Page 5 of Cold Foot Sentry (Wreck’s Mountains #6)

“It’s nothing,” she said, and then turned to a couple that just sat down at the end of the bar top and got their orders.

She made their drinks and then became very busy ignoring Tawk.

Not because she was being rude, but because she had that awkward feeling again, and didn’t know what to say to him.

The man was humongous, and so damn fine.

She didn’t know if she liked him or hated him, but she did know one thing—he was devastatingly hard to ignore.

She began to prepare another order and needed a frosty glass from the mini refrigerator right in front of where Tawk was sitting. Tammy stooped and dug one out, and when she stood, he caught her eye. He was staring at her. He cleared his throat like he wanted to say something.

“Need another beer?”

“Your bangs look nice.”

She froze, just staring at him, unblinking. “Thanks?”

He swallowed hard and pulled his baseball cap lower over his eyes, then nodded.

Utterly baffled by this man, she slowly made her way to the station to make the new drink.

She glanced over at him twice, but he had busied himself with slowly spinning his beer on the coaster.

Her cheeks were warming up, but for the life of her, she couldn’t figure out why. She wasn’t a blusher. Never had been.

She delivered the drinks and planned to make herself very busy cleaning the bar top, but got to him with the rag, and let it drop to her side. She had to know. “Was that a compliment? Earlier? About my bangs?”

“I think so.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I can’t read you. I can’t tell if you’re fucking with me. You…”

He cocked his head and removed his baseball cap, slicked his mohawk back and replaced the cap. She couldn’t tell if he was too smooth for his own good, or nervous around her.

“I what?” he asked her.

“You confuse me.”

“Well, that makes two of us. I am also confusing the hell out of myself right now.”

“If your animal gets angry when you’re drinking, please refer to the sign.” She pointed to the chalkboard sign at the entrance of the bar. No Shifter Shit in Here , it read in neon blue chalk. Her boss wrote it out every happy hour for the Cold Foot Crew.

He nodded absently and then swung his gold gaze back to her. His eyes seemed to be glowing from within now, and right near his pupils was a reddish tint. “I told you the animal is not an angry drunk, but I can see you’re still thinking on that. What do you want to know?”

“If you’re going to burn me to a crisp? I have good things happening in my life right now. Things I’ve worked very hard for. I can’t be getting eaten by a dragon right now. I have shit to accomplish.”

Tawk lifted his chin higher into the air. “I can leave if you want. I’m not here to scare anyone.”

“Why did Wreck say you’re sick?”

“You hear pretty well for a human.” Tawk dropped his head, held still for a few seconds, and then reached for his back pocket and pulled out his wallet.

He pulled out a twenty-dollar bill and set it next to the coaster, picked up his beer, and spun the coaster toward her just to piss her off before he walked over to the Cold Foot Crew.

There it was. There was the shut-down.

What did she care?

Tammy glanced away to see if anyone was watching that exchange, but thankfully it seemed like no one was paying attention.

“Miss?” Pendleton Straight called from the end of the bar.

“Coming,” she said, her eyes on Tawk as he stood near Harley, saying something she couldn’t hear over the noise of the country song playing on the Jukebox. He glanced back at her, and she felt busted, so she rushed to pretend she’d been wiping down the counter

She didn’t do this, she didn’t get flustered around anyone, but with Tawk, she felt like she was on uneven ground in high heels. And why? She didn’t know him.

She blew her bangs out of her face and rushed to make drinks for Pendleton Straight and Two-Shots-of-Jack.

For the next hour, she forced herself to get lost in the bustling chaos of happy hour.

It wasn’t until she had to make the rounds at the tables while the server, Marcy, was on her break that she had to face Tawk again.

“Everyone okay over here?” she asked the table where Cold Foot was hanging out.

Tawk was sitting in a chair, with two empty chairs on either side, but he was still hanging and seemed to have built up some kind of rapport with Cash. That wasn’t hard to do. Cash could talk to a fencepost and probably entertain it.

“It makes me relax,” Tawk said from right beside her.

She frowned at him, then looked around the table, but the Crew had all gone quiet too. “Come again?”

He pushed his empty beer bottle with the tips of his fingers and looked up at her. “Drinking relaxes me, and the dragon takes advantage. I can’t control him if I don’t care.”

“Why…” She swallowed hard. “Why don’t you care now?”

“Jess put him to sleep,” he said, gesturing to the other side of the table where Jess was sitting next to Kade.

“My head is empty,” he said, searching her face. “I can rest tonight.” There was an air of relief in his words. “A drink won’t hurt anything tonight.”

She glanced around the quiet Crew again and then picked up his empty bottle. “I’ll bring you another.”

“Say thank you,” she heard Cash tell Tawk as she walked away.

“Thank you,” Tawk repeated after him.

She turned and offered him a polite smile. What a strange one. “You’re welcome.”

Okay.

Okay.

Jess was a witch, and she must’ve had some power to put Tawk’s animal to sleep. The Cold Foot Crew seemed reserved around him, but they hadn’t kicked him out of the bar or the territory yet. She was curious about the history between them.

For her, she had made a habit of not asking too many questions when she hung around the Cold Foot Crew. In her years as a bartender, she had learned to listen, and to observe, and to form her own opinions based on the cues she picked up from people.

With Tawk, he wasn’t an easy read at all, but something about that made her more curious about him. He was interesting and challenging to talk to, and he kept her on her toes. His mind worked in a completely different direction than hers did, but she found that intriguing.

He was…different.

And sexy as hell. He was easily the hottest guy here, and all of Darby.

Hell, he was probably the hottest man in all of Montana.

It was the sharp angles of his face, and his appealing bone structure, gold eyes, physique that was definitely obvious under that thin T-shirt.

His powerful legs pushed against his jeans, and when he walked, it was with the confidence of an animal at the top of the food chain.

That man was pure sex appeal, but his words weren’t as smooth, and for some reason, she liked it way better than if he said everything perfect, or recited lines.

He didn’t talk easily. Perhaps he’d been telling the truth before when he’d said he didn’t talk much.

Ding.

She didn’t know why, but chills rippled up the back of her neck. Tammy turned and looked at the entry and froze.

Aaron stood in the doorway with his friends, Brian and Jeff.

Fuck.

When her ex-husband’s eyes tracked to her, a slow smile took his lips. “Hey, pretty girl,” Aaron called loudly across the bar.

“No. No,” she said, holding her hand up as he approached. She did an about-face and made her way directly behind the bar. “I’m not doing this.”

“Not doing what?” Aaron asked innocently as he took a seat at the bar. Brian and Jeff took the stools on either side of him.

“Hey Tammy Ray,” Jeff said with his Mister-Charming smile. She’d known these guys since she was a kid, and she was zero percent surprised they had come with Aaron for whatever dumb reason he had to drive all the way from Bozeman to here.

“You look good,” Aaron said smoothly.

“Don’t,” she said, patience wearing thin.

“You remember what I like to drink, don’t you honey?”

Tammy didn’t know why she did it, but she looked over at Tawk. He had his back to her, talking to Cash. In fact, all the guys in the Crew were deep in conversation, looked like. A little sliver of worry snaked through her gut.

She felt alone under Aaron’s watchful gaze.

“You stopped wearing your ring,” he said, pointing to her left hand.

“A long time ago, in a different life.”

“Mmm. I still wear mine,” he told her, holding up his left hand with the simple white gold band on it.

“You mean you dug it out of the drawer and put it on just for tonight when you wasted your time coming all the way up here to piss me off?”

He chuckled and shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe I’m still loyal waiting for you to come to your senses.”

“What happened to Meredith?” she asked. “Or Katie. Or Beth?”

“Okay, all right, we both know I’ve got game,” he said with his hands up.

Brian snorted.

She inhaled deeply. “What do you want? Just say it and be done with it, and leave.”

“I’m in town to go to your graduation.”

He could’ve knocked her over with a feather right about now. “How do you even know about my graduation.”

“Your parents said you got your little degree.”

“My little degree,” she repeated softly. God, she wished she’d been smarter. She wished she could go back and talk to her younger self back when she’d fallen for this chode.

“Oh come on. You know I didn’t mean it like that. You’re just looking for a reason to be mad at me. I’m proud of you.”

“You’re proud of me?” She smelled a rat. “You hated the idea of me going back to school. You were the reason I didn’t. You said it was a waste of my time.”

“I just… look, Tam, I know you’re mad at me, but you have to remember that you were the one who left me. That wasn’t my choice. I’m still waiting. I’m trying to be patient.”

“I left you because we weren’t compatible.”