Even the Score(51)

“Whatever. I’m out. You guys have fun with this asshole tonight.” He pointed a thumb at me and walked away quickly.

When I turned back toward the group, all of their eyes were on me, staring incredulously. “All right!” I called out, clapping my hands together. “Who’s ready for some drinks?”

The next couple of hours flew by in a blur of tequila shots and beer. Dani and Ellie were having a blast, grinding up and down each other on the dance floor and singing so loud I was pretty sure that wherever Louie had crawled off to, he could hear them. Brody, Viper, and I sat at the booth, mostly sober. Neither of them drank too much when they were at the bar, just in case something happened that they needed to handle, and I wasn’t having more than a beer or two so that I would be completely sober by the time we left.

“So what’s your deal?” Viper asked carefully, with a smirk on his face as he looked at me. “Still denying that you like her?”

“What are you talking about?” I played dumb as I avoided eye contact by peeling the label off my bottle of beer.

He threw his head back dramatically and rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on. Give it up. From the way you were staring Louie down when you walked up to you almost ripping his arm off for calling Dani a bitch, it’s obvious, dude. Painfully obvious.”

I looked over at Brody, who just raised his eyebrows and nodded.

I shrugged, looking back down at my beer. “I mean, what can I say? We’ve been working together every day for a couple of months now, we’ve clearly gotten closer.”

“You’ve worked with Ellie for years, and you’ve never lost your shit like that over her,” Brody added. “Just sayin’.”

I swallowed as my eyes scanned the table, trying to think of what to say. Those two knew me better than anyone, so it was pointless to lie about what was happening. “Do I like her? Sure. Am I in love with her? No.” I lifted my head, finally looking back and forth between the two of them. “We’re coworkers. Technically, I’m her boss. Nothing can happen.”

“Except desk sex. Desk sex can definitely happen.” A wicked grin appeared on Viper’s face as he nodded.

“Are you hormonally imbalanced? You are constantly thinking about, and talking about, your dick,” I joked, shaking my head.

Before he could answer, a squeal from the dance floor caught all of our attention. A man had picked Ellie up and was spinning her around as she laughed. Brody and Viper both moved to get up, but I caught them. “Hold up. That’s her boyfriend, Kevin. She knew he was meeting us here.”

Brody nodded and sat back down while Viper stood and stretched, raising his arms high above his head. “I’m fucking starving. I’m gonna go see what Ruth has cooking in there. I’ll be back.” He tapped the edge of the wooden table with his fingers and walked off.

“All right, the walking hard-on is gone, be straight with me? You like this girl?” Brody asked seriously.

I nodded, looking over at her on the dance floor. “I do.”

I watched as Dani’s hips swayed with the music, her body moving in intoxicating, sexy movements as she danced with her eyes closed. Ellie and Kevin were tangled up together nearby, but she didn’t even notice. She was too lost in her own head, seducing the brains of everyone around her, especially me.

“I think you should go for it,” Brody said, pulling my attention away from Dani and back to the table.

“Huh?”

“I said I think you should go for it,” he repeated.

“What if I do? What if I tell her I like her, she tells me she likes me back, and we get together? We date for a while and then, like all good things do, it ends. Now what? What happens to my company?” I rambled the things I’d already been over in my mind.

“What if? What if you don’t tell her and she starts dating someone else? What if you tell her and she turns out to be the most amazing human you’ve ever met, aside from me of course, and you two end up married?” Brody ran his hands through his hair and dropped them loudly on the table in front of him. “Don’t what-if me, man. You know I’m an incurable optimist, and I’m always going to find the silver lining.”

“That’s a really annoying quality, you know that?” I joked.

“Yeah, well you can thank my wife for that.” Brody grinned.

“Your wife is awesome. You? Not so much.” I picked up the soggy, balled-up beer label and threw it at him. A buzzing sound caught our attention, and we both checked our phones.

Brody picked his up and glanced at the screen. “Not me.”

I looked down and saw that I had a text from Danicka. Confused, I swiped at the screen.