Page 69 of Plum

And my gut roils. Yeah, she could know him. Really fucking well.

“Do you know a woman named Jo-Beth Connolly?”

“Jo-Beth? Sure.”

“How? How do you know her?”

Bile is rising in my throat, and all the shit I don’t think about swells up in a screaming chorus, pounding in my ears, almost drowning out his response.

“She’s a sweetbutt. Hangs around my club. Steel Bones. Mean bitch. Like a Rottweiler. Won’t give you the time of day unless you flash the cash. Whatever, you know? Plenty other gash. Steel Bones is doin’ all right. Ain’t hurtin’ for pussy.”

“So you and she have never—?”

“Nah. Not with that one. I mean, she’s fucked most of the club, but I guess I never happened to get paid the day she needed to pay her bills. I seen her suck dick. Bitch deep throats like a doped-up porn star.” He laughs. “How do you know Jo-Beth?”

“We’re—” I don’t know what to say. I want to puke. This is too real, too much. Fuck. It was easy, in her house in bumfuck, in her full-size bed that hardly fits two. So easy not to think about this. About what she is.

And suddenly, a door flies open. All the shit I hold back when I’m trying to sleep floods my brain. Pictures of Jo-Beth with my brother’s cock in her mouth. Old fights, pummeling my fists into pasty boys who laughed when I didn’t know how to take off my skis. Thomas Wade calling me into his office, a shoebox on his desk, filled with leftovers wrapped in linen napkins, rotten and reeking.

You’re a Wade now. You don’t have to do this anymore. Do you understand, son? This is disgusting.

I’m a Wade?

Absolutely.

Fuck. Is that all I do? See shit with other people’s names on it and delude myself that it’s mine? That because I want it, it belongs to me?

Nothing belongs to me. Not my past. Not my choices. Not Jo-Beth Connolly. She’s not for owning. She’s for rent. I can’t be mad. She’s never suggested otherwise.

Fuck. So many houses of cards blown over today with the breath of a few words.

I raise my hand for the check, and I ask to see the bike again. Ryan Morrison happily passes over his phone.

???

I mean to wait to confront Thomas Wade, but when I return to work, he’s waiting in my office. He’s sitting in one of the Eames lounge chairs in the glass alcove overlooking the river, sipping a bourbon. He gestures for me to take the other seat.

“I didn’t know we had a meeting.” I pour myself a drink before I sit. I see my stepfather’s helped himself to my bar globe. It’s gaudy as hell, a gift from Eric after our first quarter back in the black.

“We don’t. I was here late, and I dropped by. Your girl said you’d be back.”

“Any reason in particular for the visit?”

Thomas Wade eases back in his chair, and slightly raises his eyebrows. It’s a look I recognize from all the times Eric and I were called into his office to account for some scrape or another. When I was younger, I respected how calm he always remained. No matter how Eric blubbered or raged, Thomas was unperturbed.

Now, the expression grates.

“You met with Ryan Morrison.” He’s not asking. I’m not surprised he knows. The secretaries, including “my girl,” are all his hires, from his time. I’m not unaware that they’ll check my inbox for him if he asks.

“I did.”

“You’ve been keeping some other interesting company.”

My jaw clenches. This is not a topic I’m ready to discuss.

At my silence, my stepfather sighs. “I suppose you know that your father made overtures. I declined them on your behalf.”

“Why?” I think I should be angrier about this than I am, but I can’t fathom it, really. How would that man with the warped hands and smoke ravaged voice have fit into my life? Back then, I was enthralled with being a Wade. Had I known Ryan Morrison had reached out, I probably would have refused to see him.

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