Chapter 2
Kayla
Saturday nights at The Pit fucking suck; it’s overcrowded, the band is loud, and the lines to get a drink are out of control. People shout their orders at me as if I’m not already pouring for someone else. And to top my shitty night off, my ex is at the front of the line, staring me down.
“What’s Douchenugget doing here again?” Bianca asks from beside me as she pours a shot of bourbon into a glass.
“My guess is trying to make me jealous by showing off whatever whore he is screwing.”
Bianca snorts. “Is it working?”
“Fuck no, I wish he would leave me alone. We broke up almost two months ago, but he still comes in here every few days.”
“Want me to serve him or get Bruce to deal with it?”
As much as I would love to see our security guard Bruce throw him out on his ass, it would play right into his hands by causing a scene. Guys like Kyle thrive in situations like that because they seem innocent even when they are not.
“No, I will deal with him. Hopefully, he gets the picture that I am no longer interested and finally leaves me the fuck alone.”
Bianca wishes me luck, and I walk over to where Kyle is standing.
“Hey, baby. It took you long enough,” he says with a smirk.
I roll my eyes as a beautiful redhead slides in beside him.
She doesn’t acknowledge me but looks up at him as if he’d hang the stars and the moon just for her.
She is a lot more his type—short, pretty, and on first appearance, the doting girlfriend he wants on his arm.
I’m what he used to call scrappy. He hated my tattoos and the way I dressed; yes, my tits spill out of my shirt, but sue me for having a nice rack and showing off what my mama gave me.
Kyle smiles at her and reaches into his pocket, then looks at his phone screen. “I have to take this—will you get our drinks? Kayla will sort you out.”
The woman finally looks up at me, and while I force out a smile, she scowls. She clearly knows who I am.
“You want me to order our drinks from that stalker bitch?”
I ball my fists, reminding myself that punching a patron in the face is frowned upon. Even though my boss is a badass bitch and wouldn’t care, I do not want to get arrested tonight. Spending the weekend locked up is not my idea of fun, and frankly, I have better shit to do.
“Just get the drinks and find us a table. I will be back soon.” He leans down and gives her a kiss before answering his phone and walking away.
She turns back to me with a smug smile, though I am positive she has heard all good things about me by her body language.
“What can I get for you?” I ask, growing a little agitated that she is holding up the line.
“You can stay away from my boyfriend.”
I laugh and shake my head. “I don’t want your boyfriend or his mediocre dick. Either tell me what you want to drink, or I will serve someone else. I don’t have time for the jealous girlfriend bullshit.”
“Maybe your manager wants to hear about my bullshit.”
“ROGUE!” I call out for my boss. She is a tiny little thing, and her head pops out from the wall of liquor. “What do we do to jealous women who want to talk to the manager?”
Rogue bounces over to me; she is always full of energy. She snatches up the glass of ice water in front of me and throws it at the woman. “We cool them down.”
The redhead shrieks her outrage. “You have no idea what you’ve done! My brother won’t like this.”
Both Rogue and I laugh. The number of times a woman has caused a scene because one of the bar staff was apparently hitting on their boyfriend or something equally ridiculous pissed Rogue off, so now she likes to cause a scene.
Bruce appears beside the woman and tells her it’s time to leave.
I’m sure she is a nice girl, and Kyle has created this whole situation.
I broke up with him because he was cheating on me, but of course I am the bad guy.
Maybe I stayed longer than I should have, mainly because looking for somewhere to live wasn’t something I really wanted to do, and his apartment was in a good part of town.
Now all I can afford is the loft apartment over Mabel’s house, a half-deaf, lovely old woman, who has her television on volume 100 and lectures about safe sex whenever I bring someone home.
However, the worst part is her trying to set me up with her grandson.
Unfortunately, a thirty-year-old man who still lives at home with his parents and smokes weed all day is not my type.
Rogue gives me a high five and goes back to whatever she was doing, and I serve the next customer. One who actually wants to order a drink and not warn me to stay away from their boyfriend.
The night drags on, but at least there’s only one fistfight.
Again, it’s due to petty jealousy; a woman’s husband accuses another man of staring at her, and fists are thrown.
It’s highly amusing until they’re all dragged out and told not to come back if they can’t behave like adults.
It would be nice to have someone who’d throw hands over me.
Douchenugget rarely gave a fuck I existed until I left his ass.
“Holy shit, Lala, that guy at the end of the bar is looking at you like he wants to do some really bad shit to you.”
As I look over, I can see she isn’t wrong; the man sitting at the end of the bar is staring at me, and he doesn’t even try to hide it. I busy myself with serving customers, thankful that it has died down a little and we can start preparing to close.
I can feel his gaze the entire time—he hasn’t moved, and he hasn’t touched his drink. I’m used to men staring at me. Usually, I can ignore it, but this guy feels different, and I don’t know why. It’s almost as if he’s cataloging my every move, and it has me on edge.
I grab a cloth and start wiping down the bar, keeping myself busy as I ignore him.
Another man comes up to the bar and slams his glass down.
“What can I get for you?” I ask.
He wants a beer, so I pour the glass, then process the sale.
And when I glance back up, the guy at the end of the bar is still staring.
Now this is really pissing me off—maybe he knows me. It’s time to find out, so I stomp right over to him and place my hands on my hips. If he wants to fucking stare at me, he can do it right to my face.
“Do you need a camera so you can take a picture?”
He doesn’t answer me straight away, his dark eyes moving from my face, down my tattooed neck, and then back up to meet my burning gaze. The silence between us is a power play to a man like this.
“Just watching,” he says finally.
“Well, stop,” I snap. “You’re making my staff uncomfortable.”
It’s a lie, he is not making anyone uncomfortable, but he is pissing me off. I would like to handle this myself before calling in Rogue. She gets off on making men suffer.
“Your staff?” he says, tilting his head slightly. “It’s cute that you think you have that much power here.”
Heat crawls up my neck, and my anger steams from my ears. “Look, I don’t know what your deal is—”
“No deal,” he says, cutting me off. “What’s your name?”
“Why the fuck does it matter?”
“It doesn’t,” he simply says. “Color me curious.”
I glare at him for a moment, and he stares back. I wonder what his deal is, because men don’t just come in here and stare at me like this and get away with it.
“Kayla,” I snap, because now color me curious.
There is no way I will let this man try to intimidate me.
One of my personality flaws is that I’m not scared of anything.
Should I be? Yes, but really the worst shit that can happen to you will happen in the safety of your own home—I know that from firsthand experience.
“And you need to finish your drink or get the fuck out.”
He reaches for the untouched drink in front of him, then takes a slow sip, never breaking eye contact. “Better?”
Irritated, I get back to work, checking things off the close list. Rogue comes out and gives a last-drink warning and tells me I can clock out, that she will finish up.
Thank god. It has been a long-ass night, and all I want to do is go home, take a long shower, masturbate, and go to sleep.
Finding a guy to hook up with is in the too-hard basket tonight; I really can’t be bothered with the awkwardness afterward and having to kick him out.
By the time I return from grabbing my bag, the guy is gone. That makes me feel better about walking home alone. Though it’s only a five-minute stroll, this is not exactly the safest part of town.
After saying goodbye to everyone, I head outside where the humidity has thankfully eased.
I take my usual route, stopping by the 24/7 convenience store on the corner, which cashes in on the intoxicated people passing by.
After grabbing some snacks and a bottle of water, I head to the cashier.
There is a young guy already there, piling candy on the counter and rambling about needing a sugar rush.
The man serving him scans everything and puts it into a paper bag.
“I hate these stupid paper bags. Do you know how hard it would be to kill someone with a paper bag? It makes watching crime documentaries really boring—everyone loves a good suffocation by plastic bag,” the young guy mutters.
I snort; my issue is more about how easily they break. “I would like to see one about murdering someone with a recycled paper bag. Death via paper cuts.”
The guy turns around and smiles widely at me. “I would also love to see that. I wonder how many paper cuts would be needed to die.”
I shrug. “No idea, maybe it would be the torture part of death. A little alcohol poured over the cuts. I wonder if anyone has waterboarded anyone with alcohol before.”
The guy laughs at me. “Careful. Say things like that and someone might invite you to test it.”
“Are you offering or warning me? Because I don’t scare easily.”
“Paper-cut princess, fear isn’t about being scared.” A small smile curves his mouth. “It’s about what you enjoy before you realize you should’ve run and not involved yourself with monsters.” He winks, grabs his bag, then turns and walks out of the store.
Well, that was an interesting interaction and almost redeems the entire night. Now why can’t I meet people like that in the day and become their friend?