Shooter (Burnout) (2 page)

She'd swapped her canvas shoes for black boots with a rounded toe and only a slight, chunky heel, enough to be slightly feminine but wouldn't interfere with being on her feet for long stretches of time. They were the only boots she owned and though they were scuffed from years of wear, they were serious boots. They hadn't been cheap, and were made to last for far longer than she'd already had them.

She'd put on her blue, fitted, long sleeve knit shirt, now a little warm for the pleasant afternoon. That was alright though. Perfect actually, for her purposes, as she tugged one of the cuffs down to her wrist. The blond didn't miss the movement with her shrewd eyes and the girl tried not to smile. She strode forward and dropped her duffel on the floor with a resounding thump. The patrons turned on their stools and imitated the blonde's perusal. The girl ignored them, keeping her eyes on her mark. The blond simply waited.

"You're looking for a waitress," the girl said matter-of-factly.

"That's about right," the blond finally said, shaking her shoulder length hair. Apparently she wasn't immediately turned off by the sight in front of her because she motioned to the girl's bag. "Grab your gear and let's talk in the office."

The blond shouted for someone named Tommy, and within moments a tall, lanky middle aged man with a slight beard and big paunch came sauntering through the swinging doors. "Take over for a few, will ya?" the blond asked. "Got an interview."

Tommy got in his once-over and then nodded to the blond.

The office was small, but well maintained. No mountains of paperwork leaning precariously, no trash littered about. Only one desk and two chairs though, indicating that this woman was
the
person in charge unless she shared the desk with someone and the girl said a silent thank you.

There were dozens of framed pictures on the wall of people, bikes, people on bikes, people standing next to bikes. And a large, flatly secured Harley Davidson flag mounted to the wall behind the desk.

"What's your name?" the blond asked, taking a seat in the more expensive, more well padded chair.

The young woman dropped her bag again and took the other chair. "Hayley," she announced.

"I'm Maria. Where you from, Hayley?"

"Hayley" took approximately 2.5 seconds to size up her mark. This office was no nonsense. Ordered, clean, and neat. The woman before her might like her hair silky and bleached and her nails long and manicured, but she was somewhere around forty or forty five and while she didn't exactly look like the rode-hard-and-put-away-wet-too-many-times type, she definitely wasn't going to be one for sob stories. She just wasn't the motherly type. Or at least not like "Hayley's" mother, at any rate.

"Just got off the bus from Denver," Hayley replied.

"Hmm. What'd you do in Denver?"

"Just recently I was a waitress. In a diner downtown. I can give you the number. They'll give me a good reference. But you'd probably rather have the number of the Bar Kay, also in Denver. I went by Crystal there, though. That's my middle name. Hayley Crystal."

"Hmm," Maria said again.

Hayley squared her shoulders. "I don't have ID," Hayley admitted, better to just get that out of the way. "Left it in Denver."

"Left it in Denver," Maria repeated. "Social security card?"

"Left that, too."

"Well,
Hayley
," the older woman said, emphasizing that she in no way believed that was the younger woman's Christian name. "What
do
you have?"

"A good pair of boots for being on my feet all day and a really reliable alarm clock."
An alarm clock known as insomnia.

Maria considered this. "Just got off the bus. Means you don't have a vehicle."

"No, Ma'am, but like I said, I've got a good pair of boots. And they were made for walking."

Maria grinned in spite of herself. "And if I gave you a drug test?"

"I could pass it right now. Or
any time
you feel like giving me one."

Maria lifted an eyebrow. "Mind showing me your arms?"

Hayley faltered. Or at least pretended to. Maria raised that eyebrow even higher. Finally, slowly, Hayley lifted her arms and yanked up her sleeves revealing deep bruises that were clearly a few days old and already fading. "I'm not a charity case," Hayley said indignantly. "I'll work."

"Well, I don't hire slackers," Maria supplied. "Didn't hit you in the face, though," she observed. "Which means you can start tomorrow. I can only put you on days for now," Maria informed Hayley. "Other girls got priority."

Hayley nodded, "That's fine." And truly it was. Walking home in the dark wasn't high on her list of relished activities and she suspected that in Rapid City, like in most smaller towns, the buses stopped working after dark. If she worked nights, she’d have to take a cab home and that would take a chunk out of her nightly earnings.

Hayley had watched her spending for years, carefully monitoring expenses, and choosing only the cheapest places to live that were still considered relatively safe. She had some savings, though not in any bank, of course. But money wouldn't last forever and the only way she could be absolutely assured to stay ahead of disaster was to keep working, even if it was days in a bar which would be slow as hell.

"Days are pretty quiet," Maria told her. "Nights, when you get to 'em, can be rowdy."

Hayley nodded sagely. "I can handle rowdy."

Maria glanced down at the girl's arms. "I bet." She met Hayley's eyes again. "You keep your own bank and cash out at the end of your shift. If your receipts don't match your totals, you pay out of pocket. Happens three times and you're out, whether you paid me or not. If you work out on days, I'll switch you to some nights."

Hayley nodded. Nights sucked, but nights were money, and a diner job might open up soon, anyway. She'd just keep an eye out.

"You're late three times, you're fired."

Another nod. Apparently Maria was big on threes.

"And," she continued, "not that it's any of my business as long as it doesn't affect your job, but I'd refrain from going out with anyone you meet in here."

"I've sworn off men."

"Heard that before."

"Not from me."

The truth was the thought of a man coming with in two feet of her occasionally made bile rise in Hayley's throat. She was grateful that it was only occasionally now, rather than all the time.

Maria eyed Hayley one final time and pushed the folded paper across the desk. "Got a place to stay?"

Hayley shook her head. "That's next on my list."

"Shift starts at 10:00 tomorrow. Don't be late," Maria warned.

"That early?" Hayley asked.

"Got a small grill. Serve sandwiches and burgers for lunch and dinner."

Hayley nodded her understanding. She hiked her duffel onto her shoulder and thanked Maria.

Being so late in the afternoon, finding a place within walking distance of Maria’s proved more than a little difficult. The possibilities for rent paid in cash were few and far between, even on the edge of town. Hayley gave up looking for the day and found a cheap-as-dirt no-tell motel six blocks from the bar and settled into a room that smelled like corn chips and sweat. She struggled to drag the dresser in front of the door which was already locked and chained. Stripping off her clothes, she stepped into a hot shower and felt her aching muscles give way to the onslaught.

What she'd seen of Rapid City today, touring the city by bus and by foot, she'd liked. The people were polite, but not overly friendly. The weather was pleasant since she'd skipped winter altogether.

If things worked out with housing and a steady day job, she could easily stay a whole six months here. She washed her hair and carefully arranged a back story for herself repeating details over and over until she emerged from the shower as Hayley Turner, 26, from Denver, Colorado. With a mom at home and a father who worked in engineering, both living in Phoenix. A fair bit of that was true. She was 26, and her mom stayed at home while her father was, in fact, an engineer, though not in Phoenix.

She dried off methodically, carefully positioning her body so she was not facing the mirror. There were times when she did look in the mirror. Hours, days, had been lost with Hayley unable to look away from the straight, raised white lines on her chest and the more purplish-hued jagged ones on her belly. But today was not one of those days.

She had to find a place to live and had a new job to learn and today was not a day for wallowing. Not if she wanted to sleep as much as she could. And she did, want to sleep. That was her last thought after she set her travel alarm clock (another bit of truth there) just in case and drifted into unconsciousness as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Chapter 2

Unsurprisingly, Hayley was awake before her alarm went off. She silenced it preemptively and staggered to the bathroom to brush her hair and teeth. Sleep was always an iffy scenario at the best of times and she was pleased that she'd managed to exhaust herself so much that she had only woken a few times to check the dresser blocking the door and that the window was locked.

She dressed slowly, in the same jeans but a different long sleeved shirt. She pulled the dresser away from the door, shouldered her duffel bag that had been carefully re-packed, and headed out to hoof it the six blocks to Maria’s, leaving early enough to stop for a soda and a danish along the way.

The afternoon had passed quickly, with Hayley getting a tour of the bar from Maria and setting to work schlepping orders from the grill to the few patrons who stopped in at random times to eat and grab a quick beer.

Maria had eyed her duffel as she'd entered the bar and took that to mean that Hayley had not found suitable digs in such a short amount of time. "I might be able to set you up with something," Maria had said off-handedly, but Hayley, from experience, had said nothing because sometimes people said things and didn't mean them, or they didn't work out, and there wasn't any point in getting your hopes up until there was a reason to get your hopes up.

Toward the end of her shift, the front door opened letting in the light of another beautiful spring day. Hayley couldn't make out the customer with the glare of the sunlight in her eyes, but plucked her pad out of her apron and took a step forward to come around from behind the bar. She paused, though, when Maria called out, "Hey, Shooter," loudly from where she was stocking the fridge with local craft beers.

He came more fully into the bar, glancing around the area. His eyes passed easily over the patrons, lingered slightly on Hayley, who immediately looked to Maria. The man's eyes came to rest on Maria as an easy smile settled onto his face.

"Maria," he said, purposefully walking up to the bar.

"Here," Maria said, lifting a half full case of Bud and shoving it into his arms. "Help me with this."

He grunted, but it was a slightly amused grunt, and Maria picked up a second case of bottles and headed off toward the back while Hayley grabbed a cloth and began wiping down tables.

*************************

"That her?" Chris 'Shooter' Sullivan asked, setting his burden down in the stockroom next to Maria's crate.

"Yep."

"What's her story?"

"Sad and tragic and unknown to me," Maria replied almost disinterestedly.

Chris offered her a lazy grin. "Well, if you don't know it, how do you know it's sad and tragic?"

"Aren't they all?" Maria said, somewhat sarcastically, but with a slight sympathetic edge. "It's her first day. Can't vouch for her one way or the other. Just come in from Denver on the bus line. Spent the night over at the Rainbow Motel."