The Innocents by Ace Atkins Read Free Book Online

truck pull up, an old black man, Mr. Bobo, get out, lifting a pint bottle to his mouth and wiping it with the back of his hands. Nito didn’t care one damn bit and pulled that pistol out from his deep jean pocket, pointing it right in Sammi’s face.
    “Do it again, nigga.”
    “I didn’t do nothing,” Sammi said.
    “Shoot you right in the fucking snout.”
    Sammi just stared at him with his big black eyes. Didn’t raise his hands up or nothing. He stayed cool as shit and reached down for a little brown cigar burning in a metal tray and lifted it to his lips. “We done, man?”
    “You call the cops and I tell the cops about all that Chinese shit you selling in the back room,” Nito Reece said. “Don’t you be telling me that it fell off some damn truck.”
    Mr. Bobo saw Nito with Sammi and turned back the way he’d come, headlights clicking on, backing out that old brown truck. Man didn’t get to be that old from being dumb.
    “I thought you were my friend,” Sammi said.
    “Shit,” Nito said, flipping the gun around butt first. “Who the hell tole you that?” As he swung for Sammi, Ordeen turned his head the other way, blood flecking on the hot glass protecting all that chicken and pizza.
    •   •   •
    T hey’re real,” said the old stripper. “You can touch them if you want.”
    “That’s OK,” Milly said. She had a book in her lap,
The Christmas Promise
, with an inscribed note from the author:
Dream Big. Share your stories with the world!
    “You can tell real titties from the droop,” the woman said. “All these fake titties flying around this place are easy to spot. No jiggle. Hard as damn bricks. I had mine since I was fifteen. You don’t have to take my advice. But don’t ever get implants. You’ll cut your tips in half. Men like to look at ’em but don’t care for the touch.”
    Milly wished the woman would be quiet. It had already been a long as hell day, trucking up to Tupelo to meet that famous author and then the author not having time to hear her story. All the woman wanted was Milly’s last thirty dollars, her gas money, for a “Christian Romance Just in Time for Christmas!” How could Milly have been so dumb, bringing those little journals, trying to pass along her true stories.
    Milly and the old stripper sat together on a long bench in the locker room at Vienna’s Place. After Milly had signed the paperwork, Miss Fannie showed her to a locker and gave her the combination, saying it was up to her to keep up with her own shit. She said some of these bitches would steal her ass blind. The older woman pulled up a garter high on her leg and snapped it against her thigh.
    “This is my first night,” Milly said.
    “I could tell,” the woman said. “Make sure you take a shot of Jaeger before you hit the stage. Your legs will be shaking like a newborn fawn. But it gets better each time. By the end of the night, you won’t even care if you’re nekkid. It’s a job and that’s your uniform. Hell, you’re young. These boys are going to love you. Men know that new-car smell.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “You’re fresh, is all,” she said. “Truckers will know it. Play it. Tell ’em you’re nervous. They’ll tip out the damn ass for that.”
    The woman had long blonde hair, probably extensions, and bright blue eyes. Her white skin had been stained the color of mahogany and her teeth bleached the highest white. She had on lacy white panties, white bra over her double D’s, and long white stockings. A white ribbon wrapped the sagging skin of her throat. Milly looked down at the cover of
The Christmas Promise
—a clean-looking guy in a shirt and tie and suspenders standing before a church. A dove had been photoshopped in behind him, flying high.
    “Where you from?” the woman asked.
    “Here.”
    “Here?” the woman said. “Damn. That’s a new one on me.”
    Milly was in her street clothes—T-shirt, jeans, and Keds. She’d brought a sexy little red