Chapter 15
Bellini
I didn’t know that Susan Rorch was going to get tipsy-drunk and dance on the bar that Monday night when Logan was there with his team from work for their Christmas party.
I mean, it wasn’t unexpected. She’s done it before, and tonight was her birthday.
All her friends and four sisters were there, about twenty of them.
Plus, everyone was in the Christmas spirit.
With our three Christmas trees and fake, drunk Santa, plus Christmas music, the bar was hoppin’ with holiday love.
Mrs. Rorch climbed onto the bar when the song “We Are Family” blared over the speakers, and she and her sisters and friends began dancing.
Susan is very limber, a former gymnastics champion, and she started at one end of the bar and cartwheeled on down.
She’s seventy years old, so it was hard for me to tell her to get down.
I do respect my elders, but I was afraid she’d fall.
She was wearing a red poodle skirt with a Christmas tree on it, and reindeer antlers sat on her white hair, red and green lights flashing on and off. Santa was embroidered on her sweater, and he was holding a martini.
“I’ll get down if you get up, Bellini,” she yelled down to me as her sisters and friends cheered for her, hips swinging, arms in the air.
“Mrs. Rorch, please. I’m worried you’re going to cartwheel off the bar,” I begged her, shouting over all the singing about sisters and families.
“Sing it with me!” Susan sang out, head back, arms outstretched. “I got all my sisters with me!”
Her friends—well, the entire bar—sang back, “We are family! I got all my sisters with me! We are family!”
“Mrs. Rorch!” I yelled again as she executed a perfect cartwheel, and I hurried down the bar to catch her in case the inevitable happened. “I’m begging you. You could get hurt!”
“Come on up, my love!” She twirled, one hand gracefully held over her head, one arm out, as everyone cheered.
Lumberjack Paul and his brother Seymour lifted me up onto the bar before I could stop them, and another cheer went up as the song continued.
“Dance with me, Bellini! Come on, sweetheart! Your momma would!”
“I will if you promise to get down after this song!” I shouted over the din.
“I may, I may not. Merry Christmas, Bellini! I’m so glad you’re back.”
I gave in. I couldn’t help it. She was so happy to be celebrating.
She grabbed my hands and yelled, “Sing it with me!” and I started singing with her, swirling a little, holding her hands, like we were a couple.
I looked up and saw Logan. He was smiling at me, black hair shining even under the dim lights. He was amused, I could tell. His shoulders were huge, and he towered over everyone. I smiled back and got confused.
He was so devilishly handsome. He was older, wiser, a little more reserved, more measured maybe, but still…Logan. He made me jittery and nervous and…excited…and hopeless…and hopeful…and lusty.
So up on the bar when our gazes locked, it felt like we were still dating, and his smile gave me a tingle. An electrical zap. I had a vision of holding him close and ripping off his clothes.
All of the sudden, it was too hot in that bar. Too stuffy. Too noisy. I had hardly eaten all day, and it was catching up with me. All I saw was Logan, and then things started to… spin.
I let go of Mrs. Rorch’s hands and felt myself become off-balance, as if I were on one foot, not both, and my head and my body weren’t working together.
I felt like I was falling in a super-corny Christmas movie.
I teetered off that bar and landed in Logan’s arms. Yes, he caught me.
No, it was not intentional on my part. Yes, I felt like a fool. Dizzy, too. Embarrassed.
Oh no.
He smiled down at me and said, “Gotcha.”
I heard people clapping, and Mrs. Rorch shouted, “It’s like An Officer and a Gentleman! You know that movie?” Oh, they did.
I said, “Thanks, Logan.”
“You okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine.” I wasn’t. I still felt dizzy. Too hot. Weak. Flustered. A little sick.
For only a minute, maybe not even that long, I stared up at Logan, and he stared down at me.
Everything disappeared in a poof—our breakup, how much I’d missed him, how I was a tired and beat-up person now, alone often, and lonely, and how I spent too much time writing stories about a fourth grader and talking to my cats.
So, eyes locked to Logan’s, wandering about in memories that hurt, I said something very smart, to reflect my new intelligence and maturity, making no move to get out of his arms. “You have strong arms.”
He laughed. “Thanks, Bellini.”
And I had to add one more ridiculous thing. “Have you gotten taller?”
He laughed again, and lines fanned out from the corners of his eyes. He was better-looking now that he was older. “I don’t think so.”
“You seem bigger and wider.”
He blinked at me, and I could tell he was trying not to laugh.
Oh sheesh. “I didn’t mean…you know…”
“I know you didn’t.”
Beck and Colt, who had just arrived, and Jaxi, Helena, and Collins, who’d also come in seconds afterward, circled us, arms in the air, and sang at the top of their lungs, “We are fam-i-ly…”
I smiled, couldn’t help it, and Logan smiled back at me.
“You’re very handsome,” I told him. Why did I do that? What was the point? We were going nowhere. Why flirt?
“And you are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”
Dang. He said it with all sincerity. We were back right where we’d been before. We sizzled together. That same energy between us was back in full force. I sighed a lusty sigh. He held me closer.
Must have been some Christmas razzle-dazzle in that bar.