Unafraid

My grandpa trained horses his whole life. He had a gift; people say he was the best they’d ever seen.

We used to visit his ranch out in Beachwood Bay every summer. I’d watch in awe as the horses would be led in to that old dirt paddock, their eyes wild, nostrils flaring. They fought the lead, shied away from every touch, damn near killed a couple of ranch hands trying to get away. But Grandpa never quit. It would take him all summer long, working his magic, pacing slowly in that ring, learning what it was that made the horses tick, until by the end of it, even the craziest ones were eating peppermints from the palm of his hand.

The first time I laid eyes on Brittany Ray, I knew this girl was wilder than any stallion I’d ever seen. She was headstrong, wounded, passionate, and free. And I had to have her.

“Some horses will never be tamed,” Grandpa used to tell me. “The only way you get through is to earn their respect. You’ve got to learn what they’re so scared about, because the wildest ones… Well, those are the ones that are the most scared of all.”

I didn’t listen to him, not at first. I was eighteen, I thought I had the world all figured out, and hell, I was so desperate for her, I took any chance I could get. One night together, one brief taste of her beauty. But when morning came, she was gone.

That’s when I realized, one night with her would never be enough.

The world kept spinning after that summer, taking me far from Beachwood, and changing my life in ways too tragic to comprehend. Grandpa’s gone now too, the old ranch is crumbling to disrepair, and some nights, it feels like my time with Brit was just a fever dream. But that’s the thing about dreams: they can keep you going, even through the bleakest nights and the darkest of days. Give you something to believe in, when everything else in your world is guilt and sadness and pain.

She saved me, that girl. She saved me, and she never even knew it.

I always swore to myself, I’d make her more than just a dream. I’d go back to that town, I’d take the time to earn her trust, the way my grandpa taught me, until I know every secret lurking in those beautiful dark eyes, every hope she holds, deep in her soul.

Until she trusts me enough to stay.

My truck cruises round the bend in the road, and I see the sign loom closer, out on the edge of the windy highway as I cross the county line.

Welcome to Beachwood Bay.

I smile, feeling like myself again for the first time in damn too long. Yeah, I’m going to do it right this time.

I’m going to make her mine.

It’s Friday night in Beachwood Bay, which means there’s only one place to go: Jimmy’s. By eight, the bar is already packed, full of tourists and locals all wanting a cheap beer and some loud music to get their weekend started right.

“When are you going to change the name?” I ask Garrett, slamming down another order. He’s behind the bar, pouring beers as fast as he can to keep up. “I’ve had three tourists ask to meet Jimmy, and it’s too much hassle to explain the whole thing.”

“Hey, you don’t mess with history.” Garrett just gives that lazy shrug. He’s dressed in his usual uniform of a plaid shirt, jeans, and two-day stubble; he’s the boss now, so he gets to wear what he wants, while I’m stuck in my black Jimmy’s tank and cutoffs.

I roll my eyes. “Maybe history can move a little quicker,” I suggest, flicking back a sweaty strand of hair, dyed a dark brown this month. “I’m still waiting on those cocktails for the sorority girls in the corner.”

Garrett glances over to the group of girls in skintight cutoffs giggling in the booth. “Nah, you go ahead, I’ve got them.”

“What about Melissa?” I remind him, loading up my tray with waters and cutlery. I look up in time to catch a sheepish look flit across his face.

“Yeah, Melissa said she wouldn’t be in tonight. Or, any other night.” Garrett mumbles.

“No!” I cry, swatting him with my dish-towel. “You can’t keep doing this.”

“Doing what?”

“Screwing all the waitresses.”

“Not all.” He points out, with a grin.

“Eww. That’s disgusting.” I glare. Garrett is like a big brother to me, and with my real brother, Emerson, off in the city, he’s the only family here I’ve got. “I’m serious,” I warn him, “they keep quitting when you break their hearts, and then there’s no one left to help me serve!”

I head out across the bar, cursing the fact that Garrett can’t keep it zipped. At this rate, we’ll be blacklisted by every waitress in the state before fall.

Not that I should care.

The truth is, I’ve been telling myself that helping out at the bar is just a favor. A short-term, stopgap kind of thing until I figure out what I’m going to do with my life. But it’s been a year since I graduated high school, and I’m still here: serving burgers to the folks who wouldn’t look twice at me in the street, like somehow being a waitress is part of the plan, and not just treading water as time slips on by.

“I forgot,” Garrett tells me, when I head on back to the bar after taking another round of orders. “Mail came for you, I left it in the office.”

“Thanks.” I go check it out when there’s a lull in the crowd. The envelope is propped on the messy desk with my name printed in neat black type.

Charleston postmark.

I stop, my heart suddenly clenching in my chest. The letter is slim, weighing next to nothing, and before I can get caught up in wondering whether that’s good news or bad, I rip it open and pull out the single sheet of paper.

Dear Miss Ray,

Thank you for your interest in our company. We regret to inform you…

The words blur with a sudden sting of tears. I angrily swipe them away, crumpling the letter into a ball and hurling it to the ground before I can read another word.

I don’t need to. They’re all the same.

I’ve been secretly applying for internships for months now, sending out my portfolio to every designer and clothing line I can find. I’m not crazy, I know the best I can hope for is a basic assistant gig––fetching coffees and running fabric samples––but that’s just fine with me. Anything to get my foot in the door, and start working my way up to one day designing my own line. But every single application comes back with the same, impersonal letter. Sure, they’re polite, but after reading the first dozen, I got the message written between the lines: you’re not good enough. You don’t have the skills, or the qualifications, or the fancy fashion school credentials to even get a foot in the door.

We don’t want you.

“Bad news?” Garrett’s voice makes me jump. I turn to find him in the doorway, watching me with a concerned look on his face.

I swallow back the sting of disappointment. “It’s nothing,” I tell him.

“You sure?” Garrett’s eyes are soft, “Because—”

“I said, I’m fine!” I snap. “At least, I would be if you could stop being such a broken man-whore and keep a damn waitress in this place!”

I storm past him, but not so fast that I don’t see the flicker of hurt on his face. It’s too late to take it back, so I just add the guilt to the whole mess of emotions I’m carrying, heavy and sharp like a steel knife blade in my gut.

My phone buzzes in my back pocket, and I pull it out, glad for the distraction.

hey sexy. c u later?

It’s from Trey, a guy I’ve been hooking up with these past couple of weeks. We met in a bar a couple of towns over. One drink led to another until we closed out the night in the backseat of his beat-up old Chevy. It’s turned into a regular late night thing, my one good distraction to take my mind off another long night of nothing here at the bar.

And tonight, I sure as hell need distracting.

sure, I text back, and a moment later, his reply flashes up.

already hard 4 u.

Real romantic.

I tuck my phone away with a small grin. Trey and his dirty talk have done the trick; now my latest rejection letter is just another in the stack, one more thing to forget about and move on from.

I take a deep breath, and remind myself: I’m the one in control. All those fancy fashion lines may not want me, but I can get Trey panting with nothing but a wink and a flash of red lace from under my tank top. Out there in the world, I may be nothing, but put me in a room full of guys with one thing on their minds, and they’ll want me.

They’re always going to want me for that.

I sweep aside my disappointment and head back out to the bar, adding a swing to my h*ps and some strut to my stride in my chunky lace-up boots. Garrett gives me another look of concern so I just flash him a fake smile and keep moving, loading up my tray with waters and going to bus some empty tables in back.

You’ve got this, Brit. You’ll be just fine.

I see a new group enter the bar: an older couple, and their daughter, a pretty blonde about my age. I grab a stack of menus, about to go over to welcome them, when the door swings open again.

Trey.

Despite myself, I smile. I guess he couldn’t wait until I finished my shift. He’s dressed up, I notice: a button-down shirt, good jeans, cleanly shaven. The last few times we met, it was a late-night thing: sweaty and disheveled after a long day at work. We both know I’m a sure thing either way, but it’s nice he made the effort for me. Guys never do.

“Hey you,” I call out, but he doesn’t hear me. He doesn’t even look in my direction. Instead, he walks straight over to the far table, and the family who just walked in. He slides in next to the blonde girl and drapes an arm around her shoulder.

I freeze.

The girl smiles up at Trey, and he leans to drop a kiss on her lips. She reaches up to touch his cheek, and that’s when I see it: the ring on her engagement finger, bright and sparkling, and full of betrayal.

My blood runs cold.

Trey still hasn’t seen me. He’s smiling, easy, joking with the girl’s parents. They’re all having a ball of a time, as if ten hours ago he wasn’t grunting in my ear, cursing under his breath as he groped at every inch of flesh on my body.

Funny, he forgot to mention his fiancée.

Rage comes, hot in my veins. I shouldn’t be surprised anymore, how this goes. How it always goes. But after that letter from the design company, this is like a ton of salt dumped on the wound. All my rejection comes boiling up again, sharp and bitter with regret.

I guess I’m only good enough to fuck.

I stalk over there before I have a chance to reconsider. “Hi y’all, welcome to Jimmy’s.” I say flatly. I look to Trey for some kind of reaction: shock maybe, or fear. But instead, he has the nerve to smile at me and wink, like we’re in this together.

“We’ve got some specials here tonight,” I continue, my voice sharp and metallic.

“Sure,” Trey grins, lounging back in the booth. “Let’s hear ‘em.”

I narrow my eyes. Without the tequila blurring my vision – and good judgment – I can see he’s just a beefed up jock with a bad goatee. Jesus, why did I even waste my time on him?

Because there was nothing better to do. The voice in my head answers for me. Because he helped you forget, just for a little while, what a dead-end your life has become.

I push the voice back, and glare at Trey, like I could strip the skin off his bones with just one look.

“Well, first up we’ve got the cheating asshole,” I announce. “It comes with a side of whiskey dick.”

That wipes the smile off his face. Trey scowls at me while the rest of the table blinks in confusion. “Brit—” he warns in a menacing voice, but I’m not done yet.

“Or how about some lying piece of scum?” I continue, “You won’t have to wait long for that. Trust me, it comes real quick.”

“That’s enough!” Trey leaps to his feet, but I step back, quicker.

“Damn right it is.” I spit. “Already hard for you?” I quote his text, fury pumping in my bloodstream. “Funny how you didn’t mention your fiancée.”

I grab a plate of nachos from the next table and upend it all over his head. The mess of cheese and guacamole and beans smears down his face and drips, slowly to the floor.

There’s silence. The rest of the table gasps at me in shock.

“What the fuck?!” Trey finally finds his voice, wiping at the mess on his shirt. “You crazy bitch!”

“What’s she talking about?” The blonde blinks, all innocent confusion.

“It’s nothing, babe,” Trey says quickly. I snort.

“He’s been f**king me for weeks.” I tell her harshly. “And god knows who else. Better get tested, sweetheart. I sure as hell will. Y’all have a nice night.” I add to the girl’s parents, sitting there, shell-shocked.

I stride away, victory surging in my veins. That’ll teach him not to use me like some piece of ass, then go running back to Little Miss Perfect the minute daylight comes. I can hear him now behind me, begging and groveling to them all. “Don’t listen to her, baby,” I hear him plead. “You know what everyone says about her. She’s just a crazy slut. She’s nothing.”

My steps falter. Now that my rage is fading, I realize the whole bar is staring at me. I can see their faces, wide-eyed and scandalized. Then the whispers start, gossiping tones drifting out to me as I hurry across the bar.

“You know those Ray kids… She gets around, for sure… Just like their mama…”

I keep walking, my anger fading to humiliation as reality sinks in. As far as everyone here is concerned, Trey isn’t the one who made a fool of himself just now. No, that was me, lashing out, flying off the handle, causing some huge scene. And for what?