Driven to Ink

Chapter 13

I twirled around and assessed my situation.

There were two other doors. One not far from the ladies’ room door, and the one that wore the mirror across the room. I went to the closest one and opened it.

The men’s room.

Figures.

How would I explain that I went into the ladies’ room and came out the men’s?

I had to see where the other door led.

But before I could reach it, it swung open by itself. Well, not really by itself-there was a person behind it.

He stepped around the door and his mouth formed a small “O” when he spotted me standing next to the lockers.

“Who are you?” he asked, his eyes skittering to the lockers and then back to me.

He was onto me. I thought quickly. “I came here to get married, but I got cold feet and went into the ladies’ room, and I was trying sneak out so my fiancé wouldn’t find me.” Hey, sounded like a plan.

“Happens all the time,” he said.

Really? Interesting.

I noticed now his resemblance to Dean Martin-and by extension Ray Lucci and Dan Franklin-but it could’ve been the wig and the tux. Maybe this was Franklin.

He looked from me to the lockers again, a frown etched in his forehead. Being nosy wasn’t a crime, although I hoped he didn’t think I’d taken anything.

“This way,” he said, crooking his finger at me so I’d follow.

He didn’t believe my story. Best-case scenario: He’d kick me out and tell me never to come back. I could hear even more banging behind us as we went out into a dark hallway. I heard voices now, Jeff’s and DellaRocco’s.

“It’s my fiancé,” I whispered. Maybe now my story would seem more credible.

“This way,” he repeated, and we moved down the hall and turned a corner.

The light blinded me for a second, and I blinked a few times before I realized we were going out into a back parking lot. He stopped in front of a blue Ford, unlocking it with a key fob and opening the door for me. I hesitated, and he looked at me quizzically.

“Don’t you want to get away?” he asked.

My dad always told me not to get into a car with a stranger. “I don’t even know you.”

“My name’s Will Parker.” He tugged at the wig until it came off, and he tossed it into the backseat. He ran his hand through a mass of dark blond curls, and he unbuttoned the top button of his dress shirt. “I’ll take you wherever you want to go.”

He didn’t look like Dean Martin anymore. He had a rakish look about him, sort of like the high school football quarterback who knew he’d get the head cheerleader in a compromising position at the prom.

I wasn’t quite ready to be compromised, and I had a can of Mace in my bag along with my cell phone.

“I don’t think so,” I said. “I’m sorry, but I hope you understand.” I paused a second before asking, “You probably have a girlfriend or something waiting for you anyway, right?” Might as well try to lighten up the mood-let him think I was more worried about his personal commitments than my own safety.

An expression that I couldn’t read crossed his face, but then he shut the door. He gave me a cautious smile. “Do you have a name, or will the media start calling you the runaway bride?”

“Brett Kavanaugh,” I said without thinking. He hadn’t answered my question.

He cocked his head, indicating the tattoo on my arm, the koi in a sea of blues and greens. “I like your tattoo.” He shrugged off his jacket and shoved the sleeve of his shirt up. A skull with daggers through its eye sockets adorned his arm. It was faded with time, but it wasn’t bad work.

“You should have that touched up,” I said, reaching into my bag and producing a business card.

He studied it a second, then grinned and put it in his pocket. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks.” He paused. “Want me to call you a cab?”

I thought about Jeff Coleman and how he totally would not approve of what I was doing. But did I care?

“That would be nice,” I said, “but I think by the time the cab gets here, my fiancé”-my voice caught on the word in a little cough-“will have found me out here with you.”

And speak of the devil, but didn’t Jeff Coleman bound right out of the door we’d come through. He didn’t look too upset, though, maybe even slightly amused.

“There you are, sweetheart,” he said, his arm snaking around my waist. “What’s going on?” He looked at Will. “Who is this?”

I shrugged him off and stepped back. “Will Parker. He’s one of the-um-performers here. I got locked out.” I hoped he wouldn’t press as to where I was locked out from.

“Thanks for taking care of her,” Jeff said to Will. “I wouldn’t want to lose her.”

I was going to be sick. He didn’t have to lay it on that thick. Especially since the longer I was looking at Will Parker, the longer I thought maybe I would like to take a ride in that car at some point.

“No problem, man,” Will said, nodding, then turned to me with a concerned expression. “Are you going to be okay?” Now that I had a “real” fiancé, he seemed ready to forget about my snooping.

I nodded, although the thought of being engaged to Jeff Coleman still made me woozy.

“She wanted to get married in a church. This is all my fault,” Jeff told Will before giving me a wink Will Parker couldn’t see, then added, “We can go back home and talk about this.”

“Hope to see you again,” Will said, his eyes twinkling as he nodded at me.

I had a sudden urge to tell him to definitely call me. Jeff must have sensed my hesitation because again I felt his hand on my lower back, and he steered me back around to the front of the building. He gave Will a little finger waggle as we went.

“What was that all about?” he asked as we settled into the Pontiac. “Flirting with another man on our wedding day?” he teased.

“I was trying to get some information out of him,” I said, strapping myself in with the seat belt.

“That wasn’t all you were after,” he said.

“You’re not really my fiancé, so what do you care?”

He cocked his head at me and looked at me for a couple of seconds before saying, “You’re right. Why should I care?”

And then he gunned the engine, and the tires screeched as the car slid out of the parking lot.

“So what did you find out from Mr. Studly?” Jeff asked when we stopped at a light. Neither of us had said a word to the other for the last five minutes.

“Nothing,” I admitted, kicking myself that Will Parker now knew far more about me than I knew about him. “But there was this other door that led out from the bathroom into the Dean Martin changing room. There were lockers, and I found Dan Franklin’s wallet. He looks exactly like Ray Lucci. It was a little creepy, but it explains why Lucci might tell people he’s Franklin.”

“Interesting,” Jeff said. “I’m surprised his wallet was in the locker.”

“Why?”

“DellaRocco said he hasn’t seen Franklin in two days.”