Page 93 of The Auction
“Can’t do anything about it tonight. Let’s go.”
We haddinner at Ruby’s. I had the meatloaf special and Creed stuck to a burger. The food was great, but even better, it was nice not to have to cook for a change. Then we walked over to Pete’s and grabbed a two top table in the back.
There were some looks as we walked through the bar together. For sure.
Creed was still the new guy in town and most folks had all kinds of thoughts about me because Herb had kept me so secluded. But I just had this sense that some around the bar, the old timers, might have been staring at Creed a bit too hard. Some with judgement in their expressions. Some just with curiosity.
It’s not like seeing a Native American around town was something unique. The Cree res was only a couple hundred miles south.
“Those guys are checking you out,” I said, nodding in their direction with my chin.
“Not interested. I’m out with my wife.”
“Ha. Did they see you pick up Angie? They might think you’re a two-timer.”
He shook his head. “Didn’t come here. Drove out to the Sunset Hotel on Route 8.”
“The Sunset? That place is a dive. Was Angie a…a…” I stuttered over where my brain was going.
“I believe the word you’re searching for is prostitute, and no. She was there with a friend. They were on a cross country trip and the Sunset isn’t a dive. It’s got a nice hotel bar.”
Fun fact, I had no idea what the Sunset Hotel was like because I’d never been there. I’d only ever heard Herb talk about it. Like he did every other place that wasn’t church. Filled with sin.
Then a thought occurred to me. “If you were at a hotel, why didn’t you just get a room there?”
He took a long sip of the beer he’d ordered at the bar and let me come to my own conclusion.
“You never had any intention of fucking her. You just wanted to get back at me.”
“I am not above revenge,” Creed said bluntly. “I’m not above much come to think about it.”
I’d gone with a glass of wine tonight because beer had been too fizzy for me. The white wine was cold and flat and didn’t make me want to puke like the taste of whiskey Creed had let me try from the one glass he’d ordered.
One whiskey, one beer. But that was it. It had been champagne for my birthday but nothing else. And while he did keep a bottle of whisky in the house somewhere, (I knew this because he’d offered Angie a drink), he didn’t imbibe on a regular basis.
I wondered if that was because of Tank. Or other guys he’d known in the military who hadn’t been able to make the transition out of it. Like if he started drinking his thoughts away, he might not stop.
“Can I ask a question?”
He lifted his beer bottle then set it down. “Sure.”
“Do you have that PTSD?”
“ThatPTSD?” he said with a smirk.
“You know what I mean. I know what I mean. I was the one you pulled out of the bed in the middle of the night, letting me know you were going to kill anyone who came for what was yours. But it hasn’t really happened since. And if I make sure to let you know when I’m waking up, you don’t get all jumpy in bed anymore. So maybe you had it and it’s gone?”
He leaned back against the chair. “Do you do that? Is that why you do that stretchy thing with your arms every morning?”
I showed him how I lift my arms up, nice and slow, over my head and then down.
He glanced around the bar like it held the answers. “I saw some shit. I can’t say that some if it won’t always be inmy head. But I feel like…I don’t know, things have been calmer since I got here.”
“Farm life will do that to you,” I said. “Nothing to do but watch the plants grow.”
“Getting laid helps, too,” he laughed, nudging my calf under the table with his boot.
I rolled my eyes like I was offended. “I wouldn’t know, that hasn’t happened in days.”
