THE GIRL'S GOT SECRETS (Forbidden Men #7)

2. Remy

2

Remy

Thirty minutes after the ruin my life had become, I turned down the volume of “I Love It” by Icona Pop on the radio and parked a block away from Castañeda’s Mexican restaurant.

Face wiped free of the thick black eyeliner and lipstick I’d worn to the audition from hell, I checked my reflection to ensure my eyes were no longer red and puffy. When I saw myself, though, I snorted. Proof of my tear-fest might be gone, but I looked hideous anyway—as virginal and Christianly as a Sunday-school teacher. And yet I knew my uncle still wouldn’t approve. The tyrant preferred me in turtlenecks and cardigans over drab, ankle-length skirts made of sackcloth. But I had compromised as best I could with jeans—the denim ripped out in the knees—and a loose black sweater that liked to dip off one shoulder and revealed the strap of my purple tank top—to match the purple highlights in my hair.

My punk-rocker wig gone, I finger combed my dark mane one last time and then grabbed my purse.

I bypassed the main entrance of Castañeda’s and ducked down the alley beside it, calling a greeting to Mick, the homeless guy who camped out there and waited for stray scraps.

After unlocking the back door of the restaurant, I slipped inside and hung my jacket on a hook. Behind me, the radio played a familiar Latino tune while a humid heat crawled up the back of my sweater.

“If you keep coming in late, mi padre’s going to take a strap to you, prima.”

I yelped and spun around to find my cousin Big T, short for Tomás, mixing dough. Half a dozen raw, already stuffed and sealed empanadas sat on a cookie sheet ready to go into the oven. A hairnet covered his dark head of thick black hair and flour powdered his heavy arms up to his elbows.

“Cállate,” I muttered as I stashed my purse and found my own hairnet to slip on.

He belly laughed. “What’s this? I abandon my post at the stoves to take over your oven job for you and all I get is a shut up? In Español, no less. My sweet prima offends me.”

Realizing I had been bitchy to one of my favorite people on earth, I let out an apologetic sigh. “Plus a great big gracias and kiss on the cheek for my wonderful Big T.” I wrapped my arms around his wide barrel chest from behind and leaned over his shoulder to stamp a big, wet, sloppy one right to his cheek.

He flushed but grinned his appreciation as he shrugged me off and continued to mix the dough with his beefy hands. “Shoo. Enough of that. Tell me how your audition went. You must’ve done well if you stayed this late. Made the first cut, ¿sí?”

My smile dropped. “The audition? It was...bien.” I nudged him aside with my hip and took over where he’d left off, since the baking was technically my job. I put all my attention into pounding my palm into the dough that suddenly worked as a nice stress ball. Fold, pound. Flour. Fold, pound. Forget all auditions, sexy lead singers, and the tears it had brought. Flour. Fold, pound—

Tomás grasped my elbow. “Hijo de puta, it’s dead already. Stop torturing the poor dough.”

I scowled at him but obeyed, yanking up the rolling pin and flattening it into a disc. Crossing his arms over his chest, my perceptive cousin leaned his back against the table beside me as he studied my face.

“They’re not the only band around, you know.”

I ground my teeth, trying to ignore him as I snagged a knife, then a nearby plate to use as a stencil and cut the dough into perfect circles. “But they’re the best band.”

He snorted. “Matter of opinion.”

A die-hard Los Horóscopos de Durango fan, he didn’t get my fascination with all things pop, rock, or punk.

“Hey, wipe the glum off your face. Abuela’s here tonight, working the cash register. Seeing her is always reason to smile. Plus, she’ll know as soon as she gets a look at you that something’s wrong. You don’t want to upset our fragile, aging grandmother, do you?”

After he arched a censorious eyebrow at me, I sighed and let my shoulders deflate. “No. You’re right. I’ll stop being a drama queen.”

“Bien. Because it makes you a total pain in the ass to be around.” Then he picked up a handful of flour and flicked it at me...as if that would help cheer me up or something.

“Tomás Emmanuel Fernando Castañeda!” I screeched in outrage and tore off my hairnet, frantically brushing flour from my locks. “How could you? Pendejo.”

“Elisa!” The sharp c***k of my uncle’s voice instantly had me snapping to attention and lifting my shoulders until my back was military straight.

Fuck. Even though I felt like I was at home in this building where I’d spent most of my childhood, I never failed to flinch at that voice. But I hated getting caught spouting expletives in front of Tío Alonso. It reminded me too much of when I was little and he’d smack my knuckles with a spatula every time he heard me curse.

He no longer verbally censored my language or took a spatula after me, but he sure as hell sent me the ultimate scowl of disapproval as he plowed into the room.

Drawing in a short, bracing breath before turning around, I looked up at him and said, “¿Sí?”

“Llegas tarde.”

I shifted my weight uneasily from one foot to the other as I stared at the patriarch of my family. Though I had lived with and been raised by my grandmother, Tío Alonso—my grandmother’s oldest son as well as Big T’s dad—had been the only father figure in my life since I was two. So, despite the fact I didn’t care for his autocratic attitude, he still knew how to make me behave...and rebel.

After lifting my chin, I gave him a tight nod. “Yeah, I know I’m late. I’m sorry, but I...” I paused, trying to come up with a plausible reason for my tardiness that wouldn’t get me an overly long lecture—since he abhorred my love for his least-favorite kind of music—but he obviously didn’t want to hear excuses today.

“Carmen didn’t come in tonight. We need you up front, pronto.”

I bit back an immediate curse. But...damn it. I hated waitressing more than anything. Fingering the hem of my sweater, I said, “I’m not dressed to work out front.”

“Solo hazlo,” he muttered his command.

“Sí, tío querido.” My answer made him scowl, because it reminded him how much of a tyrant I’d repeatedly told him he was. He hated it when I called him uncle dearest in my sweet angelic voice, like some kind of meek servant—since he knew I was anything but meek or sweet—about as much as I hated how he refused to call me by my first name.

Tío Alonso was the only person on earth who addressed me as Elisa, my middle name, because he thought Remy was much too masculine and not nearly Latin enough for his taste.

“And Elisa?” he grumbled, his accent thickening with his irritation.

I sighed, wondering what he was going to pick on now. “¿Sí?”

“Limpia tu camisa.” He waved his pointer finger at my sweater.

I glanced down to see flour spotting the cloth. Muttering under my breath, I beat at it, to clean it off as best I could while Tío Alonso pushed his way back through the doorway and left us.

Behind me, Big T chuckled softly at my scolding.

“Idiota,” I hissed at him, using the much more kosher word this time, just in case Tío Alonso could still hear us. “Look what you did to me.”

He only smirked harder. “Hey, I didn’t know you were going to be forced to waitress tonight.”

“How about you wait tables then, and I’ll finish up these empanadas,” I begged, fluttering my lashes at him. But I must’ve tried that trick one too many times; he totally wasn’t swayed.

“Not on your life, prima. Get out there.”

“Asshole.” I flipped him off before hurrying my way through the doorway and finding myself behind the front counter facing the dining area where dozens of tables were already full. Ugh! I so did not have the disposition to be a good server tonight, and since it was a Monday, more of the family scene would be present, including obnoxious bratty kids and irritable fed-up parents.

The joy.

Wherever the hell Carmen was, I hoped her absence from here was worth it, because I was going to kill her for making me go through this today of all days. If I hadn’t been forced to work right now, I’d be at home, slaughtering Nazis or zombies on my Call of Duty game...because I was in the perfect mood to draw some virtual blood.

I was fishing a spare waitressing apron out from under the counter along with an extra order pad when a soft voice called my name from the cash register. I glanced over and caught sight of my tiny, gray-headed grandmother perched on a stool watching me.

I’d totally forgotten Big T had said she was here tonight...if that didn’t tell you how scattered my brain was after my auditions.

“Abuela.” I hurried to her to give her the dutiful granddaughterly hug. “Te extrañé.”

Abuela had been my legal guardian since I was nine, when enough drugs had fried my mother’s brain to the point she’d been put away in a mental institution. But since Abuela had lived with Tío Alonso ever since they’d come to the US on work visas two years before I was born, I’d been raised pretty much under his roof...and his rule. And even though my grandmother could be sassy when you crossed her, she was still the sweetest soul and usually compliant to her eldest son’s authority.

“Mi linda nieta,” she murmured, cupping my face and looking into my eyes. “Te ves triste.”

I forced a smile and shook my head. “I’m not sad,” I tried to reassure her in Spanish, all the while biting the inside of my lip and hating that she could always see so much in me. I couldn’t tell her about my failed audition either; she loathed my kind of music just as much as Tío Alonso did. “Just...upset about having to wait tables.”

Shaking her head, she swatted me away, telling me to get to work before commanding me to stop by more often to visit her. With a quick kiss to her cheek, I was off and catching a table of waiting customers that my younger cousin Luis didn’t seem to have gotten to yet, since he looked busy trying to clean up a drink spill across the room at another table.

“Hola. Buenas noches,” I greeted with a smile to the family of three I approached. “Have you guys gotten your drinks ordered yet?”

Castañeda’s boasted authentic Mexican food, despite the fact that the crunchy tacos here were nothing like a true taco back in México, where my family had migrated from. Tío Alonso called the tacos we served the locals chingaderas, aka pieces of s**t, but they were one of our most popular orders, so we continued to supply them.

Other than that, everything else we served was a true Latino dish. And everyone who worked here was of true Latino descent. I was nearly the exception, since my blood was diluted. My father had been American with German-Irish ancestors, and he’d stuck around long enough to marry my mom and get me the Curran surname before he’d taken off to parts unknown. But I looked Mexican enough and my mother had been a Castañeda, so I guess that gave me my “in” to work at the family restaurant.

And gave me the enjoyment of having the kid at the table in front of me spray my pant leg with queso-gooped snot as he sneezed on me.

Nice.

I smiled through clenched teeth at his parents as if everything was bien, even though I wanted to strangle their brat who was currently singing about Bob the Builder at the top of his lungs and tossing his tortilla chips onto his seat so he could march them into crumbs as they studied their menus, oblivious. Gritting back my irritation, I took their order and escaped before I unloaded my frustrations of the day onto them.

Six hours later, I trudged into my apartment and flopped onto the couch, where I moaned out my misery and slapped my hands over my face.

This—this—was my life. And it looked as if it was going to remain my pathetic existence for the next long while. No drumming position. No new band membership. Nothing but serving asshole customers who wrote LOL on my tip line instead of providing a single penny of gratuity after my damn fine waitressing, if I did say so myself, despite how much I wanted to curl into a ball on my sofa and cry while killing things on video games...and maybe stuffing my face with chocolate and ice cream. And piña coladas. God, and drowning myself with so many piña coladas! And maybe singing really sappy, sad love songs like “My Heart Will Go On” as I envisioned all the zombies I slaughtered were Fisher...or that bassist for Non-Castrato and the way-too-hot lead singer, Asher Hart.

Work had somewhat helped distract me from my melancholy all evening, but now, not even the half a dozen smelly grease stains on my clothes or my sore feet could keep my mind off those stupid auditions and that bastard group of band members who’d laughed in my face. Actually, my greasy smell and sore feet only helped highlight how awful it all was.

I was never going to be accepted into any band. I don’t know what I’d been thinking to audition today. Not even dating the lead singer of Fish ’N’ d***s had gotten me into their band. Why had I been so certain someone else would accept me? I was the biggest failure I knew. I’d never gotten anything I’d truly tried for or dreamed of obtaining in my entire life.

A father who stuck around and a sane mother who loved me? Denied.

Finishing college and showing my uncle I wasn’t worthless? Nope.

Marrying Braden Fisher—who was supposed to be the great love of my life—and creating the best band ever with him and his crew? Hells to the no.

Finding any man to love me? Nada.

Becoming a drummer in whatever band took me in and playing in front of a live audience? Not even a freaking audition.

Hating how miserable and sad and dejected it made me, I focused on the rage. I balled my hands into fists of fury and muttered to the room at large. “I’m never listening to your stupid music again, Non-Castrato.”

I really didn’t expect the room to respond. So when it said, “I had a bad feeling you didn’t get it,” I yelped out a startled scream.

Whirling toward the doorway of the kitchen, I scowled at my roommate for scaring the crap out of me. She’d piled her flaming red hair into a mop on top of her head and sported a green cami and shorts that barely covered her crotch—her usual around-the-house gear, regardless of whether it was summer or the middle of winter...though it happened to be November.

Cradling a steamy mug that smelled like cappuccino with both hands, she carried it into the front room and curled onto the couch beside me to give me the ultimate sympathetic sigh. “You would’ve called hours ago, screaming and ecstatic, if there’d been good news.”

My lower lip trembled. I never could handle pity well. “Fuckers wouldn’t even let me audition.”

“I’m sorry, puta.” I have no idea why Jodi always used the Spanish word for w***e as a term of affection for me, but ever since I’d taught her the translation, that’s what she’d affectionately called me. Today, it only made me cry harder though, because it reminded me how much she loved me, and I really-really needed some love right now.

Damn ovaries.

“Was it because you’re a girl?” she asked.

“Yes.” I wiped at my eyes, only to pause and give her a sharp glance. “Wait, how did you know that?”

She shrugged. “Because their name is Non-Castrato and castrato means—”

“I know what the f**k castrato means,” I snapped, feeling a mite bit testy...and pathetic...and fairly worthless. But music was my life; I’d majored in it in college for a good three semesters before I’d dropped out at Fisher’s insistence that he needed me on hand for his band stuff. I’d even written a paper about how young boys in the 1700s had been castrated before puberty so their voices would remain high, leading to the very term, castrato. I wasn’t a complete i***t—just maybe half an i***t. Fine, three-quarters. Whatever. Still. I did know what castrato meant.

“Of course you do,” Jodi cooed, patting my leg. “But what I can’t figure out is why you’re sitting here, letting those pricks make you cry.”

Leave it to my roommate. She was quick to sympathize, but just as quick to give me the kick in the ass I needed to end my pity party.

I blinked and wiped my face. “Because I’ve dreamed my whole damn life for exactly this kind of opportunity. I have practiced, and sweated, and bled to be the best goddamn drummer there is. And they wouldn’t even f*****g listen to me!”

“Exactly,” Jodi said. “You have worked at this for years. Why are you giving up now? Non-Castrato isn’t the only band. I’m sure you can— “

“But they’re the one I wanted to join! They were good and going places. And I want to be a part of that. It’s just...something about them felt right.” Until they’d treated me like crap and told me to git.

“Then make yourself a part of it, damn it.”

“Whatever. I don’t want anything to do with the scumbags now. What I’d really like to do is force them to listen to my talent and then laugh in their faces and deny them when they beg me to join their sucky band.”

“Ooh, yes. I like that idea.” Jodi pointed at me before taking a sip. “Do that.”

“As if I could.” Defeated, I tossed my hands into the air. “Bastards won’t listen to a girl drummer, remember?”

“Then don’t be a girl drummer,” Jodi rolled her eyes and muttered, “Gah.”

I froze, staring at her. “Wait. What? Do you mean, like...” I flashed my eyes open wide as I flew off the couch to grip my head in both hands. “Oh, my God. You’re a genius. Do you think you could do it? Do you think you could make me a man? Like...just for an hour?”

Jodi shook her head, obviously not following my train of thought. “Huh?”

“This is exactly what you’re going to college for. To make special effects for movies. That includes masks and such, right? Could you make me a guy? You know, like they made Robin Williams into a woman in Mrs. Doubtfire?”

“Um...” Trilling out a nervous laugh as if she wanted to believe I was joking but feared I wasn’t, Jodi shook her head. “I don’t think you realize how much time and work would go into making something like that. And it’d be even harder to make it in any way realistic.”

Desperate, I grabbed her hand, my gaze beseeching. “It only has to be believable long enough to get me through one audition. After that, when they hear how great I am, then I’ll rip the mask off and tell them, ha, a girl can be good, so go f**k yourselves.”

When leery temptation loomed in my roommate’s eyes, I knew I had her. I just needed one more good solid beg to break through her resistance. “Jodi, please, I need this. I’m counting on you and your amazing talent to help me find a little justice in the world...for all women.”

And... Jodi melted. I held my pleading stare as her internal conflict crumbled to dust. “Oh, all right. But if tomorrow is the last day they’re holding auditions, we need to get started, like, right f*****g now.”