Sleeping With Her Enemy(6)
“That’s because it’s not that light beer crap you usually drink.”
She swiped her tears and smiled. That was more like it. “I’m going to the bathroom for a sec. I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll be right here.” He caught her eyes in the mirror behind the bar. “Sweetheart.”
…
Goddamn. Amy Morrison was a hot mess. Emphasis on the mess part. No, emphasis on the hot part. Well, it was a tie. Dax blew out a breath, feeling a little like he was in the eye of a storm. Hurricane Amy part one had passed, and he was hunkering down for part two. Who knew which version of her was going to come out of that bathroom? The brokenhearted girl who didn’t yet see that her asshole ex had stopped her from making a huge mistake, or the maddening little tart who thought she could just lean in so close she was practically on his lap. She smelled like strawberries, for fuck’s sake. Had that always been the case and he just never noticed, or was that some kind of special wedding perfume bullshit?
He sighed. Contrary to what she thought, he wasn’t a total cad. She brought out the worst in him. Really, he was just a partial cad. Anyway, he couldn’t have just stood there, watching her sob in her office. So a drink at Edward’s, the office watering hole, had seemed the logical thing to suggest.
But now what? Was he going to be stuck babysitting all evening while his charge got drunker and drunker and overshared about Dr. Vajayjay? But since she and Mason lived together, it wasn’t like she could just go home. Maybe he could put her into a cab to her parents’ house, or even to Jack’s. Jack and Cassie could deal with her.
He had just pulled out his phone when he spotted her, weaving across the bar toward him.
The red lips were back.
She’d cleaned herself up in the bathroom, and now “hot” was definitely winning out over “mess.”
“My phone is going insane,” she declared, crashing into him as she overshot her stool. He was forced to bring his hands to her upper arms to right her. It was impossible not to notice how smooth they were, how ridiculously soft. As soon as she was safely upright, he dropped them like hot potatoes.
“Cassie is trying to hold them off.”
“Them?”
“Everyone. My parents. My brother. Everyone’s trying to find me.” She grabbed her beer bottle and drained it. “That can’t happen. I gotta get out of here.”
“Where do you want to go? I’ll put you in a cab.”
Eyes narrowed, she looked around the bar like she was casing the joint. “Not where. Who.”
“Excuse me?”
“Is this dress too obviously a wedding dress?” She looked down at herself. “I don’t think so, right? Ha! Finally vindicated in the nontraditional choice that gave my mother the vapors!” She scanned the room. “I’m going to pick up a guy.” Her eyes lit on a pair of fortysomething men on the other end of the bar, and she tilted her head, considering.
A hot jet of anger shot through him. “Like hell you are.”
Still-narrowed eyes turned on him. “You are not the boss of me.”
“You’re drunk.” He picked up the engagement ring that was still lying on the bar and tried to hand it to her. “It’s your wedding night.”
She recoiled from the ring like Superman facing kryptonite. “It’s not my wedding night. Haven’t you been listening? That’s the whole point.”
He didn’t miss the little hitch in her voice. She was putting on a brave front. But she was drunk. And delusional if she thought he was going to sign off on her going home with some random guy in her current state. He hadn’t missed the looks she’d been getting. The stockbroker types who frequented this bar thought she was with him, which was the only reason she didn’t have a lineup of them vying for the job of taking her home.
“I’ve been with Mason since I was twenty-two. That’s seven years, Dax. Do you know what that means?”
He pocketed the ring. He’d give it back to her later. She couldn’t be trusted now not to throw it away or give it to a stranger. Not that he thought Mason deserved it back, but she should at least pawn it and fly off to Vegas with her girlfriends or whatever women did in situations like this. “I see what you’re saying, but—”
“That means,” she said, pounding the bar for emphasis, “that I haven’t had sex with anyone but Mason for seven years. Almost my entire twenties.” She lowered her voice. “He cheated on me once, you know.”
“What?” There was the rage again, but stronger this time. His fist twitched like it had a mind of its own and wanted to punch someone. “And you were going to marry him anyway?”