Page 24 of Laila Manning (Shadeport Crew #3)

H e was watching me.

Staring over the rim of his glass as I moved around the bar, working and trying to focus.

Did he know how hard it was to pay attention to anything else in the world besides my need for him?

Did he know how difficult it was for me to admit to myself that I needed him?

My body tingled, aware of his stare as I tried to watch the bartender, Nicole, mix a cocktail for an order.

“You see?” she asked, topping it with a sprig of mint. “It goes directly to the top of the glass when it’s poured, or you did it wrong.”

“Got it.” I nodded, swallowing down the lust in my body as she handed me the shaker.

“Your turn.”

I took a deep breath, started gathering the same liquor bottles she used, and repeated the process .

“Good.” She praised me as I poured the right amount into the shaker. “Have you bartended before?” She asked as I started shaking the drink.

“Kind of.” I shrugged. “Nothing on this scale.”

“Well, you’ve got the pour counts down, which is the hardest part for most.” She watched as I strained the drink into the glass and waited to see where it would end. “Bingo.” She said as the last drop left the glass completely full. “Impressive.”

“Thanks.” I set the glass down on the server’s station with the ticket under it. “You’re a good teacher.”

“So, who’s the hunk?” Nicole asked, nodding subtly to Zeke at the other end of the bar, watching me without recourse.

“Oh,” I swallowed, rubbing my hands down my jeans before grabbing another glass and a ticket from the printer. “That’s Zeke.”

“Evans, right?” Nicole glanced at him and smirked. “I’ve heard of him before, but I’ll be honest, I never understood the Boogeyman effect until now.”

“The what?” I frowned, glancing at Zeke, fighting the pull his crystal blue eyes had on me as he ran the rim of his glass over his bottom lip. Did he have any idea how seductive everything he did was?

Nicole chuckled. “He’s like the boogeyman. No one seems to know much about him, other than that he’s scary as fuck.”

“He’s not scary,” I argued, hating how one sentence raised my possessiveness over Zeke. “He’s intimidating, sure.” I shrugged, fighting to stop defending him like I had some claim over him. “That’s his job.”

“That’s his personality.” She countered, ignoring my discomfort. To be fair, she didn’t know me from Adam and didn’t owe me anything. “But it’s cool.” She winked at me as we crossed workstations. “I love a good dark and brooding man. ”

“Eh.” I groaned to myself, fighting that knee-jerk jealousy that Elora loved to pick on me about. “Does this one get an orange?” I asked, setting down another drink on the bar, even though I already knew it got a cherry. I needed to change the subject to safer terms.

“God, that man on the other hand.” She shuddered and sighed. “He looks like the kind of man that could make a girl beg for the boogeyman.”

“Can we not—,” I started and froze when I looked up to see her staring down at the other end of the bar.

Away from Zeke.

And directly at Diesel Ames.

Who wasn’t paying her the least bit of attention, as he stared directly past her at me.

Shit. He actually fucking showed up.

I whipped my head over to Zeke, who of course already had Diesel pinned in a death glare with his hands in fists on the bar top.

Double shit.

I backed away from Diesel’s end of the bar and went straight to Zeke, as if physically siding with him would ease some of the rage building behind his eyes as he stared at the Reaper’s President.

“I didn’t invite him.” Zeke glanced at me before returning his stare to his target across the bar after my quick stammer.

“Does he come here often?”

“I don’t know,” I replied honestly. “I’ve never seen him here.”

“I don’t share,” Zeke said effortlessly, looking back at me and leaning forward on his elbows. “Let me make that clear.”

“I don’t want him.” His intense stare forced me to swallow my fear and keep going. “I’ve never invited his attention.”

“You rode his bike.” Zeke tilted his head to the side slightly .

“That upsets you,” I stated plainly, trying to figure out the emotions in my head, battling the ones slamming into me from Zeke.

“You touched him.” He tightened his hand around his whiskey glass. “Long before you ever touched me.”

My mouth snapped shut in shock as his words sank into my brain.

Diesel’s stare burned the side of my face as Zeke, and I locked eyes; I knew I had to be firm with Zeke to prevent the situation from worsening.

I leaned forward with my elbows on the bar until our faces were only a foot apart. “You’re the only one I’ve ever let touch me , though.”

His nostrils flared, and the strong column of muscles in his throat moved as he swallowed.

“Laila,” Nicole called from the other side of the bar. “We’ve got orders.”

“I have to get back to work,” I said after a long pause, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed that Zeke didn’t say anything back.

“I’m not going anywhere.” He finally responded, taking a sip of his drink, and leaning back on his stool a bit.

“That sort of feels like a threat.”

“A promise.” He clarified as I backed up.

If I thought working under Zeke’s penetrating stare was hard before, it paled in comparison to the pressure of working while Zeke and Diesel sat next to each other at the bar.

And chatted .

They could have been talking about world peace or world domination, but the effect was the same.

I was shaking.

I tried staying busy, learning as much as I could from Nicole and the other bartenders after being surprisingly thrown behind the bar instead of at the podium out front. Honestly, that shouldn’t have surprised me.

Nothing should surprise me anymore.

But Zeke and Diesel, chatting and drinking at my bar, was enough to nearly blow me over.

At one point I secretly snapped a picture of the two of them sitting next to each other, with their dark and dangerous tattoos and fuck-you energy, and sent it to Carly.

Should I be worried?

Her response came almost instantly.

I’d probably lock myself in the cooler if I were you. Should I send Jed for reinforcements?

I shuddered at the mere thought of my brother showing up at the bar as well. The whole restaurant would melt to the ground from the testosterone alone.

Are you trying to start a nuclear war? Best not.

You’re probably right. If it gets too out of hand, use the soda gun to spray them down.

I snorted and pocketed my phone. Did people really do that?

“Hey.” Nicole slid up next to me. “Head home. ”

“Really?” I glanced at the time, “I’ve still got twenty-five minutes left on my shift.”

Nicole shrugged, pushing me out of her way to get to the sanitizing sink. “Peter gives the orders; I pass them down. Take it while you can get it.”

“Okay.” I wiped my hands on the towel and clocked out at the register. When I couldn’t hesitate anymore, I slowly approached Zeke and Deisel where they sat.

They both watched me get closer and stopped talking.

“Am I interrupting?” I questioned uncomfortably.

“Just talking business.” Diesel smirked with his gnarly playboy grin.

“Are you done, Dove?” Zeke asked, sliding his empty glass across the bar top.

“Yeah.” I slid my hands into my back pockets uncertainly. “It’s early, but I’m tired. So, I think I’m just going to head home.”

He quirked an eyebrow briefly before standing up. Diesel stayed put, other than sipping from his glass as he watched me.

“Let’s go.” Zeke nodded for me to come out from behind the bar and then glanced Diesel’s way. “Don’t fuck it up, D.”

Diesel’s snarly smirk did little to throw Zeke off, but it sent shivers down my spine. “I wouldn’t dream of messing up something so angelic.” His eyes slid down my body in his dominant way, and I hurried away from him.

Zeke led the way out through the still-crowded bar with his hand possessively on my back, steering me through the masses until we hit the sidewalk.

“What were you talking about?” I questioned him as he led me toward his black car sitting at the curb in VIP parking.

“Business.” He responded .

“Then why did he look at me like that when he said it?” I countered, not interested in dropping the topic with his brush-off answer.

“Because he likes to live dangerously on the edge of life and death, always one smart-mouth response away from taking a bullet between the eyes.” Zeke scoffed as if Diesel were some perpetually misbehaving child he had to discipline.

I dug my heels into the concrete and forced him to stop. “Does he traffic women?”

Zeke’s eyebrows creased, and he leaned against the side of his car, watching me. “Why would you ask me that?”

“That’s not an answer,” I complained and then took a deep breath. “I don’t know what he wants with me. All of my experience outside of my interaction with you leads me to believe that he does bad things to women.”

“Then why do you trust him?” He threw back instantly.

“I don’t.” I shook my head, confused. Then his words from earlier flew back into my mind. You touched him. Long before you ever touched me. “Zeke.” I sighed, hating that he felt like he’d somehow come in second place when he was the first and only man to ever make my body sing for him.

“Drop it.” He cleared his throat. “He doesn’t traffic women.

But he does have sex slaves who for the most part agree to their dynamic.

Though not all of them, and I’m not going to tell you anything else about it.

” He held his hand up when I opened my mouth to counter that information.

“What Diesel Ames does in his bedroom does not interest me, Dove. The only thing about him that I care about is business-based.”