could hurt this family the most. You gave yourself to a person whose only interest in you was to get back at Henry.”
What Nick had done was a hot lump of humiliation burning a hole in her stomach, but the despair choking the life out of her was worse. As she looked at both of her parents she knew it was no use. They would never understand. Never change. And she would never escape.
“You’ve degraded yourself, and I can hardly stand to look at you,” her mother continued.
“Then don’t. You were going to take me to the University of Idaho in a week. Take me tomorrow instead.” Delaney walked from the room, the weight of resignation settling about her shoulders. She moved up the stairs, her feet felt leaden, her heart empty, too drained to cry. She didn’t bother to pull off her jeans before she crawled into bed. She stared up at the pink canopy above her head and knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep, and she was right. Her mind raced with every dreadful detail of the past few hours. What her parents had said. What she’d said, and how nothing ever changed. And no matter how hard she tried to avoid thoughts of Nick, her mind turned again and again to him. She remembered his hot touch, the cool silky texture of his hair through her fingers, and the taste of his skin. She closed her eyes and could practically feel his warm wet mouth on her breasts and lower. She didn’t know why she’d let him do those things to her. She’d had enough previous experience with him to know he could pass for pleasant one minute and turn mean as a snake the next. So why Nick Allegrezza of all people?
Delaney punched her pillow and turned on her side. Maybe because he’d always been so free, and he’d always fascinated her with his heavenly face and wild hellion ways. Maybe because he was so beautiful he took her breath away, and tonight he’d made her feel like maybe she was beautiful too. He’d looked at her like a man who wanted to make love to a woman. He’d touched her as if he wanted
Her only consolation was that no one knew, not even Henry, exactly what had happened on the hood of Nick’s Mustang. And unless Nick spoke of it, no one would ever know. Maybe her mother was wrong. Maybe no one would talk about it.
But Gwen had only been wrong about the amount of time it would take for the gossip to reach her. It was noon, not ten, the next day when Lisa called and told Delaney that someone had seen her and Nick at the Charm- Inn in the nearby city of Garden. Another had them running buck naked through Larkspur Park and having sex on the kiddie slide. And yet in a third, she and Nick had been sighted in the alley behind the liquor store, drinking tequila shooters and going at it in the backseat of his car.
Suddenly being sent away to college didn’t seem so bad. The University of Idaho wasn’t Delaney’s first choice, but it was four hours from Truly. Four hours from her parents and their tight control. Four hours from the gossip blowing through town like a hurricane. Four hours from ever having to lay eyes on Nick or any member of his family.
No, maybe the U of I wouldn’t be so horrible after all.
“If you get good grades and behave yourself,” Henry told her on the drive to Moscow, “maybe we’ll lighten your class load next year.”
“That would really be great,” she’d said without enthusiasm. Next year was twelve months away, and she was sure she’d do something in the interim to displease Henry. But she would try. Just like she always did.
She tried for one month, but her first taste of real freedom went straight to her head, and she pulled straight Ds her first semester. She lost her virginity to a wide receiver named Rex and got a job waitressing at Ducky’s Bar and Grill, which was more bar than actual grill.
The money from her job gave her even more freedom, and when she turned nineteen that February, she quit school all together. Her parents had been livid, but she didn’t care anymore. She moved in with her first boyfriend, a weightlifter named Rocky Baroli. She sought higher education reading Rocky’s incredible pecs and adding up how many straight shots she could consume at the all-night parties she attended off campus. She learned the difference between a Tom Collins and a vodka Collins, between imported and home-grown.
She’d taken her new independence and she’d run with it. She’d grabbed hold with both hands and taken a great big bite, and she was never going back. She’d lived as if she had to experience everything at once, before her freedom was snatched away from her. Whenever she thought back on those years, she knew she was lucky to be alive.
The last time she’d seen Henry, he’d tracked her down with the sole purpose of dragging her back home. By then she’d dumped Rocky and had moved into a basement apartment in Spokane with two other girls. Henry had taken one look at the garage sale furniture, overflowing ash trays, and collection of empty booze bottles, and ordered her to pack her clothes. She’d refused and the confrontation had turned ugly. He’d told her if she didn’t get in his car, he would disown her, forget she was his daughter. She’d called him a controlling pompous son of a bitch.
“I don’t want to be your daughter anymore. It’s too exhausting. You were always more dictator than father. Don’t ever hunt me down again,” were the last words she’d spoken to Henry.
After that, whenever Gwen called her on the telephone, she made sure Henry was never home. Her mother visited Delaney occasionally in whichever city she happened to be living, but of course Henry never came with her. He’d been true to his word. He’d disowned Delaney completely, and she’d never felt so free-free of his control, free to screw up her life with abandon. And sometimes she really screwed up, but in the process, she also grew up.
She’d been free to drift from state to state and job to job until she figured out what to do with her life. She’d finally figured it out six years ago when she enrolled in beauty school. After the first week, she’d known she’d found her niche. She loved the tactile sensations and the whole process of creating something wonderful right before her eyes. She had the freedom to dress outrageously if she wanted to, because there was always someone a little bolder than herself.
It may have taken Delaney longer than most to settle on a career, but at last she’d found something she was good at and loved to do.
Being a stylist gave her the freedom to be creative. It also gave her the freedom to move when she began to feel trapped in one place, although she hadn’t felt claustrophobic in a while.
Not until a few months ago when Henry had flexed his muscle one last time and left that appalling will, controlling her life once again.
Delaney picked up her boots and headed into the bedroom. She flipped on the light and tossed her boots toward the closet. What was wrong with her? What would make her kiss Nick out on a crowded dance floor in spite of their sordid past? There were other available men around. True, some were married or divorced with five kids, and none of them were as fine as Nick, but she didn’t have a painful past with other men.
Nick the snake. That’s who he was, like that big python with the mesmerizing eyes in
Delaney looked at herself in the mirror above her dresser and frowned. Maybe if she weren’t so lonely and aimless she wouldn’t be so susceptible to Nick’s hypnotic charms. There had been a time in her life when aimlessness had been her goal. Not anymore. She was living in a town she didn’t want to live in, working in a salon with no real intentions of success. Her only goals were to survive and aggravate Helen. Something had to change, and she had to change it.
Chapter Eight
Monday morning Delaney thought about advertising for a manicurist in the small daily newspaper, but she resisted the idea because the salon would be open for only seven months. She’d stayed awake last night thinking of ways to make a success out of the business, even though she would have it for only a short time. She wanted to feel proud of herself. She was going to end her secret hair war with Helen and stay as far away from Nick as humanly possible.
