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I lean even closer, bringing my mouth to her ear while my thumb draws lazy circles against her nipple. “Are you wearing panties?” I whisper in her ear before my teeth close over its lobe while I pinch her nipple between my thumb and forefinger, rolling it beneath the fabric of her dress.
She gasps, the shuttering breath of it skates across my neck and I can feel her nod, the top of her head brushing across my jawline. “Yes.”
I know people are watching us but I don’t care. She’s leaving to go on a date with another guy but before she does, I’m going to remind her that she’s mine. That she belongs to me. “Are they wet?”
She tries to jerk back, put space between us but I tighten my grip on her wrap, pulling her close enough to feel the hard length of my cock pressing against her belly. “You better answer me, Cari,” I tell her, fighting to keep my voice level. “Because if you don’t, I’m going to have to check for myself—right here, in front of this whole fucking bar. Are. They. Wet?”
I can feel her turn her head, looking around the knot of people we’re standing in. It’s barely seven o’clock on a Saturday but Gilroy’s is already half packed, people milling around us, giving us quick, knowing looks. “You wouldn’t—” she says before cutting herself off like she’s no longer sure who I am and what I’d be willing to do to her in public. “Yes.”
Smart girl to answer me because what she’s thinking about me is right. I’ve gone off the deep-end when it come to her and right now, I’m not drowning. I’m doing the fucking backstroke. Enjoying every second of my temporary insanity. “For me?”
“Yes,” she says, shifting the hold she has on her purse, the back of her hand grazing my cock.
I groan softly. I’m about five seconds away from telling the guy behind me to fuck off, drag her upstairs like a Neanderthal and fuck the shit out of her. It takes me a moment to gain a semblance of composure but when I do, I take a step back and look her right in the eye. “I’m going to fuck you when you come home,” I say, like I’m asking her to pick up milk on the way home, not even trying to whisper. “Have a good time,” I tell her grinning at the way her eyes widen slightly before I let her go.
I walk back to the bar and make my way behind it. When I do, I look at the spot I left her standing in. She’s already gone.
I spend the nextfew hours on auto-pilot, slinging drinks and breaking up fights while doing my best to dodge Lisa’s groping hands. I’m not sure how much clearer I can be about regretting what happened between us but at this point, I’m over being nice about it. Every time she touches me, I brush her off and tell her to get back to work. She just smiles at me and saunters away for a while before circling back around to cop a feel.
While I’m dealing with Lisa, Conner pulls his Houdini act with progressive frequency. I try not to pay attention to how many girls he goes through or how often he disappears. It’s not hard to do, really, all I can think about is Cari. What she’s doing. If she’s having a good time. If this Chase guy took her to a nice place. If he opened her car door for her. If he helped her take off her wrap when they got where they were going. If he’s treating her how she deserved to be treated.
Because I can’t seem to get the job done.
I’m not even mad at her anymore—not really. Not when I’m like this. Not when she’s nowhere near me. Right now, I just want her to come home. I want her to walk through the door so I can take her upstairs and help her out of her dress. I want her to curl up on the couch next to me in one of my T-shirts and force me to watch some shitty reality show about fucked-up, D-list celebrities or rich, board housewives. I want to be with her. Like we were before—only not like before. I want to kiss her like I have the right. Touch her without wondering when she’s going to finally catch a clue and start laughing. I want to sleep next to her without worrying that this is all some long, elaborate joke.
And that’s the problem, isn’t it? I don’t trust her—this. Whatever this is. What’s happening between us, I don’t trust that it’s real. I don’t think it’s going to last because, let’s face it—no matter how much I want to be, I’m not the kind of guy a girl like Cari Faraday ends up with. I’m not rich. I’m not famous. I don’t drive a Porsche. I’m not good enough for her. Every time she apologizes for the colossal mindfuck she pulled on me, it makes me feel like a puppy she just kicked through the uprights. Like some pathetic loser, she feels bad for. Like I’m some kind of pity-fuck.
That’s what pisses me off.
“Hey, can I get a Guinness?”
I look up, to find Sara standing in front of me, looking like she did the last time I saw her. She’s a cute girl—light brown hair, warm brown eyes. Nice. She was just finishing up her student teaching when we split. I wonder if she’s finished and if she’s getting ready to move back to wherever she came from for college and for a split second, I wish I felt for her, what I feel for Cari. “Sure you don’t want a whisky sour?” I tease her, forcing a smile onto my face. We broke up four months ago and she hasn’t been back to Gilroy’s since, even though we swore we’d still be friends.
She laughs, jostled slightly by the crowd shouting drink orders behind her. “You remembered,” she says playful and flirty, making me wonder why she’s here. It can’t be a coincidence that my ex-girlfriend pops up the day after Cari and I finally hook up. I automatically shoot a glance down the length of the bar, looking for Conner. This is the kind of thing that meddling asshole would set up, all in the name of helping me.
He’s MIA. Shocker.
“Come on,” I say, shoveling ice into a pint glass, filling it with Jameson before giving the drink a cursory squirt of sweet and sour from the mixer gun. “It’s the official drink of Gilroy’s college girls.” I give it a twist and set a straw into it before passing it over the bar.
From the corner of my eye, I catch sight of Tess, making her way down the bar to stand next to me, the top of her head not even level with my shoulder. She showed up around nine and climbed behind the bar. I’m not sure if Conner called her in or if she was walking by and saw me drowning and decided to jump in and lend a hand and I don’t care. Right now, she’s my favorite person.
“Hey, Sara,” she says giving my ex a quick smile while flipping the tap over a pitcher, filling it with some shitty IPA that tastes like lemon-scented floor cleaner. “Where the fuck is Con?” she says to me, obviously irritated.
“Who knows,” I say, giving Sara an apologetic smile. “It’s been a clusterfuck of a night,” I tell her, lining up a long row of rocks glasses so I can fill them with ice.
Tess rights the pitcher and flips the tap before passing it across the bar with a stack of frosted pints, exchanging it for cash. “Fuck this.” She drops the cash in the register, slamming it shut before turning toward me again. “Boost me up, Cap’n,” she says, tugging on my sleeve and I do what she says because it’s Tess and to be honest, she kinda scares me.
Closing my hands around her waist, I lift her up until her boots hit the bar. I keep a hand wrapped around her ankle because I’m afraid she’s going to launch herself into the crowd while I use the other to speed pour well whiskey over the ice I just shoveled.
Glancing in Sara’s direction, I find her where I left her, drink in hand, a weird look on her face, bouncing it between Tess and me. “What are you doing here?” I know I sound like an asshole but I don’t really have time to be nice about it. I add sweet and sour, running the gun down the row of glasses.
“I’m here with Alisha,” she practically shouts, stirring her drink before taking a drink. Alisha is the blonde Con has a near miss with the night I met Sara. “Your cousin called her. Asked her to come in.”
Sounds like Conner. Fucking dick has girls lining up and he calls in a pinch-hitter while we’re in the weeds. Before I even open my mouth, Tess reaches down to grab a handful of hair, giving it a yank.
“Fuck,” I shout, glaring up at her while she smiles down at me, all sweet and proper. There’s nothing sweet and proper about Tess.
“I thought you liked it rough,” she says, giving me another sweet smile that makes me want to shove her off the bar. Any hope Cari didn’t tell Tess that I’ve been acting like a sexual deviant for the past 24-hours has gone out the window. I can feel Sara’s stare burrow into the side of my face.