Chapter 9 Tieran #2
I laugh, and my breath coasts across her skin, making her fidget in place.
The barkeep is frantically flying back and forth, oscillating between taking orders, making drinks, and cashing people out. It’s going to be impossible to get their attention with all these people around.
Or so I thought, because not a minute later, she leans forward just as the man handling the bar is walking by, gives him a friendly smile that strikes me a little dumb from a side view, and he stops dead in his tracks, walking over to her.
“What do ya need, gorgeous?” He throws the towel he uses to wipe down the bar over his shoulder.
“Can I please get a Negroni and a Mojito,” she orders before glancing back at me. “Did you or Myles want another?”
The man tending the bar doesn’t pull his eyes off her, resolutely ignoring everyone trying to get his attention. I can’t even blame him; she’s all I can look at too. But right now, she’s looking at me, and I feel like a lucky bastard for it.
“Another Fuller’s and an Old Fashioned.” I set forty quid down on the bar top. “Thanks, mate.”
He’s still looking at Jade, and I have to resist the urge to wrap my arm around her waist and pull her into me, a move that would surely earn me a jab to my solar plexus.
Tonight is the closest she’s even come to acknowledging our tryst; no way in hell she’d react well to me touching her.
I wouldn’t do that without some sort of sign from her that it’s what she wants, no matter how much my fingers are itching to reach out and stroke her silk-covered hip.
He shifts away to make our drinks, and Jade turns in place to face me, leaning lightly against the bar, the movement making the scent of warm vanilla with a hint of bourbon drift over, and my head goes light and my cock stirs from the memory of the last time she was this close.
The King’s Swan is getting progressively busier as the night wears on and the hour creeps closer to the live entertainment starting. The crowd is bustling, pushing at my back as I hold my place to make sure Jade has room.
“You following me then?”
She raises a perfectly arched brow at me. “Excuse me?”
I list off on my fingers. “First the pub, then the team, then the market, and now back to the pub. That’s a lot of coincidences.”
“One could argue you’re following me.”
“I would follow you,” my voice pitches lower. “On hands and knees if you told me to.” I stare down at her, knowing I’ve said too much but unable to take it back now that the words are out there.
“Don’t.”
Her eyes blaze—in anger or arousal, I don’t know, but the skin on her neck flushes pink, begging for my mouth.
The group behind me is getting raucous, and someone's body collides with mine, pushing me toward Jade, forcing me to catch my arms on the ledge of the bar and caging her in with my body flush against hers.
I look down to where her hands have landed on my waist over my black jumper, helping to keep me steady. Her gaze flicks up under inky dark lashes, and it’s got me imagining a whole lot of scenarios one shouldn’t imagine in relation to their boss.
I’m about to say something, break the tension or add to it, when the barkeep pops up with our drinks. Jade turns, grabbing two and passing them to me to carry before grabbing the other two.
“This might be forward of me, but could I get your number?” the bartender asks.
She gives him a shy smile while I glower at him over her head. “That’s really kind of you, but I don’t have much time in my schedule for dating right now.”
“We could keep it casual,” he suggests, and I’m about to snap the glasses in my hands.
“She said—” I go to interrupt, but she stomps on my foot with her stiletto, and I bend slightly at the waist in pain.
“Thank you, but no.” She turns away from him and pushes me in the direction of our table. When she sees I’m hunched slightly, her brow furrows. “What’s wrong with you? Go.”
“How rude of me and my foot injury to keep you from a hasty getaway.”
“Do I need to have a whistle and clipboard in hand, shouting expletives, to get you to move?” She rolls her eyes, nudging me again.
“It wouldn’t hurt,” I grumble and start to walk back toward the table.
A throaty chuckle floats over to me, the sound light and a little raspy around the edges. A shiver slithers up my back; it makes no sense, but I feel like I’ve won something with that laugh.
Twenty minutes later, Aanya hops off her stool at our high top table and announces it’s time for her set. Apparently, she is tonight’s live entertainment.
My lovestruck best friend quickly stands after her. “I’m going to go watch.”
“Me too—” Jade starts to say before Aanya stops her.
“No, no, you stay here. There’s not a lot of room over there anyway.” She points to the area by the modest stage, where every table is already filled with people. From the way her eyes jump from Jade to me, though, it’s almost like she’s trying to meddle.
“But—” Jade starts when Aanya spears her with a look before turning and walking away. “Fine,” she mumbles. “It’s not like she guilted me into coming out to specifically watch her play, but whatever.”
“How did you guys meet?” I ask.
“She’s my neighbor.” She brings the straw of her mojito to her lips, and it’s actually sick how the slight movement draws all my focus. “She also saved my ass, so I kinda owed her, which is the only reason I came out tonight.”
“Why did you owe her?”
“My flat was a wreck when I moved into it, and she helped get it sorted out. Didn’t know a thing about me, just helped because I needed it.” It’s clear from her tone, and the small smile on her face as she watches her friend take the stage that she holds a lot of affection for her.
“That’s good to hear, since my best friend is a bit smitten,” I say, nodding at where Myles stands behind the occupied tables in front of the small riser Aanya is standing on. He’s as close to her as he can possibly get with the building crowd.
“Did you two meet on the Legends?”
I nod my head, taking a sip of my drink. “I was pretty terrified when I was recruited, and Myles…he just has this openness about him. He and Cav instantly put me at ease. Cavan’s the steady, serious one in our group. We all balance each other.”
The sound of a guitar lightly strumming flows through the pub, winding around tables and chairs, lifting the mood and setting the tone for the evening.
She looks contemplative. “And who are you of the group?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” At least ten different answers to that question float across her face before I put her out of her misery. “I’m the devilishly handsome one.”
She snorts. “Or the insufferable one.”
“The comedic relief, one might say,” I quip.
“No one’s saying that.”
“The one you go to for a good time.”
“I doubt that,” she says dryly.
“You have firsthand experience, love. I don’t recall any complaints.” I watch as a gorgeous flush crawls up her neck and settles on the tops of her cheekbones.
Coughing into her hand, she adjusts in her seat, as if she’s trying to shake off my words. “And where is the third in your band of brothers?”
“With his daughter, Ophelia. It’s his weekend.” My chest fills with warmth when I think of my other best friend and his little girl. Ophelia is only three, and she’s a spitfire who has stolen even the most grisly of hearts with a single sassy hip pop.
“That’s nice.” Fondness laces her tone, making me curious.
“Are you close to your parents?” It’s risky, asking such a personal question, but something about this night mirroring the first time we met each other—before we knew who the other was and there were no expectations or restrictions to what we could or could not say—has me feeling reckless.
She hesitates long enough that I think I must have over stepped, but then she answers quietly, “To my dad, yes. He’s probably my best friend and a big reason I moved here.
” There’s an aura of love pulsing from her, and it softens all her sharp edges.
But within a second, she seems to realise what she admitted—who she admitted it to—and straightens in her seat, clearing her throat and spearing me with a look.
Where anyone else would have looked away after being unintentionally vulnerable, she stares down the barrel of the gun and takes a step closer. And though she’d never back down, never ask for a reprieve, I give her one anyway.
I throw back the last of my Old Fashioned, savoring the burn as it slides down my throat. “So, what do you do for fun?”
“Pardon?”
“Fun. The thing humans do for personal enjoyment.
She rolls her eyes. “I work.”
“That’s not fun,” I argue.
“Do you not find your job fun, Mr. Stone?” And we’re back to formalities.
“I certainly do, Miss McKallen, but it is still work. It still comes with responsibilities and a lot of pressure. So while yes, I find rugby fun, it’s not what helps me recharge. Maybe once upon a time, it did…” I trail off.
“I don’t have time to unwind. I have multiple businesses, a rugby club to run, and a sic—” She halts what she was about to say. “I don’t have time.”
“We’ll have to sort that out.”
Jade rolls her eyes. “Do you have a habit of interjecting yourself where you aren’t welcome?”
“Just with you, apparently.”
It didn’t sit well with me that all she ever did was work.
The google search I did weeks ago told me she was only twenty-seven, just a year younger than me.
It seemed a damn shame someone as young as her didn’t have some sort of outlet.
How did she express her emotions if she never had time to process them?
“I work hard, and I’m successful.” As if that’s all that matters, all she needs. Maybe she feels that way.
“But are you happy?”
She sips on the last of her mojito, staring me down with an expression I can’t read before hopping off her stool.
“Where are you going?” I ask.
“Off to watch my friend perform. I’ve heard live music is fun.”
The sound of her heels clicking against the floor is a drumbeat that accompanies Aanya’s guitar and ethereal voice.
I pried too much, pushed too hard.
And every step she takes away from me feels like another nail in the coffin, sealing away whatever tentative friendship I thought we had been forming.
I can’t figure out why that bothers me so much.