Well, if Miss Clemons thinks that grease streak is going to make me feel guilty, she’s got another think coming. That’s what I tell myself. But when I notice she’s transferring oil to her other hand, too, thanks to her having folded them like a damn Sunday school teacher, I stomp toward the bathroom to hunt up a washcloth.
This isn’t going to work.
Even if she turns out to be a match for Birdie’s temperament, this blue-eyed Southern belle can’t have the run of my house. Coming and going as she pleases looking like…that. Maybe I should have dug down a little deeper into the links she sent me. I gathered a pageant winner would be attractive, but I didn’t expect her. She’s not merely attractive. With her glowing skin, soft, swollen mouth and limber-looking body, she’s insanely beautiful. How is it that she doesn’t have a single imperfection? This house is a fucking mess, due to my profession and lack of shits to give. She fits in here like a square peg in a circle.
In other words, she doesn’t.
My time in St. Augustine is limited. The Army gave me an extended leave due to our family emergency, but it’s quickly coming to an end. I don’t want distractions. I want to keep my head down, push through the next few months to my next deployment and go wheels up. A few minutes around Miss Clemons and I can tell it won’t be as easy to switch off my surroundings and go through the motions until I can get back to serving my purpose.
Yeah. She’s got to go.
I throw open the bathroom linen closet and grab the first washcloth I see. It would be too rough against skin like she’s got, though, so I trade it for one relatively newer. As in, purchased in the last decade. I pinch it in the corner, so I don’t get my boat filth all over it, and return to the living room, wondering why the hell she was changing in her car.
“Why the hell were you changing in your car?”
Birdie slaps her hands over her face. “God help us.”
Naomi stalls out mid-sentence, gaping at me and the dangling washcloth. “Did you actually…see me changing?”
“Relax. I didn’t catch anything important.” I toss her the cloth, but she doesn’t even acknowledge it when it lands on the couch. “Just enough movement to know what you were doing.”
A laugh tinkles out of her. “I think you must be mistaken, then.”
I sigh and nudge the washcloth closer. “I don’t make mistakes.”
She flicks a look at the washcloth. “What am I supposed to do with that?”
“Clean your hands off with it.”
“Oh.” She smiles and tilts her head at me. “No, thank you.”
I growl.
Birdie throws her booted feet up on the coffee table, crossing them at the ankles. “Now this is what I call entertainment.”
Naomi dismisses me with a blink of those blue eyes and refocuses on my sister. “Where were we?” She claps her soiled hands together, and I grind my teeth. She’s doing this on purpose, isn’t she? “Right. You were telling me about the pageant you entered.”
“Yeah.” The same booted feet she slapped up onto the table with confidence a moment ago jerk and Birdie sits up straighter. She twines a finger in the rubber band around her wrist, twisting, letting it go with a snap. Day and night. That’s my sister. One minute, she’s the planet’s biggest wiseass, but she can look so small and nervous at the flip of a switch. I hate it. But God didn’t exactly bless me with the tools to fix it. “Miss Saint John’s County. It’s my first and last. I just need you to help me win the one.”
“Oh, just the one?” Naomi has a teasing smile on her face—she never seems to stop smiling—but she’s watching Birdie fidget with the rubber band, a small crease between her brows. “Forgive me for asking such a frank question upfront, sweetheart, but what made you want to participate in one single pageant?” She sends me a bemused look. “Most of these girls will have been competing since childhood.”
“Yeah, I know. I go to school with some of them.” My sister rolls her eyes and plows a handful of fingers through her shock of blue hair. “Pastel hell in heels.”
“You’re going to love my wardrobe,” Naomi says without missing a beat. “So entering the pageant is to get a rise out of the…pastel hell girls?”
“No. That’s just a bonus.” Naomi waits, and I watch the remainder of Birdie’s bravado drain out of her in one awful wave, leaving a pale face behind. “My twin sister Natalie wanted to compete in this pageant. She used to go sit in the audience and support her friends. With all the plays she performed in at school and baton-twirling…she just hadn’t gotten around to the pageant yet.” Her chin levels up. “And now she can’t, so I’m going to do it in her place.”