Page 27 of Kiss and Tell

“That’s harsh,” he said evenly.

I took another flustered sip of my drink. “Sorry.”

“I told you I’d stop flirting with you,” he said.

“I saw you with that short girl over by the bar,” I muttered, squirming uncomfortably as I explained. “She was cute.”

“She wanted me to buy her a drink,” he said.

“She outright asked you to buy her a drink?” I asked. “Bold of her.”

“I like a woman who goes for what she wants.”

“She could have offered to be the one who bought you a drink if she was so interested,” I said.

“Is that how you show you’re into a guy?” he asked. “Buy them a drink?”

“This is on my company’s dime,” I reminded him.

“Right.” He took a swig of his beer, not saying anything else. He eyed me over the rim, dark eyes unreadable.

“What do you think of the place?” I asked, forcibly changing the subject.

“Way too many people,” he said immediately.

“Shouldn’t this be the kind of thing you’re used to?” I asked. “This is like a mosh pit.”

“There’s a big difference between an audience of people who are there to watch you play and a club full of drunken people falling over themselves.”

“Did you ever jump into a mosh pit like those famous, wild rock stars?” I asked.

I’d never met someone who played in a band before, but now that I knew someone who had, I suddenly had a hundred questions. The only concerts I’d been to had rows and rows of seating in huge arenas.

Connor picked at the label on his beer, scratching strips off the bottle and flicking them to the table.

“I’ve crowd-surfed a time or two,” he said.

“Did you ever play to a really huge audience?” I asked.

“I could draw a crowd,” he admitted, speaking so softly I had to lean over the table to hear him.

“So you were popular?” I asked.

“In the indie scene, yeah,” he said. “Never hit it real big, though.”

“Do you know any famous people?” I asked.

He looked up from his beer.

“You want me to introduce you to your favorite band or something?” he asked.

“I’m not a big rock fan,” I said. “I only know the big ones.”

“Who do you consider the big ones?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “Metallica. AC/DC.”

“I definitely don’t know them,” he said. “But some of the newer bands, yeah. The indie scene is pretty incestuous.” He’d already scratched off the entire beer label, leaving damp paper bits on the table. “If you’ve been around for a few years, eventually you’ll have played a show with pretty much everyone.”