Unraveled(18)

"No, dumbass. And I don't think you should either,” Adam replied.

"Why, because of Will?" Tucker returned. More belligerence. Everyone at the table was watching this train wreck. We couldn’t look away. "At least I'm not fucking sisters."

This was apparently directed toward Finn because he leaned forward immediately and shot back, "No, you’re only trying to fuck your dead brother's widow."

Tucker's chair made a screeching sound when he stood up, fists at the ready. Finn had risen to meet the challenge and everyone on my side of the table tensed up. We were backing Finn. No question. But Adam stood and separated the two.

"Come on, Tucker, let's go upstairs." Tucker allowed himself to be dragged away while Finn stood glaring at the two of them. He kicked one of the chairs and then left the bar. A minute later, we heard the roar of a hemi engine as Finn drove away.

"Did I catch that right? Tucker Anderson is Sam's brother-in-law? And he wants in her panties?" Everyone nodded, wide-eyed. Yup, I'd gotten that right, which meant I’d gotten everything oh-so-wrong before. Well, shit. All the details clicked into place. Sam was a widow of a military guy who’d died over in the Middle East. Her brother-in-law was the crapbag who’d just taken off. And I was the fucker who’d accused her of cheating on her dead husband. I started toward the bar.

"Don't go there," Bo said warningly. “No need to save damsels you don’t even know.”

"Go where?" I pretended like I didn't know what he was talking about.

“She’s got all she can handle if her brother-in-law is looking for a poke," Noah added.

"Ugh, can we not talk about that poor girl like this?" Grace interjected.

"Sorry," we all mumbled. It was low class. She’d made the ultimate sacrifice, losing her man in battle. That had to be respected and I wasn’t leaving until I’d made amends.


Samantha

AFTER GATSBY’S CLEARED OUT, I came down and helped Eve cash out the patio bar. “The hottie that arrived with Adam left alone, or at least without a girl. Maisey was mad because he wouldn't even accept her number. Just said that she was too pretty for him.”

I ignored her and sorted and arranged the bills so all the numbers were facing the same direction. Orderly things made sense. Knitting a precise pattern of stitches into a blanket or socks made sense. Trying to figure out a new man? That did not make sense.

"He came up to the bar a couple of times. Like he was looking for someone,” Eve said.

My hand hovered over the bills for a moment as a little thrill inside of me surged up. He looked for me? No, stop it, I thought, and clenched my hand for a moment, the pain of my nails digging into my palm bringing me back down to earth.

Eve put out a hand to stop my counting. “Steve said you had a run-in with a customer and that’s why you hid upstairs all night. The patron he described sounded a lot like Adam’s new friend.”

I closed my eyes for a moment and then opened them to see Eve still staring at me. “Yeah, it was him. I kissed him.” I didn’t tell her that I virtually dragged him down the dark hallway and then climbed him like a pole and rubbed against him like a cat in heat until I was left with wet panties and a whole lot of regrets.

Eve squealed and clapped her hands. “Oh, Sam, that’s awesome. What happened next?” She placed her fingers under her chin for support and batted her eyelashes. “Tell me more. Tell me more. Did he put up a fight?”

I smiled at her use of the words from Grease. “No, Sandra Dee, he did not, but when he saw my wedding ring he was plenty pissed off.”

“Oh no.” She groaned and lifted my left hand. She grimaced slightly. “Do you think you’re ready to take that off? You definitely don’t want to be attracting guys who think it’s okay to hit on married women.”

“I hadn’t even thought of it that way.” I didn’t know if I was ready to take off the ring. Removing the band seemed to signal that I was ready for other things—like another relationship, another boyfriend, another husband. Experimentally, I tugged at my diamond, but there was little give to it, the knuckle preventing the ring from sliding any further off my finger. No, not ready for taking my ring off then. But the memory of Gray’s mouth on mine and the dirty words he’d growled in my ear made me think I was ready for something. The press of his body against mine was like taking the first sip of hot coffee in the morning. It woke me up and I was hungry for more. I knocked my head against the register. “I’m no good at this. It’s just one of a million reasons why I shouldn’t have been kissing Gray.”