Chapter 7 Erin
Erin
I hate this place.
The bar is called The Rusty Anchor, which is misleading because it is nowhere near any water, and the romanticism of dropping an anchor in the middle of the sea is lost in this dubious part of town.
The air smells rancid and feels treacly with beer fumes.
The bottles lining the back of the bar are coated in a thick layer of dust sticky with nicotine.
It’s like the smoking ban never happened.
And the only thing masking the foul language that comes out of patrons’ mouths is a temperamental jukebox that seems to be stuck in a loop of depressing country songs about trucks and betrayal.
Only three shifts in, and I’m questioning every life choice that led me here.
“Fill me up, darlin’.”
The command reaches me from the opposite end of the bar where a scruffy regular is nursing a now-empty glass of scotch.
“Sure thing,” I reply, reaching for the bottle of Johnnie Walker.
I pour a double measure, trying not to shudder at the sensation of his eyes on my breasts.
“Put it on my tab,” he adds, in a rumbly grunt.
“Okay.”
I return to my safe haven at the back of the bar and take out the tab book, then the voice of Bobby, the manager, slithers into my ears.
“Make that his last. If he doesn’t make good soon, he’s going to drink us dry on our dime. The boss won’t take kindly to that.”
My gaze snaps to Bobby, briefly taking in his short and skinny frame thrown wildly off balance by an enormous, rotund stomach that has Metabolic Syndrome written all over it. His skin is perpetually perspiring and he appears to have either shunned or not discovered deodorant.
“What boss? I thought you were the boss.”
“I’m just the manager. The boss is the guy who owns this place. But his boss is the one we really have to worry about. Nobody fucks with him, and everybody knows it. So I guarantee our little drunk over there would prefer to hear his tab is full from you.”
“Me? Why?”
The last thing I want to do is irk a regular whose blood is probably forty percent proof.
Bobby’s shrunken, bloodshot eyes rake me from head to toe, then he leans in close, singing my skin with his breath. “Because you’re the barmaid.”
I swallow and take a step back. “Okay, fine.”
The patron’s eyes are narrowed when I turn to face him. I take a deep breath and close the distance.
“What that about?” he grunts.
“Your tab,” I say, before I have a chance to chicken out. “We need you to settle up before we can serve you any more drinks. Manager’s orders.”
His face scrunches into a monstrous scowl. “And he couldn’t tell me that? He sent a piece of skirt instead?”
I baulk at his tone and his words and his stench and everything, and for the first time since I started working in this dive, I pray for another patron to come through the door. Anything to provide a distraction.
For the first time in months, my prayers are answered.
The doorbell tinkles and a chilly gust of wind floods the small room.
I step thankfully to the center of the bar and smooth down the Hollister mini dress I stole from my daughter’s closet.
I wouldn’t have been able to squeeze into this a few months ago.
It’s amazing what a divorce, a migration and a new life back home with your mother can do for the waistline.
I remember buying it from the store in Brentwood, back when we could afford to shop at Hollister in Brentwood. These days it’s Goodwill all the way.
When I look up, I’m half tempted to flip God the bird.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mutter under my breath.
The stranger from the coffee shop just walked in with two men flanking each side. He hasn’t spotted me yet, but he will.
My stomach tightens as I take the opportunity to peruse his shape—those broad shoulders, the contoured chest beneath his suit, large inked fingers and chiseled jaw that fairy tales are made of.
I hold my breath, watching as he scans the room like a detective searching for exits.
Then his gaze pans to me and locks.
His expression doesn’t give anything away as he saunters casually toward a round table in the corner, pulls out a chair and sits. The other two men follow.
He holds my gaze for an uncomfortably long time, then looks away as a faint smile pulls at one corner of his mouth.
That incenses me. Is he gloating? Is he mocking my situation?
First of all, he spills his coffee all over me.
Second, he acts like he’s coming to my rescue by giving me his shirt.
Third, he’s sending me twenty very expensive replacements on the assumption—I presume—that I need or want new clothes.
And now he’s managed to locate the dingy premises where I work so he can, what, goad me even more?
All the shame I’ve tried to bury after that meet-not-so-cute comes bubbling back to the surface, pulled along by a tether I’ve pretty much come to the end of.
“You need to serve that guy,” Bobby murmurs into my ear.
“No,” I say, firmly. “You’ll have to do it.”
Bobby turns his head so only I can read his lips, and he says in a quiet voice, “I can’t.”
I swallow. “What do you mean, you can’t?”
“He wants you.”
I bark out a short laugh. “No he doesn’t. What on earth makes you say that?”
“Because he’s the Surgeon, Erin…”
“Surgeon?” My gaze drifts over the inked knuckles and beard stubble. “He doesn’t look like a surgeon to me.”
The color drains from Bobby’s face like he’s about to have a cardiac arrest. “He’s a fucking regular okay?
And if he wanted the same ole’ service he always gets, he’d have given me the same ole’ signal he always does.
Now get your pretty ass over to that table, and take their order. Don’t make me ask you again.”
“Funny way to ask someone,” I mumble under my breath before straightening my backbone. I hate this joint. I hate my boss and I hate the man sitting at the table biting down on a smirk.
I go over anyway, because that’s what I’m paid to do.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” I say, in a flat voice. “What can I get for you?”
Two of the men look up, but he keeps his gaze on the table. “I’ll take a Bud,” one of them says.
“Yeah, make that two.”
I turn my attention to my self-styled knight in shining armor, debating whether or not to give him a piece of my mind, but then his lashes sweep up and his dark brown eyes lock onto mine.
A flutter runs down my spine, setting my nerves alight. I remembered him being handsome, but not this handsome.
He leans back and loosely entangles his fingers between parted thighs. Hard muscles are defined beneath the expensive-looking cotton of his suit pants. His shoes are polished, his socks—
Pull yourself together, Erin. When have you ever noticed a man’s socks?
When they look as mouthwateringly soft as these do, I offer my inner voice.
I look up at the sound of a man’s throat clearing and realize I’ve been undressing him with my eyes.
“What would you like, sir?” I ask, feeling the heat of a blush caress my throat.
“Whisky. Double. Neat.”
I wring my hands together—sweat is leaching from my palms.
“Two beers, one whisky.”
He throws a fifty down. “And get one for yourself.”
I glance at the note then back at him. He has a brow half-raised. He is actually taunting me. How much more insulting can this man get?
I pick up the note and force a sugary smile onto my face.
“Thanks, but I don’t drink.” I do, but I don’t want to accept anything from this man.
Turning to walk back to the bar, a ring of heat circles my wrist. I whip my head around to see him gripping me—leisurely but firmly. The two other men are looking on, unfazed.
“Not even a soda?”
Unable to walk away while he’s holding my arm, I tip my chin. “I’m not thirsty.”
I yank my hand from his grip and walk back to the bar. Bobby is viewing the scene with an anxious look on his face.
“You need to watch your mouth,” he hisses as I walk past him to the fridges.
I pull out two bottles and pop the lids off. “I was perfectly polite,” I reply. “He shouldn’t have been touching me.”
“Honey, he can touch whoever the hell he wants.”
Frowning, I lift the bottle of Johnnie Walker. “Why? What makes him so special?”
Bobby looks back at the table, then shifts sideways toward me.
“He’s an important person around here is all. If you get him pissed, you lose your job, you got that?”
I place the bottle back on the bar and turn slowly to face Bobby.
“You would fire me for not groveling to some guy in the bar?”
“He’s not ‘some guy’ Erin. Just take my word for it. Don’t fuck with him, please.”
A thread of annoyance wraps around my spine.
I knew there was something a little dark about the stranger, given the tattoos inked across his knuckles, but to hear him described as an ‘important’ person you don’t want to fuck with, only makes me more irritated. And maybe a little clammy.
I take the drinks over to the table and place them down one by one, keeping my eyes averted from anyone else’s, then I walk away before he can try and give me his spare cents.
For the next twenty minutes, I busy myself cleaning glasses and serving drinks to the few other patrons littering the bar. I manage to not look at him once, but every now and then I feel a warmth on the side of my face.
Eventually, the other two men get up and head for the door, but before I have a chance to sigh in relief, my stranger is walking toward the bar.
His dark hazel eyes hold mine captive as he approaches.
Not drifting them away once, he removes his jacket, hooks it over the peg beneath the bar and slides onto a stool. Then he rolls his white shirt sleeves up to his elbows and rests his forearms on the bar.
Ink crawls from his fingers, right the way up, covering strips of prominent, faintly veined muscle.
The sight makes me breathless.
“So, you’re a barmaid.”
I swallow and tear my gaze from his. Heat floods into my hairline from where I stared at him for too long.
“I’m pleased to see your observation skills are intact,” I quip, lifting a murky glass to polish.