Chapter Five If the Ocean Was Beer #2
“But you need to be happy too!” she cries. “You need to love somebody again.”
“I do love somebody,” I reply. “I love you.”
She smacks her forehead with her hand. “Oh, sweetheart. You’re so awesome. You’re my hero every day. But seriously . . . I don’t want you to end up alone.”
“I’m not alone,” I explain. “I have Scooter, and my business, which I love. You have no idea, Becky. I’m serious. I want to marry it!”
She steps back and laughs. “You can’t marry your business.”
“Why not? We’re perfect for each other. My business doesn’t snore, and it pays all the bills.”
I’m vaguely aware of a man on the barstool behind me. It’s not until he rests his hand on my hip that I take notice, and my body clenches instantly with anger.
I turn around and take in his shaved head and pale, sweaty, pockmarked face. He’s a big man, at least six feet tall, and thick around the middle.
“Ladies,” he says. “You look like you’re having a good time. Can I order us a fresh round?”
Suddenly, I feel completely sober, even though I’m not. “No thanks. We’re just leaving.”
He moves around us, casually, which blocks our exit from the barstools.
“Don’t break my heart. You girls can’t leave when the night’s still young.
” He rests his hand on his chest. “I’m Joe, and I’ve got a thousand dollars’ worth of chips in my pocket.
I could use the help of two beautiful women like you at the craps table. For luck.”
Becky and I give each other a look, and I let out a breath of frustration. The night had been going so well. We’d been having such a good time.
“We’re not here to gamble,” Becky tells him.
“You don’t have to gamble,” he replies. “All you need to do is stand there and look pretty. Maybe blow on my dice.” He wipes under his bulbous, oily nose and leers at Becky, which disgusts me. I glance uneasily around the bar. It’s quite empty for a Saturday night.
“My boyfriend’s on his way to get us,” she says. “He’ll be here any minute.”
Joe grins and chuckles. “Yeah, sure. Any minute now.” He waves his arm toward the casino. “Come on, ladies. One game. My friends are down there. We’ll buy you drinks all night long. Everything on us. It’ll be fun.”
He puts his hand on my hip again, but this time I slap it away. “Do you mind?”
His bushy eyebrows lift, and when he talks, his breath stinks of onions and beer. “Don’t be rude, sweetheart.”
Honestly, I could barf. “I’m not your sweetheart.”
While I wait for his stupid retort, something behind me distracts him.
I glance over my shoulder, and there’s a guy standing with his elbows on the bar, one foot planted on the brass rail.
He’s tall and younger than Joe, about my age.
Broad shouldered. Has all his hair. He seems to be waiting to order a drink.
“How’s it going?” he asks in a friendly tone as he turns toward us.
“All right,” Joe replies uncertainly, which tells me that they’ve not met before. “What’s it to you?”
The guy behind me shrugs. “I don’t know. I was sitting over there watching the situation, and it seemed like you were being a bit pushy after the ladies said they were heading out.”
Joe glares at him and rolls his thick neck. “Pushy.”
“Yeah, just a bit.” The guy seems totally relaxed and unthreatened. He speaks offhandedly. “I think these ladies just want to go home.”
All my instincts are telling me to back away from this situation, but I can’t move because the guy who has come to our rescue is standing directly behind me and I’m in the middle of this.
Suddenly the bartender, who looks more like an Olympic weight lifter, joins the conversation. He braces both fists on the bar.
“Everything all right over here?” His blue-eyed gaze swings from Joe to the guy behind me.
Joe downs the last of his beer. He sets the empty mug on the bar and wipes his thick hand across his mouth. “Thanks for the drink. I’ll see you later.”
He turns and stalks off. We all stand in silence, watching him go.
The guy behind me speaks to the bartender. “Thanks, Kev.”
The bartender fills a mug of beer and slides it forward. “This one’s on me.”
Becky and I watch their exchange with interest.
“No, I still owe you from last night.”
“You can fill up my gas tank—how about that?”
“You two know each other?” Becky asks.
I can’t help but ask a follow-up question. “Or do you come here every night to defend unsuspecting women from annoying predators?”
The guy who came to our rescue takes a swig of beer. “Kevin and I used to be roommates. And sorry about that asshat. What was his name? Joe? He looked like a Joe. Nothing against Joes in general, but . . .” He sips his beer again and shakes his head. “I need to stop talking.”
Maybe the martinis haven’t completely worn off, because Becky starts laughing and can’t seem to stop.
“You don’t need to apologize for him,” I say. “You’re not responsible for who he is.”
“If I was, I’d be very disappointed in myself.”
We all chuckle, and Becky and I reclaim our seats at the bar. The bartender named Kevin claps his hands together. “How about two shots of tequila for you ladies, on the house.”
Becky gives me a look. “Why not? How much worse can it get? Surely one shot of tequila won’t put us over the edge.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” I reply with a dash of healthy skepticism.
Kevin fills two shot glasses, but at the last second, he adds a third for his friend and pushes forward a bowl of limes and a saltshaker.
I glance at Becky and shrug, lick my hand, sprinkle the salt, and toss back the shot. Hot fire torches my throat, so I quickly suck the lime and grimace. “I’m going to regret this in the morning.”
“We all will,” our heroic rescuer says. “Thank God for weekends.” He smiles at me, and there’s laughter in his eyes. All the tension from moments ago dissipates, and I lay my hand on his shoulder.
“Thank you. Really. That was so good of you . . . what you did.”
“No worries,” he says with ease and offers his hand. “I’m Nate.”
“Sienna.” I slide my hand into his and slowly shake it.
Our eyes remain fixed on each other’s, and I feel a dizzying sensation—which I don’t think is related to the tequila. Or the dirty martini. Or the cosmos. I haven’t felt anything quite like it since Jacob and I first started looking at each other differently in high school.
Good God, how pathetic is it that my libido has been on hiatus for the past seven years?
Not that I’m looking for anything, but this guy wakes me up to something—the long-lost thrill of certain feelings I’ve only ever experienced with Jacob.
The sort of “complication” that I told Becky I wasn’t interested in.
Becky’s phone rings in her purse, and she pulls it out, flips it open. “Hey, baby.” She listens for a moment. “No way. That’s crazy.” Another pause. “Yes, we’re fine. We’re just hanging out. Okay. Call me when you get here.”
She drops her phone into her purse and turns to me. “A tractor trailer crashed on the Macdonald Bridge, so Mark’s stuck there. Nothing’s moving.”
“Oh no,” I reply.
“I hope no one was hurt,” Kevin says. He looks to the far end of the bar, where an older couple had just sat down. “Excuse me.” He slides a pen behind his ear and leaves us.
Becky and I reach for what’s left in our martini glasses, when Nate says, “Hey, if you’re hungry, I have a big plate of nachos at my table, and they’re not going to eat themselves.”
Becky looks at me and shrugs. “I could eat.”
“Me too.”
We follow Nate to a booth overlooking the water, which reflects the moon and the city lights.
A gigantic plate of nachos is sitting there, barely touched.
I stand for a few seconds, staring at it, wondering how he intended to eat all that by himself.
More importantly, the melted cheese looks crusty and dry, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that he abandoned it when it was hot to help us get rid of Joe.
I feel guilty and grateful at the same time. I’m also ravenous, so I slide into the booth and rely on the good manners my mother taught me to make me wait until Nate digs in first.
Becky hesitates. “I need to use the ladies’ room. You guys get started. I’ll be back in a jiff.”
I chuckle because I know her too well. She’s playing matchmaker, but whatever. I pull a cheese-covered nacho from the plate and shove it into my mouth. It’s a bit chewy after sitting out for too long, but it’s still delicious, and I gobble greedily, then reach for another.
“So tell me, Sienna. What do you do?”
“I’m an interior designer.”
“That sounds creative.”
“It is, but I seem to spend most of my time worrying about bills, even though I have an office manager.”
His eyebrows lift. “You own your own business?”
All I can do is nod because my mouth is full of cheese. I hold up a finger, then dig through my bag for my little stash of business cards and hand him one. By this time, I’ve finished chewing.
He reads it and lifts his gaze. His eyes are a mix of blue and gray with flecks of yellow, and I come to notice that his face is quite perfect—a strong jaw, straight nose, full lips. His teeth are perfect too. Clean and white.
“Sienna MacKay. Owner and creative director,” he says, sounding impressed.
“Yes.” I mention nothing more because I hate tooting my own horn. I was born missing whatever brain cells it requires to brag or bask in a spotlight. I prefer to let my work speak for itself. “It’s a slow build,” I tell him, “but we’re getting there.”
“I envy you.” He holds up my card. “Can I keep this?”
“Of course.”
He leans back, slides it into the front pocket of his faded blue jeans, and then reaches for a nacho chip and uses it to scoop some green peppers and sour cream.
“How about you?” I ask. “What do you do?”
“Law school,” he replies flatly.
“Law school. Well done. And you envy me?”
He shakes his head. “Truth is I’m conflicted about it.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s not what I want to do with my life.”
“Then why are you doing it?” I ask matter-of-factly.
“Because I’m a jellyfish.”