A muscular someone.
Tattooed hands gripped my hips to steady me, but they didn’t move once I was stable. Nope. The hold tightened, his fingertips digging into the softness there.
I tipped my head back to scowl at him.
My fake boss.
My fake boyfriend.
My very real enemy.
Okay, that was probably a strong word, but I was still stewing in my anger.
His forced innocent smile didn’t help matters.
“What?” I snapped quietly.
He kept one hand on my hip and used the other to lightly skim my chin to tilt it up. “Sorry. Would’ve been here earlierbut everyone and their damn mother wanted to ask about what happened.” His grip on my chin tightened. “Thought you’d be happier to see me, hellcat.”
I’d been too distracted by my hangry food rage to pay much attention to the name last time.
I couldn’t say I hated it.
“Always happy.” Slipping into my role before I blew it, I gave him a wicked smirk of my own, and his mesmerizing eyes—more blue than green in the moody lighting—dropped in an instant to stare at my mouth. I lowered my voice to a sultry whisper, “Ireallyneed to jack something…”
His widened gaze shot back up to meet mine, and I used his stunned distraction to shift from his hold. I reached around him to pluck the bottle of whiskey off the shelf and finished fixing the Jack and Coke I’d been working on. I slid it to the waiting customer and moved to the tablet at the other end of the bar to add it to his bill.
I was already expecting Rhys before his heat hit my back. “It’s like that, is it?”
“You started it, barman.”
He grumbled something I missed before lowering his head so his lips were right by my ear. “You doing okay?”
I nodded. “No issues.”
That time, he didn’t grab my hip. That time, his large hand squeezed the side of my thigh as his smoky voice murmured, “Good girl.”
I tilted my head to look back at him in time to catch the challenge in his cocky smirk. My mouth was curved in a happy smile even as my narrowed gaze flung daggers at him.
If that’s the way he wants to play things…
This is gonna be fun.
The rest ofthe nightwasfun.
Just not in the way I’d meant it.
The showing of support hadn’t waned. The late shift bartenders and servers who’d clocked in at eight helped spread the workload a little thinner, but it was still chaotic.
But the mood stayed good. Happy. No one had bitched about the crowd or even seemed surprised by it, which made me wonder if it was more than just a fluke. Maybe most nights were like that.
Kase dragged Harlow away around eleven since they had to be up early for her little sister’s birthday. Chuck took off shortly thereafter. I’d thought I would be ready to collapse on the couch in the back room when the time came, but I was a night owl by nature and necessity. Since I had to stick around for coverage in case something happened, it made sense to stay on to help.
And since staying around had also scored me one of those amazing burgersandsome battered fries, I was even happier to do it.
“I’m driving you home,” Rhys demanded from behind me as he again squeezed my thigh for absolutely no reason. Alice and LaQuin—a server and bartender respectively—were the only twoin the front of the house, and neither were paying attention as they moved efficiently through their end-of-night tasks. But he did it anyway. The same way he’d been doing it throughout the night.
What the hell is his deal with that?