Page 22 of Rogue's Path

“You don’t like flowers?”

What is he crazy?

The waitress sets down our order and walks away.

“I love flowers, like just about every woman on the face of this earth. Flowers make me happy. But flowers from a stalker…they aren’t fun. Then when he threatens to tie you to a bed and murder you…Well, that kind of ruins your day.”

The Bear shakes his head and hair flies everywhere. “What?”

“It's not a big deal. At least according to the police. So I did what any mature woman would do with the means. Ran.” I take a sip of coffee. No, this doesn’t deserve the title coffee. Burnt sludge describes it almost adequately. “Now I’m hiding out here for a while thanks to a friend getting married. And you’d think it would be all sunshine and rainbows, right? No. I gave my number to a man three…no four bars ago. The details are a little fuzzy about everything else but Mr. Tall, Dark, and Sexy.” I lean forward and whisper. “He’s killed people. And somehow, I sort of agreed to have lunch with him tomorrow without actually saying anything.”

He whistles. “You’ve had a busy weekend.”

Right. I pop some pretzels in my mouth and chew. This guy is definitely the cuddly teddy bear type. No way is he the villain of the story. “It’s only going to get worse. After I eat these chips and hopefully sober up enough, I’m going to have to stand on that bar and dance.”

That’s definitely a smile.

Doesn’t he know it’s wrong to smile at a woman’s pain? “If I don’t fall down and kill myself, I’m going to be shocked. Also, I’m going to drink myself silly at the next bar to make sure I forget this night ever happened.”

“Don’t fall.”

Like I have any say in that? “Have you seen my shoes? Falling feels inevitable.” I poke my foot out from under the table so that he can see my totally fabulous shoes. “Stilettos weren’t made for dancing on bars mostly almost but not quite drunk.”

He just stares at them.

I’m so going to break a leg.

***

“I’m so not going up on the bar.” Cordelia stares at it with wide eyes and wavering feet.

Good idea. “How many drinks did you get?”

“Four.” She holds up three fingers.

Well, this is just a dumpster fire waiting to happen.

The music comes on and I shimmy, wiggle, and hop until it’s time to jump… climb up onto the bar.

Two burly hands surround my waist. “Don’t fall.”

Then I’m on top of the bar.

Shorts were the right choice

But I get why people do this. If I can do this, I can do anything.

Shimmy, shake, walk, and stay on the bar.

Right as we get to the last kick, Mindy stumbles towards the wall of bottles.

I close my eyes, not wanting to see her crash into the glass.

But the only sounds are gasps, then cheers.

What? Someone caught her.

Crisis averted!