The three of them had spent the afternoon
drinking more pitchers of the frozen drink than they could count.
Callie had stopped drinking a couple of hours before Gavin arrived,
thinking it would be wise to be sober for the drive so she and
Gavin could carry on nice, meaningful conversation.
Except he hadn’t been interested in
conversation—nice, meaningful, or otherwise. And she’d tried
everything. She talked about Holden’s new developments. She asked
him questions about his current projects. She’d shown an interest
in his family, his college days, his high school days, and
everything else she could think of.
All she’d gotten for her efforts was a few
caveman-type grunts and then nothing but tense silence.
“Margaritas are definitely the way to go,”
she agreed.
She pulled her cellphone from her handbag and
typed a cryptic message to Gavin. If he were going to be rude and
walk away from her, she’d be rude in return. When she finished
sending the text, she returned her attention to the blond
bartender.
Callie needed to start being realistic and
logical about Gavin. It was painful to admit, but in the car, he’d
been as rigid as a diamond. But as he conversed with the bartender,
he visibly relaxed and was completely enthralled with the
woman.
Watching him rest the weight of his upper
body on his forearms, while leaning across the bar toward the
blonde, made Callie ache. He’d never shown that much interest in
anything she had to say. But the biggest shock had been watching
him laugh. Normally serious and focused on work, Callie had never
seen him cut loose like that.
What did the bartender possess that Callie
didn’t? It certainly wasn’t class. Huge silver hooped earrings hung
from her ears, and about a hundred bracelets lined her wrist. Then
there was the necklace and the low-cut revealing halter-top.
Callie looked down at her conservative silk
top, and her heart sunk. Jen was right. She was a prude.
Without being too obvious, she turned her
head and studied Gavin. Maybe it was time to give up. How many
years had she been at this without getting any closer? The problem
was, she’d dreamt of a life with Gavin for so long, she didn’t know
how to want anything else.
No, she wasn’t a quitter. She just needed to
try harder.
***
While pondering the relationship between
Gavin and the women, Sunny wondered if the brunette might be his
sister. But after watching that painful attempt at seduction, the
answer was obviously no.
Sunny actually felt sorry for the woman, who
tried her best to put on a show for Gavin. But as soon as she
dropped her mouth over the glass, he walked away.
“
I’ll
go over there and watch her suck
on that glass.” Sunny’s brother Robby’s mouth twisted wryly. “Or
anything else she’d like to suck on.”
Robby was a typical twenty-year-old male.
Anything in a skirt caught his attention. A short skirt, big boobs,
thick, flirty lashes, and long, red fingernails were the same as a
hook through the lip reeling him in. “Don’t you have glasses to
wash?”
Robby crossed his arms over his chest and
leaned back against the counter. “Nope.” He smiled smugly.
“Besides, from what I hear, there’s a good show out here that I
shouldn’t miss.”
There wasn’t any point in denying the
accusation, since everyone had witnessed her dog-in-heat imitation.
She turned away from Robby and dug into the cooler for Gavin’s
Budweiser. The chilled air cooled her heated cheeks and tempted her
to keep her head buried there for the rest of the night.
She uncapped the bottle and set it on the
counter, then flicked a surreptitious glance across the bar. Gavin
had stopped at a copper wall fountain, which happened to be one of
her favorite pieces. He brushed his fingers across the topmost
magnolia blossom in a gentle sweeping motion, and her body
responded as if he’d stroked her.
She always liked it when the customers
appreciated her pieces, but Gavin’s reaction made her heart flutter
a little more than usual.
Certainly more than it should.
He unclipped the phone attached to his belt
and read the screen. After shooting the trio of women a look of
disbelief, he shook his head, then stalked toward Sunny.
Robby dropped his arms to his side and
stiffened. “Jesus, Sunny. He looks like one mean son of a bitch.
Flirting with that is like poking a rattlesnake.”
Sunny turned and glared at her brother. She’d
admit Gavin’s scowl was a little frightening. But, on a primal
level, she found his intensity and commanding presence as much of a
turn-on as the sexy smile he’d given her earlier.
“Wait till he smiles.” Good grief, the dreamy
singsong lilt of her voice almost made her gag.
Robby looked incredulous. “He smiles?”
Sunny made a shooing motion with her hands,
as if trying to chase away a stray dog. “Go away.”
Robby grinned, leaned against the counter,
and crossed his ankles.
She should've known better than to try to
discourage him. In all the years he’d lived with her, he’d never
seen her with a man. This was fun for him, a novelty of sorts, and
he wasn’t about to miss it. Defeated, she blew a piece of hair out
of her eye and turned her back on him.
Gavin was almost to the bar when he stopped
midstride and unclipped his phone again. He looked at the screen,
then swiped a hand over his face and nodded to the beer. “Is that
mine?”
He looked more than a little exasperated, so
she grabbed a shot glass and held it up. “Yep. But you can always
change your mind and go back to the Crown.”
He laughed, shook his head, and dropped onto
the barstool. “No, thanks. This will be good.” Under his breath he
muttered, “In fact, it’ll be outstanding.”
She sensed Robby relaxing behind her and, if
she’d been ten, she would have turned around and said, “Told ya
so,” before blowing a raspberry in his face. Instead, she kept her
focus on Gavin and the dimple in his chin.
He lifted the bottle to his mouth, closed his
eyes, and tipped his head back for a long, deep drink. Imagining
him during sex with his eyes closed, head back, a similar look of
ecstasy on his face made her break into a ferocious sweat.
“Damn, that’s good.”
I can only imagine how good it would
be,
she thought.
After a long pull that nearly polished the
thing off, he set the bottle down with what could only be described
as controlled calm. He stared at the bottle as he absently ran his
thumb back forth through the condensation.
Sunny followed the graceful stroke of his
well-manicured thumb with rapt fascination. His hands were large,
but he had a gentle touch. Watching him stroke the bottle, in the
same soft, gentle sweeping motion he’d used on the magnolia
blossom, sent her imagination and pulse into overdrive.
How would he stroke her? The confidence he
emanated, as well as the intensity surrounding him, made her think
having sex with him would be like wrestling a gentle alligator.
What a deadly combination.
Coming out of his thoughts, he looked at her
and said, “The troublesome triplets would like a pitcher of
margaritas.” He clenched his jaw. “Strawberry.”
Questions bounced around in Sunny’s mind like
kids on a trampoline. Why was he in Anticue, a little barrier
island few people visited? Why did he bring three women… women he
didn’t particularly seem to like, with him? If Sunny followed her
body’s urge and went for it with this guy, would he shut her down
as he had the brunette?
What did he look like naked?
She was more curious about some of the
questions than others, but according to Bartender Handbook rule
number one: Never ask personal questions. Rule number two: Never
get involved with a customer. In nine years of tending bar, she’d
never broken those rules.
So why did Gavin make her not only want to
break those rules, but a few state laws, as well?
While Sunny whipped up the pitcher of
margaritas, Gavin took a moment to enjoy her sexy-as-hell necklace.
Talk about an instant hard-on. As soon as Callie pointed it out,
his cock had swollen to the point he needed to leave the table and
wander around in the shadows, waiting for his pants to fit
again.
How in the hell had he missed it before?
Her eyes. That’s how.
He was so fascinated by her nearly clear,
silver eyes he hadn’t been able to pull his gaze away from her
face. They were old-soul eyes that gave the impression she’d been
through a lot. They weren’t weary from life’s struggles, just wise.
And he was completely captivated.
Now that the necklace had been brought to his
attention, he found it equally compelling. His gaze followed the
diamond chain from her neck to the center of her breasts, where a
blue topaz held the lengths of chain together. The chains separated
on either side of the topaz and disappeared under the edges of her
halter-top.
He drew in a shuddering breath and pondered
several important questions. How did the ends attach? Were her
nipples pierced? Were her nipples sensitive? How would she respond
if he tugged on that chain with his teeth?
He wanted the answers to those questions so
badly his bones ached. He snatched up his beer and downed the last
of it in one gulp, chastising himself the entire time for being a
lecher.
He also waited for the young man standing
shotgun behind Sunny to put a fist to his face. But the kid only
glared.
“Need another?” Sunny asked.
“Another ten or twelve would be good. But not
right now.” He surrendered the empty bottle and shook his head. “If
I drank all I wanted, I wouldn’t be able to walk out of here, let
alone drive home.”
She smiled, and the room brightened like a
thousand-watt spotlight had been turned on. She opened her mouth,
then slammed it shut and pressed her lips together. She grabbed
three glasses and sat them on the tray. “Where is home?”
He couldn’t hold back his smile when she
snapped her mouth closed again and shook her head, as if disgusted
with herself for asking the question. He found her honest emotional
reactions refreshing and felt lighter and happier just being in her
presence.
With her blond hair piled on top of her head
and the freckles scattered across her nose, she looked like a
teenager. But, apparently, a vixen lived under that skin, and she
was the one who chose Sunny’s wardrobe. She was also the part of
Sunny’s personality that brought all kinds of down-and-dirty
lascivious thoughts to Gavin’s mind.
He shifted on the barstool and answered her
question. “I live in Myrtle Beach.”
“You’re not originally from there. You have
an eastern North Carolina accent.”
Not only pretty, but smart. What a turn-on.
“I didn’t hear a question in there, but you’re right. I’ve been in
Myrtle since college.”
She poured the girls’ drink into a frosty
pitcher, set it and three glasses onto a tray, then turned to the
young man still leaning against the counter behind her. When he
didn’t take the dirty blender from her hands, she shook it at him.
“Here, now you have something to wash.”
His eyes shimmered with amusement, and Gavin
realized that, in addition to Sunny’s curly, blond hair, he also
had her eyes. The kid laughed and took the container from her, then
disappeared through the kitchen door at the end of the bar.
“Kid brother?”
She tried to hide her smile, but gave up the
fight and laughed. “Yep. Twenty going on forty.”
“Has he always been this protective? Or do I
bring out the pit bull in him?”
She laughed and rummaged through a jar of
Dum-Dums on the counter. “We take care of each other.”
At this rate, the pitcher of margaritas would
be lukewarm before he got it to the girls, but he didn’t care. He
wasn’t ready to end his conversation with Sunny yet. He looked
around the bar and said, “This is a neat place. Who owns it?”
Her hand froze on the wrapper for a fraction
of a second before she slipped it off and slid the sucker into her
mouth. As he watched the candy disappear between her pink lips, his
body tightened and his mind became a blank slate.
Her eyes shot toward the room behind him, and
a mischievous expression crossed her face. She pulled the sucker
from her mouth, then licked her lips. “I think you’re in
trouble.”
High heels clicking on the hardwood floor,
along with a push of perfume, warned him of Callie's approach.
“Gavin?” She slid between his body and the barstool next to him and
rested her elbow on his shoulder. “Where's my drink?”
Locking gazes with Sunny, he said, “I’ll take
that beer now.”
She grinned, jabbed the sucker back into her
mouth, and reached into the cooler. The stick wiggled in circles as
she worked the candy with her tongue, and he almost groaned out
loud.
In a move guaranteed to cause him a
tremendous amount of grief, probably for the next ten years, he
picked up the tray and carefully handed it to Callie.
Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open.
“You aren’t going to carry it to the table for me?” She rolled her
eyes toward Sunny, and her upper lip curled. “Since she’s unwilling
to do her job and take it for us.”
An irrational need to defend Sunny sent a
wave of anger from his gut to his chest. “Callie, if you want this,
you’ll take the tray out of my hands. Otherwise, you’re shit out of
luck.”
If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he
wouldn’t have believed it. She actually huffed and stomped her foot
like a two-year-old. When his only response was to cock a
you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me eyebrow, she took the tray, turned on
her heel, then tottered back to the table.
Sunny set the beer in front of him, then
scrunched up her nose like she was about to sneeze. “You’ve
probably already picked up on this, but in case you haven’t… your
girlfriend’s not happy.”