Now & Forever 3 - Blind love Read Online Free PDF Page A

Rex saw an empty table close to the stage.
    “Let’s get a drink here and then have dinner somewhere else.
The food here probably sucks,” Rex suggested.
    Alan agreed. After they ordered drinks, the music started up
again and the girls, who had been on break, came out and began to dance
topless.
    Rex watched as a brunette and a redhead gyrated. He couldn’t
decide which to approach, so he made eye contact with both. The redhead looked
bored and spying Rex staring at her didn’t do much to change her attitude. But the
brunette smiled back at him. He looked her over carefully and liked what he
saw. She would be perfect, if she were cooperative. He’d come back after
dinner, when he could ditch the stiff, Alan. Then he could move in on her.
     
    * * * *
     
    Across town in the hospital, Jay was restless.
    “We should’ve had children. Now you’re going to be completely
alone.”
    “Hush. It’s fine, Jay.”
    Marcia tried to listen and be sympathetic to his feelings,
but her emotional reserve was stretched to the breaking point. Her nerves were
raw; she hung on to sanity by a thread sometimes, waiting for her beloved Jay
to die.
    On this beautiful day in May, she got home to the frame house
with brown shutters and cream shingles at about six in the evening. The front
door was unlocked. She entered cautiously, ready to dial 911 on her cell phone
when she saw him. A tall, strange man was in the kitchen, fixing the sink. She
jumped, fear in her eyes.
    “No, no, so sorry, sorry,” he said in broken English, raising
his hands, smiling and shaking his head. “I fix sink. Johnny’s father, Jakub.”
    Marcia exhaled a big sigh of relief. The sink had needed
fixing for a week at least. Jakub looked to be about fifty years old. He was
about six feet and broad-chested, wearing a blue work shirt and jeans. His
shirtsleeves were rolled up to reveal large, firm forearms. His short hair was
a warm brown, going to gray. His face, weathered by time and the elements, had even,
handsome features including warm brown eyes. Marcia determined he was no
threat.
    She poured herself a strong vodka and tonic, looked through
the mail and switched the television on to the ballgame with barely a nod to
Jakub.
    Jakub worked for another fifteen minutes, then put everything
back together. On his way out, he looked at the television and asked, “Yankees?”
    “Mets,” she replied and managed a small smile.
    “Finish tomorrow. Goodnight.”
    Marcia made another strong drink, ate some cheese and
crackers then climbed up the steep stairs to the bedroom, took her clothes off,
fell into bed and passed out.
     
    * * * *
     
    At midnight The Wet Tee Shirt was still rocking. Rex walked
in after dropping his cousin at home. The place was dark. There was canned
music and two busty women were pole dancing topless. Men were drinking,
talking, and ogling the dancers.
    Rex sat down near the stage and ordered a beer. Being in the
mood for sex, he watched the women with interest. At The Hideaway in Harlem
where he worked for eight years as a bouncer, he only dated waitresses and
kitchen help. He rarely had time to connect with other women because he worked
six nights a week. He managed to score enough sex to stay reasonably satisfied,
but Rex had never been in love. He was thirty-five years old, lucky in
blackmail, unlucky in love.
    “Wadda ya have?”
    Rex looked up to see a topless waitress there to take his
order. His gaze slid down her body like a snake, openly evaluating her breasts
and hips. She stifled a yawn.
    “Scotch neat. You dance too?”
    “Sometimes. Not my night tonight. Be right back.”
    Rex had a lonely childhood. He’d missed having a father and
had gotten angry at being pushed around by his sisters. He put a stop to it
when he was fifteen by knocking his oldest sister, Hazel, onto the kitchen
floor once. They left him alone after that.
    The waitress returned and put his drink on top of a small,
square paper napkin.
    “What’s your