica’s eyes, and for reasons unclear to Mattie, she was certain that they’d been hard-earned.

Della slid the drink in front of Mattie instead and the next hour was spent filling in the gaps of information about their lives. It was awkward at times, a social dance that included accepting Shay’s silence when the subject of men came up and the lack of detail surrounding the last few years of Erica’s life. Della played hostess and gossip instigator like the pro that she was.

Conversation finally waned, and the four friends lapsed into companionable silence.

Mattie realized that their gazes had all inadvertently settled on the pile of envelopes. The creepy spider feeling began to walk up her spine again and her lips felt numb. The tequila? Maybe. The sight of the envelopes reminded her of an old black-and-white episode of The Twilight Zone, when the object of some paranormal event began to take on a life of its own—growing, heartbeat throbbing, spinning in the center of the camera lens…

“I just remembered…” She made a move toward the stack of envelopes.

“Oh no, you don’t,” Della said. She leaned her palms on the table, tenting the envelopes with her body.

Della looked like an angry rottweiler guarding its kibble. Was that a bit of drool at the corner of her mouth? Mattie stifled a hysterical laugh at the thought, then straightened, attempting to gain control of her ping-ponging thoughts.

“I’m sorry. I—I really can’t say—stay…” she stammered. “I have a shipment of books from Ralph Barnes’s estate that I need to go through.”

“Ralph Barnes?” Erica shivered. “He gave me the heebie-jeebies. Always walking around in that silk smoking jacket like Hugh Hefner.”