29. Chapter 29
“Holy mother of—”
Penny pushed her glasses higher on her nose.
“Don’t look now,” she said conspiratorially. “The devil in black leather just walked in.”
He did look now and knew exactly what he’d find coming through the door of the Haunt. The shot Penny poured for Jase stopped halfway to his mouth.
Christ, what was Lindsey doing? What was she thinking?
He recognized that skirt, the shirt with the ties down the front from Lake Havasu City.
Tonight her hair was a wild halo, just like every time she’d taken her helmet off and shaken those waves free on the ride up the California coast. Her eyes were smoky and rimmed in black, breasts heaving as if she’d just taken the ride of her life or was…
Scared. Behind the eyeliner she didn’t usually wear was the deer-in-headlights look of a woman who didn’t have a plan and wouldn’t know what to do with Jase if she was privy to even a sliver of what was running through his head at the sight of Lindsey in Billy’s leather.
“Oh,” Penny said, “now whole Young clan is here.”
Graham and Helen trailed behind Lindsey, giving her space for the entrance she obviously wanted to make.
Lindsey locked eyes with Jase, and she wasn’t the deer anymore.
She was the wolf. The one who was slowly—or not so slowly—ruining him for other women.
Like a smart predator, she didn’t watch her prey for very long.
She strutted past him and leaned on the bar, leaving three stools between her and where Jase stood.
He swallowed his whiskey and set the plastic shot glass out for another while Graham and Helen filled the space between them and ordered drinks.
“Surprised to see you here again,” Jase said, trying—failing—not to peer past them at Lindsey, who was making it her job not to look at him.
“You’re not the only one,” Graham said. “None of this is my idea, by the way.”
“None of what?”
“Whatever this is,” Graham said.
Jase listened to Penny ask Lindsey how the fox in leather got mixed up with the Youngs.
“She’s Graham’s ex-girlfriend,” Helen offered with a sly smile.
“Oh. Oh.” Penny frowned. “I thought you were—”
“Graham’s fiancée?” Helen asked. “Sure am.”
“Interesting.” Penny crossed her elbows on the bar. “I’m all ears for this story.”
“Can I get a drink down here?” Jase asked.
“In a minute,” Penny said, keeping her attention on Lindsey. “Ex-girlfriend, huh? You’re single?”
“Very,” Lindsey said.
The fuck she was.
Except that’s exactly what she was.
“Very interesting.”
Penny mixed Lindsey’s drink with a sultry, red-lipped grin. Was she—was she flirting? With Lindsey? Jase would’ve laughed if his own cup wasn’t empty.
“Very, very dry down here, Penny,” he said.
“I’m coming, lover boy.” Penny rolled her eyes.
“Lover boy?” Lindsey asked.
“You haven’t heard? Jase is a hot commodity,” Penny said.
“Here we go,” Jase muttered.
“Oh yeah. As soon as word got around that Jase was back in town, it packed the house.”
“Really?” Lindsey said dryly.
“Thank you, by the way.” Penny winked at Jase.
“Still empty,” he said, waving his shot cup in the air, careful to avoid the daggers Lindsey flung his way.
“I don’t get it,” Lindsey said. “Why would people come to see him?”
“You’ll see.” Penny passed Lindsey her drink and casually, but not discreetly, brushed her fingertips against the back of Lindsey’s hand. “Don’t go too far.”
Lindsey was a deer in headlights again, finally realizing Penny was hitting on her.
Jase wanted to tease her about it and ask if he could watch, but he couldn’t even get her to look at him other than to fling those daggers.
She aimed a final knife between his eyes and took her drink to join the people around the stage watching a mediocre karaoke rendition of a new country song.
Jase planted his attention on her ass until Penny stopped in front of him.
“She’s hot.”
“Huh?”
“Your brother’s ex.”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, I see,” Penny said, finally filling Jase’s shot. “You sly dog.”
“What?” he asked.
“She’s the one, isn’t she?”
“The one what?”
Jase strained to look around his brother for the skirt he suddenly couldn’t find.
Penny grinned. “The one you were all cockeyed about the other night.”
“In English, Penny.”
“I’m a bartender, lover boy. People tell me everything. Especially after a bottle of Chicken Cock.”
“Are you just trying to see how many times you can say cock in a minute? I’m into it, but you don’t want my dick getting hard if you don’t swing that way.”
It was already testing his zipper, ready to play but not with Penny.
“You were a blubbery mess, Jase. Not what I expected from the warnings I read about you on the bathroom wall.”
“The bathroom wall?”
“It’s okay. This version’s better,” Penny said. “I always knew you were a good man, Jase. And…she’s hot, so go get it.”
He laughed to himself. Good man? Where was anyone getting that idea?
Penny went to fill drinks down the bar and Jase drank the shot in front of him.
He’d need a lot more to get through the night, to survive the leather magnet, pulling Jase off his stool and into the crowd.
A good man wouldn’t be so hungry staring at those breasts stuffed into the shirt he’d taken to bed—if only in his head—since Havasu.
A good man wouldn’t torture himself with the memory of climbing up her dress the second they got back to the hotel room in Santa Cruz, or salivate over her taste on his tongue and the way she writhed on his face while he licked and sucked her to multiple orgasms that left her limp in a pile of sated limbs on the bed.
She turned as if he’d screamed every savage thought at her, and this time her eyes weren’t timid or predatory. They were narrow, pissed-off slits judging him, condemning him, disagreeing with everything Penny had said.
I always knew you were a good man, Jase.
Only he wasn’t. Since he was the worst sort of person, the kind who missed their father’s funeral and cheated and lied and ran away, he felt no qualms whatsoever about storming up to Lindsey’s back and putting his mouth to her ear.
“It’s working.”
“What?” she asked over her shoulder.
“Your outfit.”
“I didn’t wear it for you.”
“The fuck you didn’t.”
“What are you going to do about it?”
“You really have no idea what you’re asking.”
“I think I do.”
His fingers skimmed the bottom edge of the skirt, sending a shudder down her spine he felt against his chest. It was one of the things he couldn’t shake—how responsive she was to him. What he said next would either get him slapped or laid, and he’d happily accept either, as long as she touched him.
“I’m going to rip your top open and bury my face in your chest.” He splayed his palm on her ass cheek. She inhaled sharply. “Then I’m going to sink my mouth between your thighs—”
“Next up, a cameo from a fan favorite.”
Yellow lights from the stage shone into Jase’s face. The emcee, a guy named Steve who Jase knew from his time at the Haunt, waved with a microphone.
“You know him. You love him. Jase Young!”
Shit. He forgot that he’d promised Penny a song after she heard about his stints with his dad’s band and begged him to perform.
“This isn’t over,” he growled into Lindsey’s ear.
Jase pushed through the crowd to the stage.
There were already catcalls, whistling. As if he was somebody anybody should whistle for.
He took the mic from Steve and found Lindsey in the crowd.
Deer in headlights again. He was about to knock her socks off, if she was wearing any. He’d knock those black heels off, too.
The first notes of a Billy Idol song beat through the speakers and Jase decided what the hell.
Let’s give her a show.