CHAPTER TWO
Anger could only last just so long, especially when you walked straight into a moonless, starless, wind-driven rain.
It took Emily less than half a block before reality hit.
What had she done?
Her rent was due Monday. Her half of $1,950 dollars. You could rent a house with a backyard in Wilde’s Crossing for that kind of money. Here, what you got was what Realtors called a cozy apartment with charm and potential, meaning it was a fourth-floor walkup the size of a shoe box.
Yes, but it was her shoe box. She couldn’t afford to lose it.
Her knees went week.
A sob rose in her throat as she reached for a lamppost, wrapped her hand around it and clung to the wet metal for support. How could she have done what she’d just done? Lost her job, especially over something so foolish? She endured far worse things at the Tune-In. Drunks who wanted to warble songs she’d never heard of. Others who figured she was there to be hit on. At least one a night who wanted her to play something that made him sit down and sob.
She’d learned to grit her teeth and survive.
How come she hadn’t managed tonight?
The rain was coming down hard. She was beyond wet already; soon, she’d be soaked to the bone. And her jacket was in the bar’s back room. How could she have forgotten it?
Emily bit back a groan.
The same way she’d forgotten her tip jar and what a laugh to call it that when what she’d left behind was her own hard-earned money.
She had to go back.
But she couldn’t. Pneumonia was a better option. Or hypothermia. Or—or—
A car was coming.
A second’s worth of relief morphed directly into panic. A car turning up at this hour back home would have been good news but this wasn’t back home. It was a long, deserted street in a very tired part of Manhattan.
The car slowed.
Its headlights flashed over her.
“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,” Emily whispered.
It didn’t. A couple of seconds later, it picked up speed and vanished into the night.
Now what?
She had to stay calm. Calm at all costs. She was a Wilde and maybe she didn’t have the Wilde gene for planning and organization and success, but she’d grown up watching her three brother’s deal with adversity.
Surely she’d learned something. Yes, she had. Step one? The staying-calm thing. Step two? Be logical.
The cold rain was relentless. Her teeth began to chatter.
It was too late for logic. Logic would have kept her from doing what she’d done to the drunk. It would have meant retrieving her coat and that damned tip jar before walking out.
The only logic now was the realization that she was going to freeze to death unless she drowned first—or got attacked by a local version of Jack the Ripper.
Hell.
That was the thing about not being much of a planner. You ended up with an imagination that worked overtime. Not good. The point was to concentrate on positive things, and there were some.
She had her purse. There were a few dollars in it. Not many. She never carried much cash when she worked at the Tune-In; the neighborhood was too iffy for that. She did have bus fare.