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  Just Be Her

  Kaydence Snow

  Copyright © 2019 by Katarina Smythe

  All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without the express written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. The events described are fictitious; any similarities to actual events and persons are coincidental.

  Cover design by Mila Book Covers

  Editing by Kirstin Andrews

  kaydencesnow.com

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  1. Toni

  2. Alex

  3. Toni

  4. Alex

  …

  5. Toni

  …

  6. Alex

  …

  7. Toni

  …

  8. Alex

  …

  9. Toni

  …

  10. Alex

  …

  11. Toni

  …

  12. Alex

  13. Toni

  …

  14. Alex

  …

  15. Toni

  16. Alex

  …

  17. Toni

  …

  18. Alex

  …

  19. Toni

  20. Alex

  21. Toni

  22. Alex

  23. Toni

  24. Alex

  25. Toni

  26. Alex

  …

  27. Toni

  28. Alex

  …

  29. Toni

  30. Alex

  Note from the Author

  Acknowledgments

  More Romance from Kaydence Snow

  About the Author

  By Kaydence Snow

  One

  Toni

  Three spoonfuls of sugar went into my black coffee before I pulled the wedgie out of my ass and tiptoed out of the kitchenette. I kicked clothes and shoes out of my way as I passed my bed and headed to the balcony doors, trying to be quiet.

  Every step of my bare feet on the timber floor sent a jolt of pain through my skull—and threatened to wake whomever it was I’d brought home with me last night.

  As I turned the handle, the guy in my bed stirred. I cringed, waiting for him to settle before completing my escape. I couldn’t remember his name, but I did remember opening a condom packet, so at least that was one less thing to worry about.

  I settled onto the balcony’s little chair, dropped my coffee onto the round table next to it, and lit a cigarette.

  Between the caffeine and the nicotine, I slowly started to feel more like myself. The familiar sounds of cars and people going about their day drifted up to me—the soundtrack of New Orleans coming to life.

  Judging by how close the sun was to infringing on the edge of my balcony, it had to be approaching midday already. I was just trying to remember what day it was, if Andre would be expecting me, when I heard shuffling behind the open balcony doors.

  “Morning,” a deep male voice croaked. He sounded worse than I felt. “How about some breakfast?”

  I lit another cigarette and finished the dregs of my coffee before turning to face him. He was leaning in the doorway, wearing nothing but faded jeans, the open fly exposing his pubic hair. His dirty-blond hair looked like he hadn’t even run his hands through it yet.

  “I don’t have any food here.” I gave him a thin smile, hoping he’d get the hint.

  “That’s OK, beautiful.” He flashed me a grin, but that just made the dark circles under his eyes more pronounced. What the fuck had I been thinking last night? “We can go out, get some Cajun eggs at this place nearby.”

  I took another puff of my cigarette and rolled my eyes as I blew the smoke out. “Listen, dude.” I wasn’t even trying to remember his name. “We don’t need to play this game.”

  “What game?” He chuckled nervously and did up his fly, subconsciously defending his junk from my attitude.

  “You know.” I took another puff. “We go to breakfast, try to pretend this wasn’t just a hookup, exchange numbers, you never call, blah, blah, blah. It’s all good. We fucked. You fell asleep and didn’t bail before I woke up. Shit happens. Seriously, just go.”

  “Uh . . .” He rubbed the mess on top of his head, frowning. “Can I at least get a cup of coffee before—”

  “No.” I stared him down.

  Finally, he scowled. I could practically hear him calling me a bitch in his head. He turned and shuffled around in my studio, then the door slammed shut.

  I breathed a sigh of relief and leaned my head back against the brick. Lifting my feet onto the edge of the chair to evade the encroaching sun, I finished my smoke as the sounds of the vibrant city below invaded my balcony’s little slice of solitude.

  My phone went off, making me drag my hungover ass inside. I dug it out of a pile of clothes by the door, the battery nearly dead, and read the message from Andre.

  ANDRE: It’s Thursday. Get your ass downstairs or get another job.

  I groaned. It was later than I thought. My shift was starting, but I needed a shower. Andre was all bark and no bite; I could spare ten minutes.

  I showered, threw my hair up into a bun, and dressed in my favorite ripped jeans and a Jack Daniel’s tank I’d won in a pool game, which showed my electric-blue bra through the extra-wide armholes.

  The rickety stairs at the back of the building led to a narrow corridor. One door went to the back alleyway, one to a stock room, another to the bathrooms, and a fourth to the Cottonmouth Inn.

  The dingy bar was on the ground level and had two studio apartments above it. The rent was cheap, and it was also really damn convenient, as I did most of my drinking and partying at the Cottonmouth. I also worked there . . . some number of nights per week. Whenever Andre reminded me. He was the owner of that fine establishment and the building, so he was also my landlord. And my neighbor, as he happened to live in the studio across the hall.

  If he minded me getting wasted at his bar every other night, he certainly didn’t say anything about it. When one of his staff bailed on a shift, he’d call up the stairs and I’d step in to help out. It worked for us.

  “You look like shit.” Andre didn’t even look up as I walked behind the bar. His full focus was on counting the previous night’s takings, the cash stacked neatly in front of him.

  He was in blue jeans, his tall frame hunched over the bar, a sky-blue T-shirt stretched across his broad shoulders. The bright fabric popped against his dark brown skin. Andre had a deep, gruff voice and could look like a mean motherfucker when he wanted to, but he was a softie for the most part. I’d seen him break up more fights than I’d even started.

  I flipped him off and grunted, moving straight to the servery at the other end.

  “There ya go, sugar.” Loretta slid a plate over to me before I even had to beg. She’d made my favorite hangover cure—a bacon and egg sandwich with double cheese, mustard, and ketchup.

  My mouth watered even as my stomach heaved. “I love you, woman.” I groaned, taking the plate and settling onto one of the bar stools.

  “I know.” She waved me off and went back to her food prep, only pausing to hack out half a lung on yet another coughing fit. Loretta was somewhere between forty and sixty years old and all elbows and collarbones under her jeans and T-shirts—the kind of skinny that made you wonder if she was slowly dying from some disease. She perpetually had two inches of gray roots showing beneath her otherwise red hair, as if she specifically asked them to leave a strip when she went to the salon, and wore makeup two shades t
oo dark for her pale complexion.

  But she always showed up on time, and she made a mean cheeseburger. She’d worked at the Cottonmouth longer than Andre. I wasn’t sure exactly how that worked, seeing as he owned the place, but I wasn’t going to pry if he didn’t want to share.

  That’s why Andre and I worked—we weren’t in each other’s pockets. We helped each other out when needed and left each other the fuck alone the rest of the time.

  I was halfway through my meal when Andre finished counting the money, leaving enough change in the till and tucking the rest into a pouch ready to deposit in his safe upstairs. He leaned his big hands on the bar and gave me an expectant stare.

  “Wha?” I spoke around a mouthful.

  “Your shift started an hour ago.”

  “Yeah, but if I try to lug those cases of beer out on an empty stomach, I might hurt myself.” I bugged my eyes out, then grinned before taking another bite.

  He shook his head, but I saw the little amused twitch in his lip. “I gotta go run some errands. I want this place spotless and ready in time for opening.” He picked up the pouch and walked out the back without sparing us another glance.

  “Yes, boss,” Loretta and I both yelled after him. Then she hacked up the other half of that lung.

  Ten minutes later, Dennis arrived for his shift. Dennis attended one of the local universities—I couldn’t remember which one—and bussed at the Cottonmouth a few nights per week.

  We put music on and set to getting the place in order. It was ridiculous to demand we make the place spotless. It probably hadn’t been spotless in a good twenty years. The building was old, complete with wrought-iron railings and window coverings, and the interior looked like it hadn’t been touched in decades. A little carved black sign—with the bar’s name and a snake below it—hung off an iron post above the front door; we had to take it down whenever there was a hurricane warning so it wouldn’t fly off.

  We restocked the bar fridges, wiped down the counters, swept and mopped, straightened the furniture.

  With fifteen minutes left until opening, Andre still hadn’t returned. I gathered the trash and carried the black bag out to the dumpster, then settled onto the back stairs and pulled out my cigarettes. I lit one and sighed, leaning against the brick building.

  The sun was setting, casting the alley in shadow. The humid heat made the dumpster smell perpetually putrid, but the smoke from my cigarette masked the worst of it as I watched people walk past on the street.

  We didn’t get a lot of tourists at the Cottonmouth. It was on a busy street, but it wasn’t in the French Quarter. Tourists were more likely to stumble across it than seek it out on purpose. We catered more to the locals—good burgers and bar food, great beer and bourbon. We had our regulars, our career alcoholics, and the college crowd.

  The squeal of tires, followed by a door slamming, had me narrowing my eyes. The front of a shiny black car was just visible at the end of the alley.

  “Stay there, George.” The feminine voice was loud and confident but sounded shaky around the edges. “I just need a minute.”

  A woman walked around the corner, her heels clicking rapidly on the concrete. Halfway up the alley, she leaned on the wall with one arm, the other clutching her chest as she doubled over as if to vomit.

  I rolled my eyes and took another puff of my cigarette. It was way too early in the night to be dealing with assholes vomiting in the alley. I had half a mind to turn the hose on her—we kept it behind the dumpster specifically so we could hose away the vomit and piss. Occasionally some jerk would even take a dump in the corner. People were disgusting.

  But something about her made me pause. She didn’t look like she was vomiting. She looked like she couldn’t breathe.

  The hand she was using to lean against the wall clenched and relaxed even as it shook. Her other hand pulled at the neck of her linen dress, clawing at her chest as though to rip open a hole for the air to get in. Her shoulders shook, and a sob tore from her throat, the sound one of pure helplessness.

  I knew a panic attack when I saw one.

  Not my problem.

  I took one last drag of my cigarette and put it out on the step. Flicking the butt into the trash, I got to my feet and turned for the door.

  Another pathetic sob made my hand freeze on the knob. That desperate sound pulled on the last few redeemable strings of my black heart.

  “Dammit.” I sighed and rolled my eyes.

  I jogged back down the few stairs and grabbed an empty crate on my way past the dumpster, approaching the woman slowly.

  Her dress was a pale blue, her feet tucked into white pumps. The pristine shoes had clearly never seen the dirty back alley of a building. Her perfectly straight black hair was slicked back in a low ponytail. This chick even had a string of pearls around her neck. Definitely not from around this neighborhood.

  I crouched down, lowering the crate to the ground and holding my other hand out in a calming gesture. “Excuse me.” I made my voice gentle but loud enough for her to hear me over the sound of her own despair.

  She reeled back, her shoulder hitting the wall as she glanced at me with wide eyes. The settling dusk made it more difficult to see her properly, but there was something kind of familiar about her.

  “Please . . . just . . . leave me alone.” She spoke between trying to breathe and control the sobbing.

  “I just want to help.” I took another tentative step forward, and she turned away and sobbed into the bricks. “Look, I’ve been there, OK? I’ve had panic attacks. I know exactly how you’re feeling.”

  “How could . . . you . . . possibly?” Even through hysterical anxiety, she managed to enunciate perfectly.

  I resisted the urge to walk away and leave this bitch to deal with her own shit. “Just have a seat. It’ll help.”

  My patience with her was wearing thin, so I took a chance. I reached out and placed my hand on her delicate shoulder. The linen dress was ridiculously soft. She let me wrap my arm around her shoulders and guide her to sit down on the crate.

  “Put your head between your knees.” I rubbed the top of her back gently.

  She took her heels off, pressed the fabric of her dress down between her legs, and leaned over, rocking back and forth on the spot. After a few moments, her breathing started to even out.

  I crouched in front of her, my arms resting on my knees, and waited.

  Eventually she stopped rocking and raised herself back up a little, staring into her lap. She had really long lashes. They kept brushing her cheeks as she blinked. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I knew her somehow, and I wished she’d look up so I could see her face properly.

  “What’s your name?” She didn’t lift her head, but her voice sounded much more even.

  “Toni. What’s yours?”

  “Alexandria. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

  I snorted. Who the fuck speaks like that? “Yeah, nice to meet you too. You all right? You in some kind of trouble, Alex?”

  The words were out before I could stop them. I tried to avoid getting involved in other people’s shit as a general rule, but there was something about this chick . . . Maybe the fact that I couldn’t figure out why she was so familiar had me more curious. Regardless of my rules, if she was having trouble with some asshole boyfriend, I had no qualms about running inside to grab the baseball bat Andre kept behind the bar.

  “It’s Alexandria. And no, I’m not in any trouble. Just in an impossible situation, partly of my own making, to which there is no alternative.”

  “Oh, come on. People say shit like that all the time. ‘I have to.’ ‘I have no choice.’ ‘There’s no other way.’” I shrugged. “But that’s a load of crap. It may be a choice between something shitty and something even shittier, but we always have a choice.”

  She finally looked up, her back straightening; somehow she managed to look like she was perched on a throne, not sitting barefoot on a crate in a dirty alleyway. The only light came from t
he streetlamps around the corner, but it was enough to see her tear-streaked face, enough to make out her features.

  I frowned. My spine stiffened, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up, despite the sticky Louisiana evening.

  A cat hissed and jumped down from the dumpster, activating the motion sensor. The bright lights at the back of the door lit the alleyway up.

  Finally, I got a good look at her.

  My eyes widened and I gasped. Losing balance, I fell back onto my ass. I was so shocked I just stayed there, sitting in the gutter and staring at her.

  She had the same wide-eyed, bewildered expression on her face, her chest heaving, as if the panic was about to come roaring back.

  Sitting on the crate, staring back at me, was the same person that stared back at me every damn day in the mirror.

  She had my black hair, although hers was neatly tied back and mine was in a messy, unbrushed bun. She had my olive complexion, the same full breasts and hips, the same thin nose and chocolate eyes, the same heart-shaped face with a slightly pointy chin. My arms were more toned from carrying all that beer every day, and her stomach looked flatter than mine, but other than that—and the fact that her dress probably cost what I made in a month—we looked identical.

  “Oh my,” she breathed, taking me in, her manicured fingers playing with the perfectly round pearls at her neck.