Page 6 of Wicked Pickle

That can’t be up to code for a bar this size. Maybe there’s another one somewhere else.

I slam the door and slide a hook into a metal loop. That doesn’t seem secure.

But my bladder has sensed the proximity to relief and is ready to blow. I have to get out of this contraption holding me together.

I shimmy the red dress up my hips, revealing the long expanse of white. There’s no zipper or snaps. I’m held in by the power of microfibers and my sheer will when I dragged this size-small torture device over a size-large body.

I manage to get my thumbs under my bra and into the top elastic.

But as soon as the band realizes it’s got somewhere else to go, it rolls into the tightest coil I’ve ever felt around my waist.

I shove my thumbs inside to move it down. I push. I grunt. I tug. I sweat.

But the spandex vise is stronger than me. I shove my entire hand in there, hoping to get it to budge.

Then I can’t get it out. I’m stuck in the elastic up to my elbow.

Holy hell.

I’m trapped.

CHAPTER 2

DIESEL

The line outside the bathroom is growing.

Most of the men step outside to take a piss in the wind. But the ladies are getting antsy.

I call over Vicki, the lone female member of my staff. She’s the mother of three bikers, tough as hell, and handles our clientele better than we do. When she actually does her job. And that’s not often. She prefers to fraternize.

“Vicki, can you check on the women’s bathroom?” I ask her.

Vicki stares over the angry mob that’s forming, her red lips clashing with her orange hair. “I’d rather chop the head off a chicken.” She pulls a cigarette out of the pack in her apron pocket and sticks it in her mouth. “I’m going on break.”

Yeah, I should have seen that coming.

I guess it’s on me.

I wander to the end of the bar to get a bead on the situation.

Carla calls out, “Diesel, you gonna get another bathroom in this dump, or are we gonna riot?”

“It’s in the works,” I yell back. Getting a building permit in this Godforsaken county in the middle of nowhere, Florida, is harder than wrangling a hungry alligator.

I’ll take the ‘gator over the permit department. I’ve already bribed them twice.

Them and the cops to avoid them parking by the road on either side of my bar to bust anybody who’s had more than two beers. Which is everybody.

Nobody gives a damn what I pay out to keep this place alive.

I leap over the bar to check out the bathroom door. I know damn well who’s in there. Symphony, part of that bachelorette party.

The other three friends keep looking this way, like they’re anxious she’s sick. The one getting married already asked if there was any way in.

There’s no lock, just a hook and wire situation.

I should have taken care of that by now. God knows I’ve had my share of women holing up in there, sick or crying or dragging some worthless sack of bones in there for a dry hump.

---