Page 46 of Iron Hearts

“You’re taking me to get mynailsdone?” I asked.

“Yep. Booked you a mani and a pedi. Off you go, enjoy yourself, I’ll be right here.” He dropped into one of the waiting room’s seats, and a girl came to get me. He told her my name and the appointment time.

She nodded and said, “Ah, yeah, we fix your nails nice.” She enthusiastically took my hand and led me into the salon toward the big deluxe massaging pedicure chairs.

My flabbers wereghasted. I had no idea how to deal with this input of information. No one had ever done anything like this for me except for my mom, back when we’d had the money for such luxuries. We didn’t anymore, except on the rare, rare occasion, and Imissed it. So much.

I didn’t want to seem like an ungrateful brat, and Striker was smiling and watching me go, waving his hands at me in a shooing motion as I reluctantly trailed along after the salon lady.

He waited patiently in the waiting room, scrolling on his phone and laughing occasionally at something he read or watched in a video, and I just observed him.

He was incredibly handsome, and I felt a nervous flight of butterflies take off every time he smiled and that dimple on the one side appeared.

I liked his rings. He wore several large, chunky, silver rings. One looked like a class ring, but I couldn’t tell from here if it was actually a class ring or some kind of military ring. He’d said he’d enlisted right out of high school but never mentioned how long he was in for or if he maybe went to schoolafter… you know? He’d lived almost twice the life I had, but it was hard to remember that, just looking at his face.

He didnotlook like he was in his forties. Thirties,maybe, but not forties.

Honestly, I had no idea what I was even doing here, except it’d been a while since I’d remembered having a friend. I’d had plenty in high school, but after graduation, almost all of them went off to college or to travel abroad. I’d opted to stay home and take a year off. I wanted to work and save some money, take a trip somewhere… then Mom got pregnant, and we weresoexcited… and then… well… we were broken.

I didn’t think there was any real life left after Dad.

I hadn’t felt anythingcloseto being as vibrant as I was before he…died.I used to sayleftbecause I couldn’t bear to even say the word.

I let the women in the nail salon work on my hands and feet and felt a bit of a stirring in my chest. Like there was a glimmer of the old me, just there on the horizon, that I just might be able tocatchwith a lift from Striker on the back of his bike.

Silly, I know… but this?

I looked down at where my nails were being carefully filed. I opted for a French tip on both fingers and toes. Something simple that hopefully wouldn’t chip at the bar. I missed my acrylics, which could withstand just about anything, but affording them was a pipe dream anymore. I just couldn’t fathom dropping fifty bucks or so every other week at a good salon. That was a hundred bucks a month that could go to much better things, like keeping the three growing little monsters in clothes thatfit.

Lord, that was a chore in and of itself! It felt like we had only just bought them shoes, and they were in another size a couple of mere months later.

“You good, baby girl?” I heard from across the empty salon, and I blinked and shook myself as if coming awake. I said, “Oh! Yeah! Just thinking really hard.”

He got up, wandered over in my direction, sat sort of funny in the chair next to mine, and asked, “What about?”

His voice was gentle, soothing, and I flashed back to how he’d used it on the phone with the ex-soldier who was having a hard time.

“You’re a good listener,” I said, and he had a slow smile grace his lips.

It was a knowing one, as he licked his bottom lip and said to me, “Don’t try to change the subject.”

I laughed a little and asked, “Why is this so much easier over text rather than in person?”

“That’s easy. There’s something anonymous about typing into a screen and sending a message out into the ether. You were talking to me, sure, but there’s an almost disconnect about it. Now…” his voice dropped into a lower register that sent a shiver down my spine inallthe right ways. “Don’t change the subject.”

“I was thinking about how much I miss getting my nails done,” I said. “I just can’t justify the cost with the boys, you know?”

“No, yeah, I get that,” he said.

“How did you even know?” I asked, and I couldn’t help the smile curving my own lips.

“The pictures in your bedroom,” he answered.

I cocked my head to the side, curiously and in silent question.

His smile grew, and he raked a hand through his hair, those heavy silver rings sparkling under the harsh overhead lights of the salon.

A skull with a crown, so like their club’s logo. That class-looking ring with the red stone. The Harley Davidson logo, and finally, one that was a round-looking seal with a skull in the middle of it withmementoabove it andmoribelow it.

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