Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Cole
The lobby doors glide open and we’re hit with the cool hum of air conditioning.
The same old TV is bolted to the ceiling in the corner, picture fuzzy, tuned in to a talk show. The wooden bar itself is a little worse for the wear, but it has so much character.
This place is like a time capsule. It’s as though I’ve never left.
But I have left.
And the proof is walking two steps ahead of me in cutoff shorts and a black tank top that clings to her in all the ways that make it impossible to think straight: Ella, my best friend’s daughter. The most utterly beautiful and goddamn perfect woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.
We pass through the lobby and get to the bar, where those two skeevy punks are waiting, as promised. The bar is otherwise empty. I take a seat down at the other end so I can keep a distant eye on them. They seem oblivious to my presence because their eyes are on Ella.
“What can I get you?” she asks as she puts a napkin on the bar in front of me. There’s a mirror on the wall behind the bottles of alcohol. I catch a glance at myself. Everything from my hardened gaze to my jaw, everything is tense. I realize my fists are tied into knots in my lap. I shake them out.
“Having a hard time deciding?” Ella asks, putting her hand on the bar. “Don’t know what you’re in the mood for?”
“I’ll take a beer,” I finally say, clearing my throat.
“Coming right up,” she says as she turns toward the two guys at the other end of the bar. “You guys want your usual? A beer and a martini?”
“Yeah,” one says, fiddling with the puca shell necklace around his neck. “A beer and a martini.”
“Shaken, right?” Ella says.
The other guy smirks and nods.
Ella rolls her eyes and uncaps a beer, putting it in front of me. My throat is as dry as the desert. I take a sip immediately, and it takes the edge off my thirst but doesn’t satisfy me.
As I watch her grab a shaker and smile up at me from behind the bar, things change. She pours the alcohol and the ice into the shaker and then goes to town, turning away from the bar and shaking up the metal container with fury.
That’s when I catch her reflection through the mirror.
Her arms are lifted, her breasts bouncing with every jolt of her body, nipples hard and pressing against the fabric of her shirt. She’s trying to hide herself, but the mirror betrays her—every soft curve, every subtle shift.
Then my heartbeat kicks up when I see the guys at the other end of the bar.
They have a better view than I do.
My jaw clenches as I look back at Ella.
Her arms lifted, tits bouncing, nipples hard and piercing.
All I can think about is dragging her into the back room, pressing her against the wall, peeling that shirt off with my teeth. Telling her exactly what she’s doing to me — how I’m two seconds from snapping because no one else gets to see her like this.
Only me.
Her breasts bounce up and down with every shake. Every movement of the shaker, every quirk of her lips, it all makes her move in a way that makes my cock grow to epic proportions.
I look at the two guys at the end of the bar and see them giving each other knowing looks and snickering.
No. My eyes grow wide as I look back to Ella again. She’s still shaking that fucking thing, making it hard for me to think.
My elbow knocks against my beer and it tips over, sloshing across the surface of the bar.
Ella turns around, grabbing a rag and shaking her head.
“Shit. I’m sorry, Ella,” I say, already half-rising from my stool.
“It’s okay,” she replies quickly. “Just a spill.” She tosses the towel in the sink. “I’m gonna run to the back and grab another rag. She adds to the guy at the end of the bar, “your drink will be right up.”
She disappears through the swinging kitchen door.
I’m on my feet the second it closes behind her.
Two long strides and I’m standing over the guys.
“You always get your martinis shaken, James Bond?” I ask, voice low and steady, but laced with steel.
“She likes the attention,” he scoffs. “And with a body like that, she’s in the wrong line of work.”
I see red.
“Get up.”
He blinks up at me, a little confused at first, but then his eyes widen.
“I said, get up.”
My voice is low, controlled, but there’s nothing calm about me right now. My hands are shaking with adrenaline, testing my restraint. I’m one second away from grabbing both of them by the back of their necks and dragging them out into the street.
“Hey,” the other guy says, voice warbling. “We’re just having a drink. You should relax.”
“This is me relaxed.”
They glance at each other, trying to figure out how serious I am.
I show them.
I grab them both by the collar as their stools tumble to the ground. I drag the pair of guys out of the bar as each is sputtering and fighting against me. The cool air conditioning of the lobby shifts around us, turning hot. My feet don’t stop moving until we get outside.
"She’s mine,” I growl, throwing the guys through the door outside. “And if I see either of you here ever again, I will knock your teeth out and wear them as a necklace.
I stride back to the bar, flip the sign from “open” to “closed," and pull the door shut behind me.
Without hesitation, I head through the swinging kitchen door. The air is hotter back here, the scent of spices and old wood thick around us.
Ella is reaching onto a high shelf, her black tank top clinging to every inch of her, hair loosely tied but with strands escaping to frame her face. She’s standing on her tip-toes and reaching up to a high shelf, making her chest stick out and her back arch.
The door behind me swooshes closed, changing the air around us. She turns her head to see me, her eyes growing wide.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
She can see that there’s something happening in me. A shift.
I want to make her mine, right here and now. Her chest rises and falls, our mutual breathing seeming to sync up with each other’s, an irrefutable heavy stillness to the moment, drawing us together.
“Nothing’s wrong,” I say.
“You look like you’ve just stuck your head under a running faucet,” she says, cracking a little smile.
I touch my forehead. She’s right. I’m sweating bullets.
“It’s the heat,” I say, pulling my hand away.
But it’s heat from deep inside me, not from something as stupid and insignificant as the weather.
I take a small step toward her, her sweet, warm scent making my mouth water.
My length feels heavy and hard behind my zipper, blood rushing to it with brutal clarity. It’s not just lust—it’s need. It’s the way her lips are parting as she watches me come closer, the way her knees shift slightly like she’s trying to decide whether to run or let herself fall into this.
The same question crystalizes in my own mind. Run for the hills, remove myself from the presence of my oldest friend’s daughter, or let this happen. I don’t have to think about it long. I already know the answer.
I step in close enough to feel her heat against my chest, to see the little pulse fluttering in her throat. Her nipples are hard under that thin fabric, pressing against the thin material of her tank top, like they want me to graze my teeth against them.
“Ella,” I say, my voice thick.
She sways closer. Her eyes flick down to my mouth, then back up. She’s leaning in.
I’m leaning in.
I’m a breath away from kissing her, from tasting her, from undoing everything inside me, when my phone buzzes.
It’s the worst sound I’ve ever heard.
Ella steps back, as though tripping out of the same trance I was caught in.
“Sorry,” she says, shaking her head and looking away. “You should probably get that.”
“I probably should…” I say softly, “but that doesn’t mean I have to.”
My phone buzzes again. I grit my teeth, dragging a hand down my face. I don’t want to answer, but I know who it is. It’s why I came here. It’s the meeting I can’t miss.
Her eyes hold mine before she walks past me, the door swinging softly behind her.
And she’s gone before I can stop her.