A Stone in the Sea(6)

Good God, he was a sipper.

With shaky fingers, I touched my forehead and felt the heat there. Self-consciously, I tucked a thick lock of my long bangs behind my ear and did my best to clear the lump from my throat. Still, my voice was hoarse. “Let me know if there’s anything else I can get for you,” I said, fumbling as I backed away.

Every instinct told me I needed to run, that there was something about this beautiful stranger I couldn’t resist. What scared me most was the intensity of his stare telling me that he knew exactly what I wouldn’t be able to resist and he wouldn’t be opposed to using it against me.

I almost breathed a sigh of relief when I found him gone the next time I made my rounds, a hundred-dollar bill trapped beneath the empty glass. However, the overwhelming rush of disappointment distorted the relief.





WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING?

I stood on the sidewalk outside the old building. People milled around, laughing as they hopped from bar to bar along the popular river walk, out drinking their cares away.

It was super late, close to two a.m., and the crowds were beginning to thin.

And I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I shouldn’t be here.

Night clung to the sky like a blackened drape.

Oppressive and hot.

Like some kind of ominous warning telling me not to step through.

Maybe I was just looking to get laid, which was probably a damned good idea right about now, because maybe it’d undo the knot that’d had me wound up like a fucking kite all day.

But not here.

Because I was curious, and fucking curious and me usually turned out to be a bad combination.

Chewing at my lip, I leaned my shoulders back and craned my head to peer down the street, hoping for something else to catch my attention.

But whatever waited inside these old brick walls seemed way more interesting than anything else within a thousand-mile radius.

I pushed open the heavy doors to Charlie’s.

Last night I’d come to get away and tonight I found there was nothing I could do to stay away.

It was darker inside than out, country music pumping from the overhead speakers, which was hardly my thing, but it fit right into the vibe that anyone could come here and find something they liked. Last night they were playing some classic rock right before the live band was supposed to come on.

Which was the reason I’d been here in the first place. Anthony had suggested it, told me about this bar on the river that had live music almost every night. He knew the owner, too, said he was a cool guy, and he frequented the place whenever in town. He figured it’d be right up my alley, a place for me to unwind and escape when I got all twitchy and itchy and just needed the one thing that ever brought me peace.

Music.

Whether I was playing it myself, or listening to someone else bring it alive.

So I’d come.

What I wasn’t expecting was her.

That fucking gorgeous girl who’d swallowed me whole with just a glimpse. Last night I’d taken off because she’d left me unnerved and out of sorts, which I sure as hell wasn’t accustomed to feeling.

Control.

Learned a long time ago that it’s the only way to survive in this messed-up world.

And in five seconds flat, that girl had managed to make me feel like I was losing it.

So I’d jumped on my bike and hit the road—rode for hours with nowhere to go—with just the thoughts in my mind and the stirrings of a song fluttering somewhere in my subconscious as company. But even after I’d gone back to the beach house when it was nearing dawn and hashed out all those words on paper, there’d been no getting her off my mind. I had to see her again. Had to know if I’d been fucking hallucinating the strange connection I’d felt with her or if somehow it’d been real.

So here I was.

Curious.

Squinting, I allowed my eyesight to adjust. The place was busier than I expected just an hour before the town shut down for the night, but not packed like last night. My attention bounced around the room, seeking out the one thing I wanted to find.

My chest tightened when I did.

She was at the bar, leaning against it with her arms pressed to the top, talking to the older guy working behind it. Mounds of dark, wavy blonde curls, full and shiny and begging to have my hands wrapped in it, obstructed her face.

She had on a pair of frayed super-short cut-off jeans, which she wore with a pair of red scuffed-up cowgirl boots, showing off miles of long legs that were sleek and tanned, and suddenly had me questioning my control again.

Tonight she’d shed the flowy royal-blue blouse she’d worn yesterday in favor of a red tank top. It was a damned shame because I was dying to catch a glimpse of the creamy expanse of bare skin on her back that her shirt from last night had teased me with.