Page 7 of A Wreck, You Make Me (Bad Boys of Bardstown #3)

Chapter One

Present

I’m a Bard’s Muse.

Which is just a fancy name for waitresses at the Bardstown Strip Club. I think it’s to keep things classy and exotic. And in light of that, all the Muses are supposed to wear a short skirt and a tank top—both white—with a sparkly halo on our heads.

While the halo is non-negotiable, the management lets us be creative with the uniform.

As in, short skirts can be uber short skirts.

So uber that your butt cheeks could hang out if you wanted them to.

Instead of a tank top, you could wear a tube top, baring your midriff and your shoulders.

Or a bikini top even. And if there happens to be a little nip slip while serving your drinks, no one is going to blame you. It only helps with the tips.

“Okay, what do you think?” Lively, one of the waitresses, turns around from her locker to face me. “Too much? Too little?” Then, looking down at herself, “Or maybe even less than little?”

I’m sitting on the long bench, between the row of what used to be white lockers—now they just look discolored and even rusted in places—and putting on my lipstick before my shift.

It’s a bright red shade that I think helps with my pale skin and cinnamon freckles.

As in, if you’re blinded by my lipstick, you may not notice my million freckles, but who knows. I’m not an expert at makeup.

I look away from the compact mirror and focus on Lively.

It’s her first day being a Muse. I met her a few months ago at one of the catering events that I do on and off along with my other regular jobs and we immediately hit it off.

When she expressed her desire to pick up more work, I connected her to the manager of this place, George.

But only because I had no other choice. As in, this isn’t the best job in the world.

You get ogled at. You get groped. Men think they get a free pass at you just because you’re serving them drinks.

But it pays well. And from the looks of it, Lively needed money.

I mean, she works multiple jobs like me so it wasn’t hard to guess.

It’s my worst job but it’s also my best paying job, so here she is.

Plus George took one look at Lively’s long blonde tresses and light brown eyes and declared her muse material. Just as I knew he would.

And dare I say, she’s taking to it better than I ever did.

Her skirt is short and frilly but not so short that you can see glimpses of her butt cheeks.

Her tank top is a cami with lace work around the shoulders and spaghetti straps that curiously keep falling down her arms, baring the slopes of her breasts.

It’s not the most revealing outfit I’ve seen, but I think it will work.

I nod. “This is great.”

“Yeah?” She pats her skirt, looking down at herself. “You don’t think I should show more skin?”

“Nope. Just let that strap do all the work and you could be making your next month’s rent by the end of this week.”

She beams. “Yay.” Then, getting serious, “Have I thanked you today?”

I chuckle, going back to my lipstick. “You have, and like I said before, no need to thank me for it. Because that’s what friends do.”

“Not my friends,” she mumbles.

I don’t know what her story is but I know she’s new in town and that she needs the cash. She’s pretty reserved that way, and since I have a few deep dark secrets of my own, I can relate to her desire for privacy.

Once ready, Lively leaves for the floor while I hang back to call my sister like I always do. She picks up on the first ring and says, “I’m in bed. Reading. But don’t worry, I’ll go to sleep before midnight like some kind of boring Cinderella.”

I smile at her sassy tone but still decree, “You’ll go to sleep before eleven.”

“Ugh, come on,” she whines. “This book is good. If I power through, I can finish it tonight.”

“Power through tomorrow.”

“But—”

“No, hon,” I say in a gentle tone. “You know the rules. Lights out by eleven.”

She sighs. “I hate when you get all responsible and big sister-y.”

“I am your big sister,” I retort.

“Yeah, but you’re the fun sister,” she reminds me. “Not this rule-following disciplinarian who’s allergic to putting even a single toe out of line.”

“Well, I’m the rule-following disciplinarian only because I’m afraid, remember?” I tell her, my fingers clutching the phone tightly. “Once I recover from the biggest scare of my life, you can go back to being all rebellious and staying up all night reading. Until then, indulge me, okay?”

Snow is silent for a few seconds before saying, her tone even gentler than mine, “Nothing is going to happen to me.”

A big ball of emotions gets stuck in my throat, and I croak, “And I’m going to make sure of that.”

“I’m fine, Juju,” she says, using her childhood nickname for me. “The doctor said I’m recovering nicely.”

My eyes sting and I blink a few times to get things under control. “He also said what happened to you was extremely rare, so I’m not taking any chances.”

No, I’m fucking not.

Not with my sister. Not with her health, her life . Her heart . Which is what’s at stake right now. Apparently it’s been at stake ever since she was born, but we only found out about it last year.

Ebstein’s anomaly. That’s what they called it when Snow fainted in class last year and was brought to the emergency room.

They said her heart wasn’t beating right.

That she had arrhythmia and she needed further testing, which showed that she had a defect in her tricuspid valve.

They said it was congenital, that she’d had it since birth. It was only presenting itself now.

As scary as that was—and believe me, it was plenty scary—the scarier part was when they said she was going to need a new heart. That simply repairing the damaged part wasn’t enough, because it was associated with other abnormalities, and a transplant was a long-term solution.

Imagine hearing that about your little sister.

The one you’ve been trying to protect ever since you realized that monsters may be real.

Only the monster that came to get her was inside her own body.

I would’ve given her my own heart if they’d let me.

But we were lucky enough to be put high up on the transplant list and managed to get a heart after only a few months of waiting.

“Fine,” Snow gives in. “Lights out by eleven.”

I breathe out with relief. “Thank you. And don’t forget your meds. I put them out for you on your nightstand.”

“Yup. Saw them and took them. Every single one.”

“Even the big red one?” I ask.

I can imagine her wrinkling her nose, because she hates that pill, as she replies, “Yes, even the big red one.”

“Good.” Then, I move on to the other important part. “I also put some brochures on the nightstand right next to the pills.”

This time, a sigh is her only response.

“Just take a look at them,” I insist. “For me. Please?”

Another sigh, this one sharper. “You’re the reason I don’t want to look at them.”

My heart clenches. “Snow, I told you. I’ll be fine. In fact, I’ll be happy you’re out of here. I’ll visit you.”

“I don’t want you to visit me,” Snow says. “I want to live with you.”

I know she does. I want to live with her too.

I’ve always wanted that. I’ve also always wanted to get her away from Jeremy.

And since my mother wouldn’t leave him, from her too.

Which is why as soon as I could, I moved out myself.

I got a job, multiple jobs, got an apartment, and then moved her out.

Of course, it wasn’t easy. While my mother was happy that I no longer lived with them, she didn’t want to lose Snow.

Snow has always been my mom’s favorite, the daughter she loves more than me.

Plus Snow was a minor—still is; she’s only seventeen—so she did everything she could to stop Snow from moving out.

But then my sister fainted at school, and we found out about her heart.

As much as my mother claimed to love Snow, she didn’t want to be the one to take care of her.

So she let my sister go. And I did whatever I had to—extra shifts, taking out loans, begging and pleading to extend those loans—to take care of her.

But I did all that so Snow could get out of here, out of Bardstown. I did it so she could go to college, build a life for herself. A life that’s about more than just survival. Because my own has always been about that.

Just surviving.

“Snow,” I say. “Please, okay? For me. Just look at them.”

“College is expensive,” she argues like she always does. “And I see the huge stack of bills on your desk.”

It stings that my sister knows about this.

About the state of our finances, about overdue bills and the medical debt.

It makes me feel like I failed as a big sister.

The fact that I couldn’t shield her from the truth.

But I’ll figure out a way to send her to college.

I will. There are loans, right? I’ll take out loans.

I’ll somehow get the money but I’m not giving up and I don’t want her to either.

I go to retort when she continues, “And I thought of something.”

“What?”

“I’ll think of going to college when you think of going to college yourself,” she says triumphantly.

“What?”

“Yeah, why should I be the only one to go to college? You should go too.”

“Because you’re the smart one. Plus, you like books.”

“You like dancing.”

“So?”

“They have dance schools.”

Yes, they do. And maybe, a long, long time ago, I may have looked into them.

When things would feel really hard at home, when my mother’s hatred toward me would bug me more than usual, I’d dream about running away to a dance school and never coming back.

But those were just dreams. I can’t really go to a dance school.

I wouldn’t even know how to get into one.

Not to mention I hardly have the money to send my sister to college, let alone myself.