Chapter 10
10
Skye Simmons
“I don’t know about this,” I say, tugging on my skirt. A skirt I’d never wear if chosen on my own. But two hours ago, Vivian showed up at my place with a bag and a smile after I’d made the mistake of telling her Tori was staying at a friend’s for the evening.
Yep a night to myself, where I’d planned to have a hot bath, a glass of wine, and maybe read a good book was quickly shot down.
“We’re going out!” she announced, there was no question in her words. She’d already made up her mind and when that happens there isn’t anything to stop her.
Vivian and I had become great friends fast but the one thing I knew very well from the start was she doesn’t take no for an answer. I’m not sure she even knows the word.
“Will you stop tugging on that?” Swatting my hand like I’m a child she offers a humph and keeps walking toward the lit up sign above an entrance.
Ruby’s.
“You look amazing,” she states, pausing just outside. “I’d kill for those legs, and your ass is perfect. That skirt only complements your figure. You look like a walking hot sex ad. Will you stop tugging on your clothes and get inside.” She says it all so fast it’s almost like she’d been rehearsing it and all I can do is stare at her.
“What?” she asks, throwing her hands up in the air.
Someone exits the bar and the music from inside filters out.
“Have you never gone to a bar before?” I narrow my eyes at her and she laughs.
“Yes, for your information I have gone to a bar. I’m not a nun.”
“Are you sure?”
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re an asshole?” Even if I’d wanted my words to sound harsh a smile couldn’t hide the humor I was feeling.
“Fine,” I say, lowering my voice as I step in closer to her. “It’s been a while,” I admit.
“A while?” Vivian pushes a little more. “Six months? A year?”
“Three and a half.” I shrug.
“Wait.” I can almost picture the wheels turning in her mind. “You’re twenty-two.”
“Yep.” I nod, looking behind me as the door to the bar opens again.
“So that would mean you were what,” Viv pauses counting with her fingers out in front of us.
“Nineteen,” I answer for her and her eyes widen.
“Oh my, Skye.” She giggles when she rhymes her words unintentionally. “It would seem you do have a rebellious side.”
I shrug.
“So what happened?”
Suddenly I am feeling very vulnerable and if it was anyone other than Vivian I’d shy away and catch the first cab out of here. But she was, is, the only true friend I have.
“My parents died.” Her expression instantly softens. “One night I was a nineteen-year-old college student, enjoying my first taste of freedom after moving into a dorm. I was doing things outside of my comfort zone, I was truly getting a sense of myself and not caring about the next day. I was living in the moment, laughing and flirting.”
I nibble on my lip, trying not to allow my emotions or the memories of the night that changed everything resurface.
“Overnight I’d become a single mom to a young girl. I was dropping out of college, getting a job, and worrying about how I was going to pay next month’s rent. None of my friends wanted to hang around with a girl raising a pre-teen I was no longer the one that was comfortable sneaking into bars and flirting with bouncers. I wasn’t the girl that would flash the bartenders for free drinks anymore.”
“You did that?” She seems impressed triggering me to smile.
“Twice.” I hold up two fingers then pause. “Okay three times if you count the street festival.”
“Oh honey.” Vivian moves in and throws her arm over my shoulders. “You’re my hero.” I would think she was making fun of me had I not heard those words from her before. Vivian isn’t someone that says things she doesn’t mean. She may be sassy and sarcastic, but she is also honest and loyal. “And none of those bitches were your true friends, not if they bolted the first time things got rough. However just because you have a teenager at home it shouldn’t mean you forget live for you too.”
Again I bite at my lip nervously.
“Remember what we told Luann.” The woman with the new baby at home that had stopped taking care of herself the moment she brought her baby home. “Tori adores you, but she also is a smart kid and she knows what you’ve sacrificed for her. She knows what you continue to sacrifice, and your happiness shouldn’t be one of those things.”
“I’m happy,” I correct her and she hugs me tighter.
“Okay fine, but wouldn’t you be a tad bit happier if you had the occasional orgasm too?”
“Oh my God!” I hang my head and she laughs.
“You can yell that if you want, guys love to be called God.”
I shove against her and she laughs holding her stomach. “So are you ready to go inside? Maybe enjoy yourself a little.”
“Fine, let’s go, but you should know that enjoying myself doesn’t mean I plan on going home with a man.”
“Okay fine.” She opens the door and nudges me in front of her. “You can go home with a woman, I don’t judge.” And before I get the opportunity to offer her a response, she is pushing me inside, the sounds of her laughing ringing in my ear.
I start to scan over the space and instantly fall in love. It’s rugged with wood ceilings and bar tops. The back wall behind the bar is long with shelves lined with all different types of liquor. The barstools, steel and manly with wooden tops, match the rest of the place. It’s beautiful actually and it seems weird in my head to refer to a bar as such, but it’s true.
“Cooper, who is a fellow firefighter with your hot neighbor, owns this place. His younger brothers Axel and Joey are also owners and they named it for their late mother.”
I nod, feeling a respect for three men I’ve never met. If I had a place I could name after my parents I would.
“It’s somewhat of a hangout for all the firefighters.” Again I nod, then her words register. Spinning around to face her I furrow my brows.
“Wait, they all come here?”
She opens her mouth to reply then her gaze shifts up over my shoulder and I swear the little hairs on the back of my neck stand tall.
“Hey, neighbor.” A deep southern laced tone rolls through me.
I meet Vivian’s gaze once more and don’t miss the way she is attempting to fight her smile.
“Good evening, Gray,” she says only she is watching me.
And in that moment I want nothing more than to tackle her, then run.