Dollface: A Novel of the Roaring Twenties by Renée Rosen Page B

closer and closer, until I heard myself gasp and bolted up in bed, still not convinced that I was safe.
    “Huh! What!” Evelyn woke with a start. The outline of her face and shoulders was silhouetted by the streetlamp outside our window.
    “I’m sorry. Go back to sleep.” I was bathed in a cold sweat, and my heart continued to hammer.
    “Another nightmare?”
    “I’m sorry,” I said again. It was the second night in a row that I’d woken her up like that.
    She pulled back her covers and scooted over to the far edge of her mattress. “C’mon,” she said, patting the sheets.
    I grabbed my pillow and climbed in beside her, easing down under the warmth of the blankets. “I’m sorry.”
    “Shhh.” She pulled the covers up over my shoulders. Her hair smelled of lavender from her Little Dot perfume.
    Ever since the fiasco outside the flower shop two days before, I’d been having nightmares—that was if I could sleep at all. During the daytime I was on edge. Loud noises—the door slamming, the radiator clanking—made me jump.
    “You want to talk about it?” she asked, stifling a yawn.
    I sighed and rolled onto my side, facing her. “What’s there to talk about? It’s over with Shep.”
    “You’d better tell him that. He’s been calling here since Sunday.”
    “I know, but I don’t know how to tell him I can’t see him anymore. And I can’t. Not after what happened the other day.”
    “But you’re crazy about him.”
    I swallowed hard. My heart had stopped racing, but now it felt pinched and heavy in my chest. “But he’s really a gangster, Ev.”
    “C’mon, you knew that already.”
    “But I didn’t get it. I didn’t really understand. Yes, I knew he was a gangster but not the kind of gangster who went around shooting people. None of it seemed real to me until his friend shot that guy. My God, they could have killed him. How can you keep seeing Izzy after that?”
    “It’s not like Izzy shot the guy. Neither did Shep, for that matter. Like you said, it was their friend.” She yawned again. “Our guys had nothing to do with it.”
    I flopped onto my back, wishing I could justify it the way she had. My eyes were tearing up. “The funny thing is, I felt safe with Shep. Protected. Now I’m scared of him. I don’t know who he is, what he’s capable of. And to think I finally thought I met someone I really liked. I’ve never known anyone like Shep before. I knew things would never be dull with him, but I wasn’t expecting guns to be going off, you know?” I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. “But still, I miss him. I wish I didn’t, but I really do miss him, Ev.”
    Evelyn didn’t say anything.
    “Ev?”
    I looked over at her, watching the covers rhythmically rise up, then ease back down. She was already asleep again.
    •   •   •
    T he next day, when Izzy telephoned, Evelyn hesitated for a moment or two, but in the end she couldn’t say no to him. And though she wouldn’t admit it, I knew Izzy’s being a real gangster only made her like him more. It was all part of her getting a taste of the world her parents had wanted to shield her from.
    Later that afternoon I was in the front parlor playing a hand of gin rummy with some of the other girls when the telephone rang. Barbara Lewis poked her head inside and said, “Vera, it’s for you. It’s Shep calling.”
    I looked up, and my heart began beating fast. God, how I wanted to hear his voice, know that he was okay, but all I did was shake my head. As hard as it was, I’d made up my mind not to see him again. The stakes were too high, the risks too great.
    “You sure? It’s the second time he’s called for you today.”
    “I’m sure.” I fanned out my cards and then set them facedown. “Do you girls mind if we don’t finish this hand? I’m not feeling too well.”
    I went upstairs, flung myself on my bed and had a good cry, leaving smudges of mascara and eyeliner streaked across my pillowcase. Later that