“Welcome to Strawberry Springs.” He said it like it was an explanation.
“But I have to pay. You’re offering me a service.”
“We’re lucky here,” he said. “Between the show and other things, we aren’t hurting for money. And hell, if I’m lucky, you’ll come back while you’re here.”
He started to walk off, and I remembered my manners.
“Thanks, Mark!” I called, to which he nodded and got a drink for the man who’d sat next to me.
Huh. He’d been shockingly nice.
Was it because I knew Wren?
I didn’t get a chance to think too hard on it because the door opened. Mark looked up to welcome whoever it was who walked in.
But then he glared.
I knew I could learn a lot about the town from how they treated their least-liked residents. I turned too, certain I was gonna see their true colors.
The woman who walked in was probably my age with wavy hair dyed bright blonde. She was dressed to the nines in a short skirt and cowboy boots that had never seen a hard day of work in their existence. As she flicked her hair over her shoulder, she looked at everything as if it were beneath her.
And I immediately decided I didn’t like her either.
Was she one of the new people in town? Was she like all the invaders of Shady Acres who’d come in and taken it over?
God, I hoped she didn’t talk to me. I didn’t want my dick to shrivel up and fall off.
“Mark!” the woman called. “Can you get me one of those martinis?”
“I’ll need your card to open a tab, Brooke.” Mark’s voicewas flat.
Brooke crossed her arms. “You don’t ask anyone else that.”
“I haven’t had an issue with anyone else not paying,” Mark replied. “And I’m not asking Grace to cover you again. Lord knows she’s done that too many times.”
At the mention of Grace, my eyes shot up. Did Brooke know her?
I realized my mistake the second Brooke’s eyes met mine. Now she was smiling at me, and I hadn’t meant to let her know I even existed. I gave her a wave and went back to my beer. She wasn’t deterred.
“I haven’t seen you around,” she said. “And I’ve seen everyone.”
“I’m just passing through, ma’am.”
“Hopefully you’re staying long enough to buy a girl a drink?” She tilted her head to the side.
“Not really. Sorry.” Her eyes narrowed.
“Brooke,” Mark cut in, “you need to pay for your own this time. Don’t make me call Grace.”
“Are you seriously being a tattletale right now?” Brooke rolled her eyes. “Not everyone has to call my perfect big sister to watch me.”
Big sister.So Brooke was from here. They’d turned against one of their own. I didn’t blame them from what I’d seen so far. But how was a person like Grace related to a woman like this?
“Brooke. Your card.” Mark held out his hand. She slammed her card down.
Jesus. She was definitely over twenty-one, but she sure didn’t act like it.
“And just so you know,” she said to me, her tone now harder than I’d heard it, “if a girl out of your league is hitting on you, you don’t say no.”