Chapter 23 #2
“She thinks I’d hurt Briar, and she’s probably right.
But that’s not the only reason I should stay away.
I really need this job. I was going crazy at Big Catch.
Working with Briar is…” I rub a hand over my chest, trying to ease the ache.
But it’s a bitch of a feeling that won’t go away.
“If this works out, it’ll be everything I’ve ever wanted.
A dream job. A creative outlet. I can’t throw that away. ”
She plays that silent game of hers again for a moment. Then she says, “You didn’t strike me as a man who’d admit defeat before he even plays the game.”
I give her an incredulous look. “And you didn’t strike me as the kind of person who’d think any of this was a game.”
“Life is a game, Liam. Winning and losing are part of it, and they can both hurt. But we don’t get to experience any of it if we refuse to play.”
Her words are a sucker punch to the soul, but I lean back on the seat and say, “I’m a sore loser.”
“So perhaps I should be sitting here with Otis.”
I have to laugh at her boldness. “You’re threatening me?”
“I’m speaking factually. Our dear Briar deserves to be loved.
I’ve made it my mission to find her a partner.
” She smiles at me, her whole face leaning into it.
All of her wrinkles, I realize, are from forming this smile.
Decades’ worth of smiles live on this woman’s face.
“I think you’ll find that I am also a sore loser. ”
I swear under my breath, pushing the tea away.
“Does it vex you to think about her with another man?”
Vex me? It makes me want to flip the table.
“Sure,” I respond tightly. “But I’ve got no right. She’s not mine.”
She gives me another long look. “Drink your tea, dear.”
“Is this where you drug me, and I wake up in some kind of rehab community for assholes?” I glance down into the teacup. “Because I already tried that. Turns out anger management classes are just full of other angry people.”
“There’s nothing but love and tea leaves in that cup.”
“So you did drug it,” I say with a reluctant smile.
“If you choose to see it that way.”
I ignore the tea, my hand tapping the tabletop. “Look. I’m not going out with Briar. I like my balls where they are, and she’s my boss. It’s not happening. But I do want to make sure she has somewhere to go on Christmas. Can you help me with that?”
“Of course she’d be welcome to join my partner and me. But, as it happens, I know she already has other plans.”
“Oh?” I ask, feeling like an opponent in the ring has a one-up on me.
“Indeed. I’m sure she’d tell you all about what she’s doing if you were to ask.”
“She’s not going to her parents’ house?”
“No, thank goodness.”
So where is she going? Hannah’s gone, and Sophie left for the holidays too.
Otis.
He and his grandmother will probably be in town.
Dottie has been hinting that she thinks Briar might eventually come around to the kid’s obsession with her.
Could she possibly be right?
My mind skips back to the past—to a shitty groove I’ve worn into the record of my life.
Me screwing up with a woman. Another man stepping in with sympathy when it was most needed…
It’s happened before.
I can feel my mouth settling into a severe line, and even though my temples are aching, I want to hit the gym to release the awful feelings flooding me.
“Well, this was a lovely talk, my dear.” Dottie sips her tea as if she didn’t just throw me for a massive loop.
She’s not done yet, though. She skewers me with a look and says, “But I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t tell you that your life will still feel too small unless you let more people into it. ”
I almost tell her that I have let other people in.
I’ve buddied up with Mick, I like Travis well enough, Cormac wanted to get that drink, and I told the kid I’d give him boxing lessons.
But even as I open my mouth to say the words, I remember that I quit Travis’s band, I still haven’t followed up on Cormac’s invitation, and I haven’t asked the kid when he’s free.
Given what she just told me, I doubt I will.
I don’t really believe Briar has any romantic interest in Otis, but if I had to watch him twirl her around and kiss her and run his fingers through her hair…
Well, I think I’d fucking die. It wouldn’t be a good death, either, the kind that goes down in history books. It would be a pathetic, wasting-away kind of death.
I go to pick up the teacup, and yep, there goes the handle, snapping under my grip like it’s a toothpick.
“Shit, sorry.”
She shrugs. “It’s been known to happen.”
“Not everyone needs a big life, you know.”
She gives me a sad smile. “Maybe not, my dear. But you do. You deserve to take up every bit of space your body requires. Now, finish that tea.”
“So you can try to read the leaves? Hannah warned me about that.”
She winks at me. “I imagine she also warned you that it’s your quickest way out of here.”
I could just get up and leave. She’d be hard-pressed to stop me. But being rude to her would be different than being rude to my ex-boss or Briar’s horror-show parents. She’s a tough lady, a straight shooter, but she’s also good people.
So I lift the cup up, the jagged handle digging into my skin, and drain it.
Dottie smiles as she accepts the cup from me. She tips it over onto its saucer, rotates it a few times, and then turns it over.
“So what does fate have in store for me?” I ask after a moment.
She looks up at me, her eyes lively. “Oh, you mistake me, dear. I wasn’t looking at the leaves so I could tell you your future. I wanted guidance for my own path.”
“You’re seriously not going to tell me what you think is in there?” I ask, bemused.
“There’s no point in speaking the words if you’re not ready to listen to them.”
It’s as good as a dismissal, which I’ve been waiting for, but I don’t get up. Because there’s something else that’s been nagging at me.
“There’s this woman,” I say.
“I very much hope you’re not seeing other women,” Dottie says, a little tartly. “That would be foolish for—”
“No. There’s no one else.”
The satisfied look on her face says I’ve finally given something away without intending to, but I don’t backtrack from the truth. “It’s someone who’s been giving Briar a hard time her whole life. I think she might cause some trouble for us.”