Sharlene looked at all the empty bottles and shot glasses on the table. “Shhhtory of my life,” she muttered. She pushed the chair back, staggered to the bar, and slapped it with her fist. “One more Coors.”
Holt could hardly believe his eyes. It couldn’t be Sharlene Waverly of Mingus, Texas, slapping the bar right beside him. He’d just visited with her yesterday and moved into her rental house that very morning. The kids had been elated to have a house again. Judd had done a jig all the way to the front porch when she saw the hideous multicolored house.
“I’ll give you one more beer for your car keys. I can call you a taxi, but I can’t let you drive as drunk as you are,” the bartender said.
“Over my dead body. I can drive an army jeep back to the barracks through a sharqi windstorm after an all-night mission. I can drive anything with four wheels and can shoot the eyes out of a rattlesnake at fifty yards, so give me a beer and I’ll drive myself to the hotel. Besides, it’s only two blocks from here,” she argued loudly.
“She’s with me,” Holt said. “Give her a beer and I’ll see to it she makes it home.”
“And who the hell are you?” Sharlene turned bloodshot eyes at him. Was there one or two fine-looking cowboys sitting on the stool? Dear God, was that Holt Jackson, the man she’d hired to add the addition to the Honky Tonk?
“Don’t you remember me? I’m Holt, the man who’s going to put an addition on your beer joint in Mingus,” he said.
“Well, slap some camouflage on my sorry butt and call me a soldier, I believe it is.” She picked up the bottle of beer and turned it up. “And you’re going to take me home?”
“Wherever you need to go. Boss gets killed, I don’t have a job.”
She set the bottle down with a thump. “Well, pay the man and let’s get out of here, Mr. Jolt Hackson.”
The bartender waved away the bill Holt held out. “Her friends took care of their bill and paid for her last drink. They made me promise to call a taxi for her. She’s pretty wasted.”
“Shit-faced is more like it,” Holt said.
Sharlene laughed and stumbled when she slid off the bar.
Holt hooked an arm around her waist and slipped his fingers through her belt loops. He led her outside where the hot night air rushed to meet them as if someone had opened a giant bake oven in the parking lot.
“Hot, ain’t it? That’s my pink VW Bug over there. Just put me in it and follow me to my hotel, cowboy.” She tried to drag him in that direction.
“You are not driving anywhere, not even out of this lot, Sharlene.”
“I been to Iraq. I could take you in a fight. I’m that good. Don’t let my size fool you,” she said.
Holt grinned. “Where’s your hotel key? I’ll take you there, and you can get a taxi to come get your car in the morning.”
She fumbled in the back pocket of her jeans and brought out a paper envelope to the Super 8 with the room number written on the outside. “If you look that way…” She squinted to the south and tilted her head to one side. “Nope, guess it’s that way…” She turned too quickly and fell into his arms. “There’s that sorry sucker. Do you reckon they moved the sign while me and my friends were in the bar?”
Holt laughed. “Surprising how those things happen when you’ve had too much to drink.”
“I’m not that drunk. I was worse than this when I came home from Iraq. They all came to New York to welcome me home. Did I tell you that I was in Iraq two years? They killed Jonah. Sand was everywhere. Blowing in my eyes and sneaking down my bra. It was everywhere. It was hot like this, only hotter. Take me to my hotel. It’s cool there,” she said.
He put her in the cab of his pickup truck and drove to the Super 8. She was snoring when he parked.
“Hey, wake up, Sharlene; you are home,” he said.
She didn’t move.
“Damn!” he swore as he opened the door and rounded the back end of the truck. He opened the door, and she fell out into his arms but didn’t open her eyes. He carried her like a bride through the front door, across the lobby, and down the hall to the right to her room. It took some maneuvering to get the key out of his shirt pocket without dropping her, but he managed.
He laid her on the bed, removed her boots and denim miniskirt, pulled the comforter up from the side of the bed, and started to cover her when her eyes popped open. “Shhh, if you make a noise they’ll see us. You have to be very quiet. They’re up there but you might not hear them yet. I hate this place. I want to go home where it’s green and there ain’t burned-up trucks and bombed-out buildings.”
“What do you hear, Sharlene?”
“The helicopter blades. They buzz like flies lighting on cow patties. Shhh, they’ll be here soon and we haven’t finished the job. If we don’t do it, the men will be in trouble.”
He sat down on the other side of the bed. She grabbed his arm, looked him right in the eyes, and pulled at his arm. “Get down or they’ll see you. Don’t make a noise. I can’t get you out of here if you talk. Just lie here beside me until they are gone.”
“I’ll be quiet.” He stretched out beside her.
Her eyes snapped shut and she snuggled up to his side. He decided to wait until she was snoring again before he left. As drunk as she was, she might see aliens the next time her eyes opened, and if the
