The Jewel Box by C Michelle McCarty Page A

tips.
    “You gonna give me a piece of ass, if I do?” he asked in exaggerated Texas drawl.
    “Pleeease stop spouting that stupid line. You need shock therapy or something.”
    “I’ll bet shock therapy couldn’t be as electrifying as a piece of ass from you.” He slapped a five dollar tip on my tray.
    Okay. The tip momentarily numbed my tongue. But not my desire to beat him at his little game of verbal insolence. “Maybe a cattle prod would get my point across.”
    “Whoa, a cattle prod. I grew up on a farm and. . .”
    “So did Robert Burns. But you’re hardly poetic. In fact, I think you’re the sort of man who gets excited by a cattle prod and aroused by livestock.”
    “Nice return, Blondie.”
    “Blondie?”
    “Yeaaah, you remind me of that ditzy Goldie chick on
Laugh In
.”
    “Ditzy? Well, you remind me of something my dad once coughed up during a nasty illness.” I grabbed my tip tray and walked away.
    “Hey, I think Goldie’s cute and just pretends to be ditzy,” he shouted as my white go-go boots kept walking. “And maybe I’m the one who needs that Dale Carnegie course.”
    I relayed mine and Gabe’s encounter to Beau while placing my drink order. Only semi-amused, he took on a stern, fatherly look. “Baby.” He turned his head to hide a little grin, “That phlegm bit wasn’t exactly ladylike verbiage.”
    From day one, I sensed Beau was trying to pull a Professor Higgins on me, but I wasn’t a quick study like Eliza Doolittle. “Well pardon me.” I fluttered my eyelashes Katie-Laura fashion, “I didn’t realize your rules for ‘ladylike verbiage’ were written in Sanskrit. But I’ll bet Gabe thinks twice before he spouts off to me again.”
    “Maybe, maybe not.” Beau shook his head as though talking to me somewhat hopeless. “And you’re one to talk about spouting off. Stop wasting time and losing money by debating customers. Hell, you’re longer winded than Pentecostal preachers speaking in tongues.”
    I attempted a Pentecostal chant before grabbing my drink tray to head back into the crowd. I adored Beau, but didn’t think my recurringrepartee with Gabe a waste of time, and actually enjoyed the challenging diversion, which established an understanding of sorts between the so-called “arrogant asshole” and me. Even though Gabe usually reigned triumphant, I suspected his public performance failed to correspond with the man inside.

5
    The day after I spent three thousand bucks on a used Chevy Nova, Wesley called the Jewel Box threatening me in one breath while begging me to reunite in another. Making foolish mistakes was customary for me, but having the crap beat out of me wasn’t. When the psycho said he was on his way to Houston, I slammed the phone in his ear and told Beau I had to quit.
    “I’ve got a plan,” my surrogate father said. “Angel’s pregnant and swelling up like a dirigible. Instead of dancing I’ll have her wait tables until she moves back to Maine. Meanwhile, you lay low.”
    “But. . .”
    “No buts. Just lease an apartment for you and Nikki, stay away from your usual hangouts including the club, Kat, and Ellen’s house for a couple of weeks.”
    I sighed. Buying the Nova left me with less than two hundred bucks.
    “Here, baby.” Beau handed me a thousand dollars to prepay rent, buy a bed, and other necessities. “You can pay me back a little each night.”
    “You burn cool.” I kissed his cheek.
    “Paying several months rent in advance should placate managers enough to let you lease under an alias without questions.”
    “And temporary vanishing will hopefully make Wesley vanish forever.”
    “Just choose a simple name like Bertha Smith or Carol Wood.”
    The look on Beau’s face was so sincere, I respectfully opted for Carol. “Good Lord, Beau. Bertha?”
    He chuckled. The Jewel Box was Beau’s first venture in the topless business, although he had owned various clubs in Dallas and Houston aftermoving to Texas from Nevada,