Chapter 5 Genevieve
Genevieve
The only thing worse than sharing Art with Lance Calloway is sharing air.
His presence hangs in a room like humidity, existing in my space.
The same way he always seems to be doing.
It’s infuriating.
The Round Table is half-full tonight, mostly regulars, and my eyes reflexively find Lance across the bar. He’s scowling in the corner booth with his jaw tight and his shoulders tense, same as always. Even more so, because his siblings are here like I manifested them by bringing them up.
Well…two of them, anyway.
Juliette and Alex Calloway.
A light brown palm slaps against the bar top, and I jolt, coming face-to-face with a more familiar regular, Merrick Carter.
“Daydreaming again, Gin?”
“You know me.”
“Another round for the table,” he drawls, eyes a little too glassy to pass for sober. “Get it? Round…table?”
“Fairly confident that’s not what the name means, Merrick.”
“Semantics, schmemantics.”
I glance down at his side, knowing damn well what’s under his crisp black tee is a healing bullet wound he got on the Verona University campus. “You sure you should be throwing back another one?”
“You know what they say.”
“Do I?” I grab two pint glasses and flip them under the taps.
“No rest for the wicked.”
“And you’re the wicked one in this scenario?”
“Worse. I survived being shot, which means I’m immortal.” He presses a hand to his chest. “And all immortal beings eventually fall into wickedness.”
I laugh. “So you’ve learned nothing, then.”
“Oh, I’ve learned,” he says, tapping his temple. “I’ve learned when you cheat death, you get to drink for free.”
“Is that written in the bylaws of bar etiquette?” I slide the beers to him.
He winks and chugs one down. “You’ll bring the rest back to us, yeah, sweetheart?”
“You got it.”
I fill another pint, trying not to look toward the corner where Lance is glaring like it’s my fault he’s here.
“Helloooo, earth to Ginny. You good?”
Rosalie’s shooting me a loaded glance, her strawberry hair bouncing in a ponytail as she fills up a round black tray with pink shots at the service bar.
“Peachy.”
I slam the drink I’m making down a little too hard and grip the neck of a vodka bottle like I’m trying to strangle it. “Who the hell does he think he is?”
She rears back, then looks around. “Care to elaborate on who you’re talking about?”
“Your cousin, Lance.”
“Ugh. Don’t remind me that they’re here. Lance is the only one I can tolerate.”
“Well I don’t know how. He’s awful,” I say. “Where were you anyway?”
“Benny wanted some alone time, you know how it is.” She winks, wiping the corner of her mouth.
I swallow the gag.
She acts like everything is fine with them, but it’s easy to see through the act. Benjamin is a creep who love bombs Rosalie into being at his side and then treats her like shit.
Not that she’d listen if I tell her that. I tried to be her friend when I first moved here, but she’s got a wall too high for anyone to climb. So instead, we trade barbs back and forth during our shifts, and that’s the extent of it.
“Anyway, prepare for your night to get worse,” she continues. “Benny said you have to clean downstairs.”
My eyes fly to Lance again. His head’s tilted toward Juliette while she talks, that forever frown on his face.
“Like…clean it, clean it?” I ask.
I’ve never been allowed unfettered access to the Lye before, and part of me naively thought that because Frederick was gone, maybe Art would shut the whole operation down.
But that’s silly, because Art doesn’t run that operation. He’s just the name on the books.
“I don’t know; I’m not the fucking boss,” Rosalie says.
“Uh, why are you yelling at me?”
“Sorry.” She frowns. “You just ask a lot of questions.”
“Sue me.”
Rosalie picks up the last shot, her attention floating over my shoulder, and the color drains from her cheeks. “There’s that guy again.”
“What guy?”
She jerks her chin toward the corner by the front door.
There’s a man standing there, tall and lean, with a blond crew cut. And his eyes are on me.
“Do you know him?” she asks.
“Why would I know him?”
“He’s staring like you do.”
Paranoia wraps its sticky fingers around my throat and squeezes, and panic makes my vision blur.
It’s about Genevieve’s father.
Is this about my dad? Is this guy here because of him?
No, I brush the thought aside. My dad said everything was fine, and why would someone be in Rosebrook Falls for me when he’s in Boston, anyway?
But he works with criminals, so how safe is he really?
The man tilts his head, and then he grins.
My lungs cinch tight, making my breathing shallow.
I don’t know who this guy is, but he gives me the creeps.
A shadow falls over the bar, and I snap out of my daze.
Lance is staring down at me, and the heat of him cuts through the shiver crawling down my spine.
“Where the hell are the drinks?” he asks.
I grab a shaker just to do something with my hands. “You shouldn’t be behind the bar.”
“You shouldn’t be here at all. Guess we’re both out of luck.”
I peer around him, because that guy seemed so familiar, but I can’t place him.
“Drinks, Half-Pint,” Lance repeats, nodding toward the table where his siblings and Merrick are sitting. “Merrick thinks you’re mad at him.”
He says it like he’s irritated, but I swear he angles his body just enough to block the man’s line of sight.
I raise the shaker, tipping it back and forth. “Do you have vision problems? I’m making them.”
“Do that.”
My eyes flick to the man again, another chill coiling around my middle.
Lance steps closer, his expression turning dark. “Do you know him?”
“No.”
“Stay behind the bar.”
My pulse spikes. “Why?”
He doesn’t answer, just turns around like he’s hiding me from view.
The guy holds Lance’s stare for one long, unsettling moment, and then he spins and walks out the front door, that stupid red bell chiming cheerfully.
Lance twists, and snaps his fingers in my face.
“Drinks, Genevieve. And don’t step one foot outside this bar unless I’m with you.”
I scrunch my nose and mock him, but clearly, it doesn’t deter him, because when the bar closes, Lance is there like an overbearing shadow, following me on my short walk home.
He doesn’t speak, and when I get inside my place, slam the door in his face, and look through the peephole, he’s perched outside, his tall and broad frame taking up the entire view, that silver chain glinting against the sidewalk lights.
I should invite him in.
But I don’t.
Instead, I spend all night wide awake, wondering what Lance Calloway was like before he became the underground fighter at the Lye.