Page 16 of Misadventures And Ms. Demeanor
We got in line to pay for our drinks. "New friends?" The deep timbre of JT's voice made my nipples harden. I didn't even have to see him to get all hot and bothered. I wouldn't mind writing something aroundhisbelly button. Just because he was a jerk didn't mean it wouldn't be fun.
"Mmm," I replied noncommittally.
"Or are they fans? Guys who aren't just imagining what you look like beneath your clothes, butknow?"
I spun around, ready to tell him I wasnotSilky Tangles for the umpteenth time. But when his face was right there, his dark eyes so piercing that he could practically hypnotize a woman out of her panties, I decided against it. It was the cocky grin that had me changing tactics.
I shrugged casually, moved a step forward in line. "It's important to me that I'm available to my fans."
"Available?" He took a sip of his coffee and eyed me over the brim.
"This is a truck stop, the perfect place to build my fan base." I sighed. "Besides, it's great men recognize me even without my hair styled and the fake eyelashes. Don't forget the clothes. They even recognize meinclothes. Just like you did before the whole taser thing."
One of his eyebrows went up, the little scar shifting into the shape of a comma. His coffee was forgotten, but he still held it up by his mouth. "So, you're saying?—"
"Give me your drink, Daphne," Goldie told me, interrupting us. "Go get Zach away from that barrel of beef jerky. If he eats any of it, he'll have diarrhea for a week, especially the jalapeño flavor."
I grinned at the surprised look on JT's face and put a little extra shift in my hips on my way over to the jerky barrel, although yoga pants and an old t-shirt weren't that alluring.
We made it to Billings in a record setting pace of four hours. It was the slowest trip ever made by a motorized vehicle when the roads were dry. Lewis and Clark had made it by boat faster back in the day. Besides the break at the first truck stop outside Livingston, we hit the next one as well because everyone drank too much of their beverages. Goldie's ban on the RV's bathroom made for very slow going. There were four men waiting at the next Trekker for me, or Silky Tangles, so I signed autographs then beelined for the safety of the empty ladies' room. How the men knew I was going to be there had me stumped until they mentioned something about Facebook.
Zach was met by his friend and his friend’s mother in the parking lot of a McDonalds off the highway. After a quick romp in the Playland, they were on their way. The remainder of us waited for Esther Millhouse. Aunt Velma was napping in the back bedroom, her snoring cutting through the quiet like a buzz saw in the springtime. Goldie read from her e-reader in the driver's seat, her rhinestone encrusted eyeglass holder that ranaround her neck sparkling in the sunlight. JT paced outside the RV on his cell as he took a sip from another cup of coffee. If I'd drank as much caffeine as he had, I'd be up for a week. I was stuck at the miniscule dinette with my laptop trying to eke out the beginnings of a road trip article. So far, the topic was Truck Stops of the West, but it was early enough in the trip to be hopeful for more.
We were so far behind I didn't know if Esther was late or we'd missed her and she'd given up. I glanced at my watch with a sigh. Four o'clock. At the rate we were going, we wouldn't be to Sturgis until the middle of the night. Just when I was about to close up the lid on my computer and take a nap myself, a horn blared to the tune ofDixie. Montana was definitely a red state and folks leaned toward the conservative, but I didn't consider it a part of the South. We weren't remotely near the Mason-Dixon line, and it was more about cowboys and Indians out here than the North and South.
"There she is!" Aunt Velma called out. She ducked her head to fit through the small bedroom doorway, her red hair matted flat on one side.
I pulled down a slat in the metal shade on the window behind me. Nothing stood out of the ordinary until a woman who was about five foot nothing, had blinding white hair and wore a purple velour track suit climbed out of a late model Taurus. That car had the Dixie horn?
She angled her head back into the car and made the toot-the-horn arm motion and the horn blared again. She laughed and slapped her knee at the repeated sound. Yes, that was the car. Everyone in the parking lot turned her way and had mouths hanging open, staring. The trunk popped and she went to the back, grabbed an avocado green hard-sided suitcase, circa 1975, and set it down. Reaching back in, she pulled out a large cardboard box that, from my elevated angle, I could see wasfilled with liquor bottles. She placed this on the ground next. Lastly, she lifted out a huge watermelon. Oh man, this was going to be a serious road trip.
This was not a woman to underestimate. She had to be strong as an ox to lug a watermelon of that size when she probably weighed ninety pounds soaking wet. I had no doubt she could drink any one of us under the table based on her trip supplies. This woman had been a Roller Doll? She marched right over to JT, who stood on the curb, phone to his ear and mouth on the ground and handed him the watermelon. He fumbled with his coffee, his phone and the large fruit, completely stunned. When Esther turned back to the Dixie car, JT was mumbling to himself. It was probably a good thing I wasn't a lip reader.
Aunt Velma and Goldie piled out of the RV and I followed, albeit a little less enthusiastically.
"Only you, Goldie West, would drive an RV that looks like a giant silver dildo," Esther Millhouse commented, hands on hips and shaking her head.
JT spewed coffee in a three-foot radius, then muttered something I could definitely understand without having to read his lips.
"Put that watermelon inside for me, young man," Esther dictated. Probably knowing he couldn't just hand the thing back to the woman without appearing rude, he just did as he was told. He gave me a look that screamedwhat the fuck?
"Daphne, come meet Esther." I didn't have a choice but to join my aunt and meet the woman since she was going to be spending the next few days with us.
"Hello, Esther." I shook her tiny hand and tried not to cry out when she gave me a death grip squeeze.
"I've heard all about you," she replied. "This is going to be great. I love a good trip with the girls, and that man, hoo wee.Have any of you claimed him yet, because it's been a long time since I've had myself a man like that."
Out of the corner of my eye, I’d seen JT step out of the RV, but at the woman's words, he backpedaled right back inside. Perhaps he was afraid he was going to get his ass pinched. I tried not to grin.
"I've already claimed my man, Esther. You were at the wedding forty years ago," Goldie said.
Esther sniffed. "How about you, Velma?"
"Carl's all the man I need right now, Esther." Based on the way they humped like rabbits, I couldn't imagine her having enough strength for another.
"Hmm, it's just you and me, kid," she eyed me like a boxer across a ring. "So, who is that beefcake?"
"JT, stop hiding and come out here," Aunt Velma called.