CHAPTER 5
BLAIRE
I should’ve left.
The moment I walked into this bar and felt the weight of his stare, I should’ve run right back to my grandmother’s house.
Instead, I was still leaning against the bar, staring down at yet another empty shot of tequila.
Colt Calloway.
My pulse hadn’t settled since the moment our eyes met, and my skin still prickled where his gaze had touched it. He had mapped out every inch of me in those few minutes, sliding past my defenses and noting every way I’d changed.
He didn’t have to say a word. His eyes tracked over me, and I became hyperaware of my hair, my shorts, the flush in my cheeks.
Did he see it? The way I’d traded pieces of myself until I barely recognized the woman staring back at me?
I tossed back the shot, the burn not nearly enough to erase the sound of his voice or the way my stomach had flipped when he called me Strawberry.
I had practically lived a lifetime without him, yet he still had the power to unravel me completely.
I was more affected by him than I had ever been with Grant. If Grant had been here, he wouldn’t have told that cowboy he would break his hands if he touched me again.
But he would have had plenty to say to me.
He wouldn’t have come over here if you didn’t dress like such a whore.
You wanted him to hit on you, didn’t you? Did you want him to fuck you, too?
His accusations echoed in my mind like a record stuck on repeat, each play making them harder to dismiss as the lies they were. He had trained my doubt to surge forward before anything else could.
I raised my hand and motioned for the bartender to bring me another.
I glanced toward the door and considered slipping out, but then Maggie leaned closer to me, her shoulder bumping into mine. “You okay?”
The urge to tell her the truth was overwhelming.
I’d only known Maggie for a few hours, but being around her tonight made me realize just how lonely I’d been.
In Raleigh, I didn’t have my own friends.
Only Grant’s. There was no one for me to call when everything happened, no one to turn to. “I’m fine.”
“Are you sure?” She glanced over my shoulder, and I knew exactly where she was looking without turning around. “That was—” She motioned her hand back and forth between me and the space Colt had been. “—intense.”
“It’s history.” I shrugged as the bartender slipped another shot in front of me. “History that I’d rather not bring back up.”
“So you’ve been caught up with a Calloway?” She was still looking over my shoulder, and I wondered if she was looking at Colt or Hunter.
“Unfortunately.” I finally spared a glance in their direction, and all three of them were looking at us. Colt, Hunter, and McCoy had been inseparable when we were kids, and there was a time when I wanted nothing more than to be around all of them.
It didn’t matter that McCoy wasn’t a Calloway brother by blood. He had been one of them for as long as I could remember. Ever since his mother passed away.
“You ever wonder what it would’ve been like if you stayed?” Maggie’s voice was soft, but her words cut through me.
“There isn’t enough alcohol in this bar for that conversation.” I lifted my next shot and tapped it against hers. I was already feeling tipsy, but it wasn’t enough.
Maggie grinned before she lifted her own and threw it back. I followed suit, and this time I winced as the burn hit my throat.
I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, and Maggie’s gaze slid away from me and back to them. “So what about you? What’s going on with you and Hunter?”
She jolted as if my question shocked her. “What? There’s nothing going on there.”
“Be for real.” I laughed and turned until I could press my back against the bar. “You two had so much tension on June’s porch I started sweating a little.”
She scoffed, but it was weak. “Hunter and I are friends.”
“And why is that?” I glanced in Hunter’s direction, careful not to look at Colt. His fingers toyed with the label on his beer bottle, but it was unmistakable where his focus was. “He’s not looking at you like you’re friends.”
“Well, he should. Considering he’s my sister’s ex.”
“Oh, shit.” The way he was looking at her was like he wanted to eat her alive. Not like a man who used to date her sister.
“Yeah.” She shook her head. “Hunter Calloway is off-limits. It doesn’t matter that he’s insanely hot or charming or has the best ass in the state.”
I wanted to ask more, but I didn’t. Fair was fair. I didn’t want to talk about my history, so I had no right to ask about hers. She fiddled with the ring on her pointer finger, twisting it round and round.
“Fuck the Calloway brothers.” I grinned at her, feeling the tequila’s warmth in my veins. “They are not worth all this headspace we’re giving them.”
“That’s so true,” she laughed, “but it’s also hard when they won’t quit staring at us.”
I turned back to see them, and my eyes locked with Colt’s.
I thought he’d look away once he realized I caught him staring, but he didn’t.
Instead, he let his gaze travel over me slowly, lingering at my throat where my pulse hammered traitorously beneath my skin, then lower still, leaving a trail of heat that made me forget how to breathe.
The corner of his mouth lifted in a knowing half-smile that said he remembered exactly how my body responded to him.
“Should we leave? Maybe this was a bad idea,” Maggie asked, but I couldn't tear my eyes away from Colt's challenge. The tequila had turned my blood warm and reckless, and I found myself shaking my head.
“We’re not leaving.” I grabbed Maggie’s hand in mine before I pushed off the bar. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?” she asked as her laughter trailed behind us.
“If they’re going to stare at us all night, we might as well go over there.” I sounded braver than I felt, but my adrenaline surged with each step we took toward their table. Especially when Colt’s gaze lifted to mine again, and I saw surprise flicker in his eyes.
The three of them looked untouchable sitting there.
Hunter leaned back in his chair, his eyes tracking Maggie.
McCoy’s easy grin made him look too damn charming, and Colt looked like a storm.
The sun had browned his throat where his collar opened, and I wondered if the rest of his skin was that tanned.
I almost turned back, but I didn’t.
Colt lifted his chin, his gaze skimming over my face, and my pulse thundered as I forced a smile and dropped into the chair beside him.
“These seats taken?”
“Apparently they are now,” McCoy drawled with a grin as he leaned forward and placed his elbows on the table. He looked up at Maggie before gesturing toward the empty chair. “By all means.”
Maggie slid in beside me, her chair scraping against the floor as she pulled it closer until our shoulders touched. She flashed me a look, like she couldn’t believe we were really doing this, but I smiled at her, letting the tequila fuel me.
“To what do we owe this pleasure?” McCoy’s eyes flicked toward Colt before settling back on me. “Never thought I’d see the day you’d come back to Willow Grove.”
“I needed a bit of fresh air.” I crossed my arms and raised my chin. “Plus, June needs help with the farm.”
Colt’s scoff cut through the air, and my gaze snapped to his.
“Is there a problem?” I asked, plucking a beer from their ice bucket at the center of the table. I held his gaze as I twisted off the top and brought the bottle to my lips, the cold liquid sliding down my throat while a muscle in his jaw ticked.
“I just can’t imagine that June’s farm is really what brought you back.” He watched me as if he was sizing up every part of me. “She’s been needing help for years. Didn’t see you rushing home then.”
I flinched, his words hitting their mark, and my guilt rushed through me. “Well, I’m here now.”
“That you are.” Colt nodded, and the way he watched me made me want to crawl out of my skin.
“How long are you staying, Blaire?” McCoy asked, and even though his question was harmless, my chest tightened.
“I’m not sure yet. As long as June needs me.” I lifted my chin, and I knew I shouldn’t have said the next words before they even left my lips. “Why? Are any of you planning to tell me to leave like last time?”
McCoy let a curse slip past his lips, and Hunter practically choked on his beer. But Colt hardly looked affected by my words or by me.
“I guess that depends.” Colt watched me carefully.
“On what, exactly?” I leaned forward, closer to him, and I took another slow sip of my beer, swallowing the words burning on my tongue.
Maggie’s knee pressed hard against mine beneath the table, but all I could feel was the weight of Colt’s gaze.
“Is your fiancé going to be joining you, or did you leave him back in the city?” Colt cocked his head slightly, one corner of his mouth lifting, but his fingers tapped against the table as he studied my face.
Heat crept up my neck as I watched that calculated look in his eyes. He was baiting me—the same push and pull that used to light me up and set me off.
My fingers shook around my beer as I swallowed the urge to snap back at him. I needed to lay out the truth now, so he’d stop looking at me like he knew all my secrets.
“What’s your obsession with that?” I watched him carefully. “Are you dying for me to tell you I’m no longer engaged?”
His smirk faltered, the cocky edge dissolving into something softer, more vulnerable.
I couldn’t stop looking at the curve of his lips.
His bottom one was fuller than the top, and they parted enough to reveal the edge of his teeth.
The bar seemed to fade away until I could focus on nothing else. But then Hunter’s voice cut through.
“You two still fight like an old married couple.” Hunter laughed, and I jerked my gaze away from Colt’s mouth. “It’s like you never left.”
“Except I did leave.”
“And we were never a couple,” Colt chimed in, and his words affected me far more than they should’ve.