Page 2 of Soft Rebound (Mad City Moments #2)

Liz

H e looks like a fucking god.

He’s completely doing it for me.

His head is shaved and he has a nicely trimmed dark-brown beard. Dressed in a button-up shirt and slacks, he reminds me of a lumberjack on his way to Sunday church.

My mouth feels dry.

Ridiculously large men in incongruous office attire appear to be my type now. Who knew?

“So what do you say?” he asks.

“What do I say to what?”

“Would it be okay if I joined you? They asked me if I wouldn’t mind sitting at the bar because I’m solo, and it seems they asked you, too, so I figured we could sit together and keep the table.”

“They offered me a free drink if I move to the bar.”

His eyebrows shoot up. “Seriously? They offered me no such thing. I guess you’re going to the bar then...”

“Maybe I should.”

He grins. “You don’t want to, do you?”

“Not really,” I say. “I like this table. Unobstructed view of the TV, plus I’m in the corner so no one bothers me...”

“Except me.”

“Except you. I guess I didn’t send strong enough fuck-off vibes.”

His face turns serious. “Look, I’m sorry. If you want to be left alone, I’m not going to bother you. But I promise I’m not bad company to watch football with, and I thought maybe we’d both need someone to vent our frustration with the Vikings defensive line.”

I consider him carefully. He seems genuine so far, but it’s too early to relax.

“I will leave if you really want me to,” he says. “I certainly didn’t mean any disrespect.”

“You can stay.”

He smiles, the kind of smile that lights up a person’s whole face, and I’m struck by how beautiful it is. He’s got that amazing thick beard and gorgeous teeth, and while he’s not classically handsome, my God, that fucking smile could power this whole bar.

I think I might be blushing. Am I blushing?

“So what kind of beer is that and is it roofied?” I ask as I nod toward his pitcher, trying to stay breezy amid feeling unsettled in several conflicting ways. I should stay safe-—he is a stranger. But I really want to get closer to him, somehow.

“If it’s roofied, I’ll be down for the count soon,” he says. “I drank from it myself.”

“Maybe you put something in if before you got to my table.”

“Jesus.” He looks at me like I’m crazy. “I promise you the beer is fine. But we can get a fresh pitcher, if you want. You can pick it up and I’ll pay for it.”

“Just pour yourself some and have a drink,” I urge.

He fills his glass and takes several gulps. I’m mesmerized by the contractions of his throat. Have I ever paid attention to a man’s throat before?

When he’s done, foam is stuck to his beard and mustache, and he wipes it off with the back of his hand. Why does that look so hot?

“Happy?” he asks.

“You have shown yourself not to be a date rapist,” I say with faux seriousness. “So what kind of beer is it?”

“Moon Man.”

“I’ve never heard of it.”

“It’s a local beer. What are you drinking now?”

“Coors Light.”

“Well, Moon Man is gonna be more hoppy than that. More bitter. But I think you’ll like it.”

I drink down everything from my glass and feel ready for the challenge. “Okay, hit me. Just half a glass, please.”

“As you wish, milady.” He pours with a one-sided smirk.

I take a small exploratory sip, and he’s right. It’s more bitter than what I usually drink, but I enjoy the taste.

“It’s good,” I say. “I like it.”

He beams, and it’s like the sun has sat next to me.

“So what’s your name?” he asks.

“Melanie.”

I ... lied.

Why did I lie?

Melanie is not my name. It’s the name of my cousin Chloe’s friend, the woman from whom I’m subletting an apartment.

The sublet has been a godsend, because I left my life in Minnesota in a hurry and I’m currently hiding, and it works for Melanie too, because she had to leave her place thanks to a caretaking emergency.

I guess I kind of live her life now? I kind of am her?

“Melanie,” he says like he’s trying it out on his lips. “That’s a nice name.”

“Thank you.” It feels weird and more than a little disingenuous to accept a compliment on behalf of a woman I barely know. “And what’s your name?”

He looks at me in confusion. “Joe. I believe I mentioned it when I came over... Did I?”

“I might have been processing several different inputs when you showed up,” I say. “The pitcher. The chair.” I wave in his general direction. “All this.”

“All this?”

“You know. All. This,” I say as my fingers fly, pointing to his face and chest. “It was a lot to take in.”

He frowns, and I realize he might be self-conscious. “Good a lot or bad a lot?” he asks.

“Good a lot. I thought you looked like a god,” I blurt out, deciding to pretend I only said it to make him feel better.

His eyes widen and there , there’s that panty-dropper grin again. Absolutely devastating.

“Are you sure you didn’t put something in this beer?” I ask and take another sip. “Maybe the truth serum?”

“You’re a delight, Melanie,” he says, his lips still curled up at the corners. “And I thought so way before you said I looked like a god.”

“Way before? You mean in the ancient history spanning the one minute of our acquaintance that preceded my ill-advised bit of flattery?”

“Before that. I noticed you when you walked in. Have been watching you ever since.”

Alarms go off in my head and my back stiffens.

“No, no, it’s not like that.” He’s noticed my discomfort, both palms up and shaking side to side to indicate he absolutely didn’t mean what I’d inferred. “Jesus, I am so rusty. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to freak you out. It’s nothing like that. Nothing creepy.”

“So how is it then?” I lean back and cross my arms, sirens blaring in my head. “And why the hell were you sitting there alone anyway?” God, I drank half a glass of his beer. Who knows what’s in it? I’m so stupid.

“Please calm down,” Joe says, his outstretched palms pushing down on nothing in a soothing gesture.

“Look, I was supposed to meet my brother-in-law at 7:00. I can show you his texts.” He pulls out his phone.

“I haven’t seen him in ages. He lives in Milwaukee.

But he hasn’t shown and, honestly, I’m a little worried that something happened on the way. ”

“What kind of brother-in-law?”

“What do you mean?”

“Who married whose sibling?”

“Oh! I was married to his sister. Until two years ago. He’s an ex-brother-in-law, actually.”

“What’s her name?”

“My ex-wife’s name?”

“Yes.”

“Kim.”

“How long were you married?”

“Ten years.”

“Tell me what happened. With your marriage.”

Joe looks to the side. Wrings his hands. Takes a sip of beer. Looks up at me again.

Finally, he sighs and decides to speak. “We wanted different things.”

“I will need more than that,” I say. I still sound stiff, although I’m beginning to relax.

Joe’s eyes meet mine. “This is all so I would convince you that I’m not creeping on you?”

“Yes.”

“You need more details on why my marriage fell apart for that?”

“Yes.”

He shifts in his chair, looking very uncomfortable. “I’m not sure I want to avoid sitting at the bar that much.”

“Yes, you do,” I say and point at his entire person. “Look at how big you are. You’d be all scrunched up at the bar, no room for your legs.”

“You’re not wrong. And you seem well versed in tall-people problems.”

I shrug. “Happen to face them myself. And they run in the family.”

His eyebrows shoot up, as if his interest has been piqued. “You have tall siblings? Parents?”

“Yes and yes. But enough about me. I’m not the one trying to prove I’m not a creeper.”

Joe takes a deep breath. His elbows rest on the table, fingers interlaced before his face. “So. My failed marriage.”

“If you please. Or you move to the bar. Or I bring the waiter over and tell him you’ve been bothering me.”

“You wouldn’t!” He seems almost hurt at the thought.

“I would.”

He sighs. “Jesus Christ. Okay. I can’t believe I am telling the story of my life’s biggest failure to a complete stranger. A charming, lunatic stranger, but a stranger nonetheless.”

“Thanks for the compliment. And quit stalling.”

His palms are up in a defensive stance again.

“Okay, okay. Kim and I met in college, dated, got married when I started law school. We’re both from Minnesota but managed to get jobs in Wisconsin—Milwaukee actually—so we moved.

It was good for a while, a few years, but then came the talk of children.

I’ve always wanted kids and she said she’s never dreamt of being a mother but might do it for me. ”

I nod.

“Only she kept dragging her feet. She wanted us to buy a house, then for us to hit this or that career milestone, and before you know it, we’ve been married eight years and she’s still not sure if it’s the right time.”

“So you broke up?”

“Not right away. The thing is, she did get pregnant. One of those things where birth control pills lose their efficacy if you take antibiotics. I was ecstatic at first—everything I’d ever wanted was coming together. But Kim got more and more subdued with each passing day.”

“She wasn’t happy to be pregnant?”

“No.” His face twists at the memory. “Then she had a miscarriage. I was devastated and she seemed so ... relieved. Overjoyed, even. I... I couldn’t believe it. It broke my heart that she was so happy to be rid of it.”

I meet his eyes and he looks so wounded, there’s no way he’s making this up. Or if he is, I’m sitting with the next Ted Bundy, and this is the last anyone will have seen of me.

I reach out and squeeze his hand. “I’m so sorry, Joe.”

“Thank you,” he mutters, looking at my hand on his.

“Then what happened?”

“That was the beginning of the end. We started fighting; we’d never fought before.

I couldn’t forgive her. Her relief. She said I was imagining things.

But I wasn’t. I know I wasn’t. And eventually we had a big showdown, and she told me she’d never wanted to have children, period.

That I was the asshole who didn’t love her enough to stay together without the kids. ”

I squeeze his fingers. He squeezes mine back.