Loving Lilly (The Devoted Men #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Elijah walked swiftly along the pavement, weaving in and out of the crowds to get to Blue’s, the bar he owned.

He’d just spent the morning with his best mate, Mickey, talking about love, life and their work.

Mickey didn’t waste any opportunity of making fun that he hadn’t asked out the woman of his dreams.

Lilly Harrison spent every weekday lunchtime in his bar. She’d wandered in six months ago, looking lost and bewildered. He was besotted the first time he saw her.

Powering through the crowds, he was on a mission.

Not the kind he had when he was in the Navy.

This was far more grave. He needed to tell Elaine that he didn’t want to see her away from the bar anymore.

She’d talked him into going for a coffee one day.

Unusually, he’d said yes. Then he was compelled to say yes to a late night bite to eat and finally last week, they went to see an afternoon showing of an action movie.

Elaine had practically proposed marriage on the second date.

A text came through from Elaine as he hurried along. It made him stop in the middle of the pavement abruptly. Elaine’s text message had rattled him. She wanted to take him out for dinner this evening.

The stranger he’d bumped into when he started walking again, smiled at Elijah, gave an appreciative glance, and walked away.

He was used to women eyeing him up; it happened every night at Blue’s.

Elijah went back to studying the text message in front of him.

It was bad news. Not the end of the world news, but it signalled the end of his good mood.

It meant he had to find courage and tell her straight.

How he had managed to go from a movie date to his entire future mapped out, he didn’t know.

Elaine was clingy and needy. Elaine was a stunning woman, most men’s dream woman.

Long eyelashes framing cobalt blue eyes.

Her Italian heritage gave her the Sophia Loren appearance.

She had a cleavage you could get lost in.

Elaine was charming every time she came into his bar, and after a few weeks of chatting, she suggested a coffee date and he’d said yes.

That’s when she completely changed personality.

Elijah had never been comfortable with women chasing him, he found he liked to do the chasing.

It helped him to be in control. The expectations were much easier to manage that way.

It didn’t take long until Elaine became clingy and jealous of his job and his time.

She didn’t mind that he talked with women at Blue’s before he took her out for a coffee.

The next day at the bar where she was working, she didn’t like it.

Talking with his customers was a part of his job.

Elaine couldn’t handle him talking to any woman apart from her or his brother’s fiancé, Olivia.

It was bizarre that she thought he had a claim on him.

He knew the message he received today was about the other day when Elaine came into the bar and saw him talking to Lilly.

Elijah was in love with Lilly, even though it was unrequited.

Elijah wanted to rescue Lilly from whatever was making her miserable, but she wouldn’t let him in.

He tried to talk to her, but he only ever had an hour a day when she came in for her lunch at his bar.

He craved those sixty minutes and ensured that he was behind the bar when she walked in through the door of Blue’s. It was his favourite part of the day.

Except for yesterday.

Elaine was at the bar, chatting away at a million miles an hour.

Making plans for their future. He was only half listening.

Elaine’s focus was on meeting Elijah’s parents.

When Lilly had arrived, and Elaine hadn’t stopped her talk of meeting his parents, he grew frustrated.

He had no intention of Elaine meeting his parents, he would go to great lengths that she never met them.

The situation was out of control and he needed to stop it, immediately. That was today’s mission.

Elaine kept him talking the whole time Lilly was sitting at the bar, drinking her usual beverage.

Gazing over at her, he was lost in thoughts of spending his life with her.

Elaine had caught him staring more than once at Lilly and called him out on it.

Elijah had made up a story about being concerned about her, as she seemed sad. This angered Elaine further.

He had finally turned his focus and attention to Elaine and tried to block out Lilly, but it didn’t work when he had to keep asking Elaine to repeat herself.

Eventually, Elaine lost her patience and left Elijah to it, making a fuss of picking up her bag, and putting her coat on.

If Elijah were a betting man, he would have said Elaine was taking her time to allow him to persuade her out of leaving.

He didn’t stop Elaine and helped her on with her coat.

It was the same time Lilly was going, and that made his disappointment even more painful.

He hadn’t got his Lilly fix, and that would leave him miserable for the rest of the day.

Elijah watched as Elaine eyed up Lilly as she followed her out of the bar.

He could see that Elaine talked to Lilly briefly and worried for a moment about what Elaine had said.

Elaine could be a nasty bitch when she wanted to be, and Lilly was the loveliest women he’d ever met.

There wasn’t a nasty bone in her body. He wanted her, but she had her barriers up, and he couldn’t infiltrate her walls.

Re-reading the text message, Elijah thought about why she said she wanted to talk. It could only mean one thing. She was quitting her job or wanted to take their few dates more serious.

With a heavy sigh, he pocketed his phone and walked on to his beloved Blue’s.

He’d owned Blue’s for years, buying the premises when he came out of the Navy.

It was an old Victorian building, with high ceilings in the day bar and low ceilings in the night bar.

Elijah had bought it when it was run down and empty.

It had been a pub previously many years ago and was derelict when he bought it.

After renovations, he opened Blue’s. The day bar had a comfortable, deep red armchairs, and airy high ceilings with glittering chandeliers.

It was a place you felt instantly at home in.

This part of the building closed at around six o’clock and then the night bar opened.

This part of the bar was intimate and seductive.

The atmosphere drew you in. The moment you stepped over the threshold, you already felt you were having a great night.

There was nothing specific you could put your finger on, but the ambience was there.

Technically, Elijah didn’t currently own the deeds to the place.

The last bet he had made with his brother Jack he had lost. The ownership had passed back and forth a dozen times or more over the previous few years.

Their parents held the deed, and a post-it note on the front of it dictated who currently owned the bar.

The ownership changed depending on who won the last bet.

The change in ownership reminded him he needed to make a new one.

The previous wager that was discussed involved Olivia agreeing to marry his brother, and Elijah had lost. Maybe he could bet who made it down the aisle first, him or Jack.

Jack was pushing Olivia to get married, and she wanted to wait, but Jack was impatient and wanted that ring on her finger.

Something was holding Olivia back, and he didn’t know what it was.

Jack was oblivious and had planned the biggest wedding Edinburgh had witnessed outside of a royal wedding.

Jack wanted everyone he knew to know he wanted Olivia now and forever.

Olivia, on the other hand, wanted a quieter affair but didn’t get a choice.

It was rare for anyone to go against anything that Jack wanted.

This was no exception. The two of them were perfect for each other.

Arriving at Blue’s he looked up at the neon sign and grinned.

He loved being here, which was fortunate, as his apartment sat above the premises.

Pulling open the door, he walked in and up to Elaine.

Elijah arrived inside and scanned the room.

He looked over to where Elaine would be and saw her dressed in overalls painting the wall.

Blue’s had commissioned her to paint the back wall.

He regretted that decision the moment he agreed to it.

Helping Elaine was Elijah’s priority at the time.

Elaine was a freelance artist that specialised in murals for business premises.

She hadn’t had a commission for work in months, and he needed his mural painted on the wall of his bar.

Her idea for the wall was ingenious. It created the illusion of another room to expand the naturally dark area of the bar.

The drawings looked like you were looking in on a decadent party and wanted to be a part of the Venetian 18th-century masquerade ball.

Elaine had made little progress in the last month, and the area was filled with pots of paint, ladders and floor coverings. She’d started working on the wall after they signed the drawings off, which was last month.

He prepared to end it. No matter what she said, he wouldn’t carry on with any causal dates. She could finish the painting, but that was it.

He stood directly behind her and watched as she bent down for a paintbrush. The curve of her bottom in the overalls didn’t excite him as much as it should. These thoughts were further confirmation that he didn’t want her, even if Lilly didn’t want him.

“I got your message, Elaine. What do you want to talk about?” Elijah said, his voice impatient and monotone.

“Oh hello darling, there you are,” Elaine replied without turning around. She carried on mixing the paint and pouring it into the tray, ready for the roller. She was priming the wall first before the sketching work started.

“What was so urgent that you needed to see me?” Elijah asked.

His tone, more than the question, prompted her to turn around. Elijah wanted to know what she had to say, but looking at the thunder in her eyes made him take a step back. His impatient tone had angered Elaine, and he didn’t like her venomous stare, it made him instantly uneasy.

“Elijah, is there a reason I have to justify asking to see the man I am dating? Are you fed up with me, because you never want to see me at the moment? You refuse to let me meet your family or have sex. I have a high sex drive, and you deny me.”

“Why do you keep pushing to see my family? We’ve been out three times. What is this about? As for the sex, if that is all you want from me, then you will be disappointed,” Elijah replied.

He baulked at the idea of having sex with Elaine. Sex was something he wanted only with one person, and she would arrive any moment now.

“It’s normal, Elijah, to introduce your girlfriend to your family. So, what is it to be Elijah? Are you going to introduce me to them or not?”

Elaine stood there with her hands on her hips, blowing a stray hair out of her face while she glared at him.

She wanted an answer, and Elijah didn’t like being given an ultimatum.

At the start of their relationship, he had told her he wanted nothing serious, and she had agreed to it.

Why was she now changing the goal posts?

Wasn’t helping her with a commission enough for her?

She had stretched out doing the artwork for the bar long enough.

He suspected the delay was solely to drag out the relationship, but this demanding to meet his parents was a deal breaker.

“You’re not my girlfriend. So, no, I won’t introduce you to them. I’m ending this now, whatever you think we have. You can still finish the commission piece on the wall. No hard feelings.”

“Wow Elijah, you’re an unfeeling bastard, aren’t you?”

“We’ve had three dates in four weeks. Casual, remember? I’m not cold, just not interested in taking us to the next stage,” Elijah said and fidgeted on the spot so he could get a direct view of the bar and still talk to Elaine.

The truth was, if Lilly let him, he would take her to bed and then the next day present her to his parents wearing an engagement ring.

But Lilly showed little interest in him apart from small talk.

He had spotted Lilly walking in a few minutes ago, and his heart beat faster for a few seconds.

First, he had to deal with Elaine standing in front of him, knowing that Lilly was in the same room, probably watching the car crash happening.

It equally thrilled Elijah that she could see he was about to be single and hoped that was why she didn’t respond to his flirting.

“Just as I thought, this was a non-starter. It’s a shame, Elijah, we could have been good for each other. Never mind, now leave me to get on with this painting,” Elaine said.

Elaine turned around, ending the conversation.

If Elijah wanted to say anything else, he was going to have to talk to her back.

He wasn’t going to, so he shifted his gaze from her paint-splattered overalls and to the bar.

His eyes locked on Lilly’s. Her face and eyes were not smiling, they were simply staring at him, asking him a question.

He suspected she was asking what was going on and was he ok, but without words he was guessing.

He was dumbstruck by the connection and couldn’t move his head to answer her question.

Instead, Elijah turned his entire body and walked to the other bar, out of her sight.

He didn’t want to know what she thought, while she could consider the worst. He couldn’t stand the thought of her thinking that he was an idiot and she no longer wanted to speak with him.

It was a bizarre idea because the worst she could think about was that he just ended a relationship.

It scared him to death that he was now single, and there wasn’t anything stopping him from pursuing Lilly.

What if Lilly didn’t want him? That would break his heart.

He’d hidden behind his job to chat with Lilly from afar.

Over the last eight months, they had got to know each other over lunch every day.

Now he was single and open to court her, to have a relationship with her, and it terrified him.