Chapter 12
Club nights were usually easy. Tonight, it felt like punishment.
Leland stood behind the bar, polishing a glass that didn’t need polishing. Music, mostly a drumbeat, drifted through the doors. Laughter rose from the patio. Members who’d finished playing relaxed for a few minutes before heading out. Drinks, made by him, flowed.
Normally, he’d be somewhere else. Monitoring, patrolling, anything but bartending. But after three straight days of dead ends and frustration, he’d volunteered for bar duty where his distraction wouldn’t matter.
It wasn’t helping.
Alec appeared from nowhere and dropped onto a stool. “You look cheerful.”
Leland snorted, which he thought was answer enough. Alec, not so much.
“I take it the lead you were following didn’t pan out?” he asked.
“Waste of time. What are you having?”
“White wine.”
Leland looked up, brow arched. Alec was a beer or bourbon man.
“For my lovely bride. Nothing for me. I’m driving.”
Leland searched for the corkscrew, which wasn’t where he’d left it. He looked under a bar towel and in a drawer. Nothing.
A few minutes later, Dev slid onto a stool next to Alec. “I was in Jacksonville all day. How’s the investigation going?”
Alec shook his head. “Slow.”
“Gaby and Rhys?”
They’d just arrived. Rhys as composed as ever. Gaby looking ready to punch someone—never a promising sign.
“I spoke to him earlier,” Alec advised. “Nothing useful.”
“The list of people who didn’t kill anyone continues to grow impressively,” Leland grumbled as he pulled a twist-off bottle of Moscato out of the fridge and poured.
Dev frowned. “We’re missing something.”
“We know,” Alec said.
The silence that followed carried the weight of an entire week spent chasing leads that evaporated under scrutiny.
Finally, Michael wandered up to the bar. “Where’s Callan?”
Monitoring wasn’t Callan’s favorite thing, and, since he stared at a monitor all day, working the security office was a have-to case.
He actually didn’t mind tending bar and could often be found there when not playing on Wednesday and Saturday nights.
He was good at it; his mathematical mind with his ability to memorize drink ratios, anticipate bar flow, and track inventory helped, no doubt.
“When I left HQ, he was buried under several terabytes of surveillance footage,” Alec replied.
Michael winced. “Damn.”
“Yeah.” Alec took a pull from his beer. “Apparently The Underground systems are a mess.”
“How so?” Leland asked, wiping condensation off the bar top with a towel.
Dev shook his head. “I didn’t understand all the technical jargon, but Callan said the cameras recorded at different frame rates and don’t sync properly. Half the timestamps don’t match, and feeds jump a few seconds before correcting themselves.”
Leland paused mid-bar swipe. “Don’t tell me the footage is useless.”
“No. Just frustrating,” Dev said. “It’s all there, but reviewing is taking three times longer than it should.”
Michael whistled low. “That’s brutal.”
“Tell me about it.” Dev raised his whiskey, staring into it without drinking. “I called in extra help. We’re not waiting weeks for answers.”
“Which leaves me as the substitute bartender,” Leland said. “What’ll you have?”
“A beer,” Michael said.
“Safe,” someone muttered.
“But my lovely submissive asked for a cosmo. Can you—”
“In my sleep,” Leland replied, mildly offended as he reached for the vodka and cranberry juice.
Cosmopolitan was Julia’s drink.
As he poured, images arrived uninvited. Julia perched on a stool at the far end of the bar, blue eyes bright with amusement. The sound of her laughter. How her pink lips puckered after the first sip.
Other memories followed. Julia curled against him after a scene, warm and boneless beneath a blanket. Those same lips, swollen from his kisses, as she looked up at him as though he hung the moon.
He shoved those thoughts aside and reached for another bottle.
About to pour, Alec drawled, “You sure about that?”
Leland frowned at the bottle in his hand. Bacardi White Rum. Not Triple Sec. Not even close.
For a moment, nobody said anything. Then Michael started laughing.
“Jesus Christ, you’ve got it bad,” he wheezed. “Why don’t you swallow your dom pride, grovel a bit, and get her ass back here?”
Boone nearly choked on his beer.
Alec was openly grinning now.
Dev looked suspiciously amused.
Leland tossed the bar towel onto the counter. “From now on,” he snapped, “it’s serve your own damn self.”
Boone blinked. “That’s not really how bars work.”
“I have faith you’ll figure it out. I’m calling it a night.” Leland stepped out from behind the bar and headed for the parking lot by way of the house.
Behind him, Boone asked, “What’s got his ass in a knot?”
Alec answered, “Five foot six. Blue-eyed blonde. Works for my wife. MIA lately.”
Leland kept walking, ignoring the comment and subsequent laughter. He didn’t slow down, which only made his so-called friends laugh harder.