One More Time by Deborah Cooke Page B

Just one more call home.
    “Don’t you got somewhere to go, my friend?”
    And that was the crux of it. Leaving the bar meant having to decide. A hotel room was not the most appealing prospect. The last thing Matt wanted was to be alone, to be left to sober up and face the shadows lurking in his mind. He wanted to be with someone, not just anyone.
    He wished suddenly that it could have been Leslie, then told himself not to live in the past.
    On the other hand, he didn’t want to appear unannounced at Sharan’s house, ready to embark on phase two of his life, and drunk out of his mind. It seemed that might be a bad start.
    And he wasn’t even sure about going to Sharan anymore. Funny how the choice he’d been so sure was the right choice didn’t feel so right anymore.
    All because Leslie hated her job and he hadn’t known.
    All because Leslie had kissed him as if she’d swallow him whole.
    All because the Leslie who had once surprised him half a dozen times a day and stolen his heart away had made a sudden and startling reappearance.
    The bartender opened the dishwasher, releasing a puff of steam. He started to unload glasses, giving each one a wipe with a towel before sliding it into the overhead rack. “You got a woman? You look like you’re thinking ’bout one.”
    Matt deliberately chose to refer to a woman closer to his current locale. He was drunk. He was seeing things as they couldn’t possibly be. He was afraid to leave the past behind. It couldn’t be more than that.
    “I haven’t seen her in years.” Matt shook his head. “Maybe I shouldn’t call her. I’m still married.”
    “And not to her?”
    “No.”
    The bartender chuckled. “Hey, this town’s like Las Vegas. What happens here stays here. Everybody comes here gets a little something going on. Where’s this woman live?”
    “Algiers.”
    “‘Cross the river?” He looked at his watch. “You better get it in gear, then. The last ferry goes by midnight.”
    “That early?”
    “People sleep in Algiers; they don’t party. Or they party at home maybe.” The bartender shrugged massive shoulders. “Don’t make no never mind to me. I never seen the appeal of the place myself, but that’s just me. I like the city.” He grinned. “I like meeting boys from the north like you, who git away from home and go wild.”
    Matt chuckled despite himself. He deliberately remembered how Sharan had looked at him once, refused to admit that Leslie had also once looked at him that way, and told himself that his decision was made.
    He stood unsteadily and grasped the brass rail on the bar to stay on his feet. “Give me the tally, my friend,” he said to the bartender who smiled at Matt’s poor imitation of his accent. “Let’s square it up.”
    “You northern boys just can’t drawl, can you?” The bartender worked the word ‘drawl’ so that it stretched out past Tuesday. “You just don’t got it in you.”
    Matt looked back at him. “I could never touch that, drunk or sober.”
    The bartender laughed when he handed Matt back his credit card receipt. “Go find your woman, my friend.”
    * * *
    Matt hadn’t called.
    It was incomprehensible. Leslie sat in bed and stared at the clock. She’d been hoping and hoping... But it was almost midnight. He should have called, he would have called if he had any intention of doing so. He had tried to call her back earlier today.
    She had been stupid to not pick up the phone then. Maybe it had been the last mistake he’d allow her to make.
    He must have arrived at the hotel already.
    He wasn’t going to call. Leslie slid down in the bed, finding it all too easy to imagine what—or who—might be keeping Matt busy. She tried to swallow the lump in her throat, tried to tell herself that she couldn’t expect a grown man to check in regularly like she was his mommy, tried to insist to herself that it wasn’t that important.
    Except that it was.
    Because Matt always called in. Promptly. Frequently. It