Chapter 3
Three
CLOVER
Inside, McLeary’s looks like someone bet a New Orleans-loving Irishman he couldn’t out-decorate a Mardi Gras float, and he unleashed his full Blarney-fueled interior design skills, no holding back.
The ceiling is strung with thousands of Mardi Gras beads looped over Celtic crosses, a taxidermied alligator looms over the bar in a tiny green derby, and two hand-painted banners read—“Kiss me, I’m Irish” and “Let the Good Times Roll.”
Both are crooked, but there are way bigger things to get worked up about than whether or not the signs above the taps are straight.
Like whether or not the gumbo is fire…
And this gumbo is clearly fire.
I smell it the second we walk in, a smoky-sweetness with top notes of tomato and grilled sausage that makes my mouth water. It also reminds me that I never made it inside to the snack table at Charlotte’s party before Charlie Bean decided she was ready to get out of her mama.
“We should get some gumbo with our stale popcorn,” I say, raising my voice to be heard over the fiddle music blasting from the jukebox.
Dean widens his eyes and gives a small, but dramatic, shake of his head before lifting a hand to the bartender, an older woman with a haystack of bleached blond hair pulled into a ponytail atop her head. “Hey, Karen, how’s it going?”
“Dean! Darling Deany Kate,” she says in an Irish accent that sounds a little off for some reason. “I’m well and doin’ better now that you’re here, darling boy. It’s been an age.”
“Way too long,” Dean agrees.
She flashes a kind smile my way. “And I see you’ve brought a friend! Welcome, love, I’m Karen McLeary, and this is your new home away from home. Grab a basket and get yourself some popcorn. It’s on the house.”
“Thanks,” I say with a smile, following Dean to a shamrock green booth in the corner by the ancient popcorn machine. When he turns back to me, I whisper, “What’s wrong with the gumbo?”
“Pretty sure the pot hasn’t been cleaned this decade,” Dean says, just loudly enough to be heard over the music. “Every time I eat it, I regret it for days afterward. Days.”
I wince and laugh. “Ouch. Okay. Well, that’s a shame. It smells amazing.”
“That’s how it reels you in,” he says, shedding his coat and tossing it into the booth. “But I care too much about your fine ass to put it in the McLeary’s Gumbo line of fire.”
I bite my bottom lip. “Well, thanks. My ass and I appreciate that. Should I get popcorn then, while you get beer? I could go for a snack.”
Boy, could I. I want to snack on every inch of this man. But until I have free rein to go ham on his big, beautiful body, I’ll have to make do with bar food.
He grins, his eyes glittering as if he has a pretty good idea what I’m thinking. “Yeah, grab us a basket. I’ll get beers and some chips, too. Abita on draft, okay?”
“Yeah, love Abita.”
“Me, too. Be right back.”
“Sounds good,” I murmur, watching him go.
Dean’s lankier than Blue—his team captain and my surrogate older brother—but his backside is pure beefcake.
You could bounce an entire handful of quarters off that round, muscled ass.
And he’s tall, too, a good four inches taller than me, which is rare for a girl a whisper away from six feet.
I’m used to being as tall or taller than the men I date.
It’s not something that’s ever bothered me, but looking up at a guy for once is… kind of nice.
Especially when the guy looks as good as Dean.
My head is in the perfect place for a night like this, I decide, arranging a paper liner in a faded straw basket and scooping salty-smelling movie-style popcorn inside.
I’ll stay focused on Dean’s yummy exterior, have a great time breaking my dry spell, and walk away without a mark on my secretly squishy heart.
I have enough physical scars.
I don’t need any emotional ones right now, thank you very much.
He returns with beers, salt-and-vinegar chips, and a package of BBQ-flavored pork rinds.
“Quite possibly the most disgusting Southern snack food of all,” I observe as I study the winking pig on the cover. “When my friend, Shelby, told me what they were made of, I didn’t believe her at first.”
Dean wrinkles his nose. “Sorry. They were the only other option aside from the chips. We don’t have to eat them. I prefer the stale popcorn, honestly.” He grabs a handful, funneling it into his mouth and chewing with a low moan. “Damn. So good.”
Still pretty sure he’s messing with me, I pop a couple of pieces between my lips, and salty, buttery hits my tongue. “Wow.” I chew behind my hand as the experience evolves. “You’re right, the texture is pure Styrofoam, but the flavor is—”
“Heaven,” Dean cuts in, collecting another handful.
I laugh. “So, how did you find this place?”
“A friend of mine from the team comes here sometimes. After my divorce was final, he brought me here to ‘celebrate.’ I wasn’t really in the mood, but…” His lips curve in a tight smile. “I ended up hitting it off with Karen and craving the popcorn, so…”
“I wonder what they do to it to make it so addictive?” I ask, diving in for more.
“Dark magic,” Dean says seriously. “It’s the only answer.”
I hum low in my throat. “Well, you play for the Voodoo, guess you would know. I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you when we first met. Blue gave me season tickets, and I’ve watched at least four games all the way through this year.”
“All the way through,” he repeats, arching a teasing brow. “As opposed to ducking out after the first period? Not a hockey fan, I’m guessing?”
“No, I like hockey. I’m just usually exhausted.
Before the accident, I was at the diner all the time.
And after, well…” I force a breezy note into my voice, “I’m not able to work as many shifts, but turns out healing from multiple bone fractures is pretty tiring.
Who knew? So where are you from originally?
” I ask, ready to move on from my tragic recent past.
“Minnesota. My mom got a job at a law firm outside of Minneapolis when I was a kid. My big brother and I hated it at first, but then we discovered the youth hockey league and…the rest is history. He coaches full-time in our hometown, and I went pro. How about you?”
“Missouri,” I say, bobbing a shoulder. “Didn’t love it.
Didn’t hate it, but by the time I graduated from high school, I was ready to leave.
I stuck around for a while, doing community college to make my dad happy, but it wasn’t for me.
I’m too artsy-fartsy for business school.
And most of the things you need to learn about starting a business, you can learn online for free now anyway. ”
“Business school, huh? I would have thought you’d be a music major. You’re an incredible musician,” he says, continuing to be not-at-all shy with the compliments.
Which is so rare! I swear, it feels like guys my age resent it when they realize I’m not just a pretty girl who sews clothes.
The fact that I can make my bass do sexy things on stage sours them faster than the fact that I’m allegedly “way taller than five-ten.” (Spoiler: I am not way taller than five-ten.
They are all lying to themselves about how short they are, and need to continue living in denial more than they need to date a fantastic tall girl like me.)
I honestly don’t get it. You would think a guy would be proud that the person he’s dating is talented, but apparently not.
Sigh…
Why, oh why, couldn’t I have met Dean sooner? Pre-kids?
Though, considering our age gap, I’m guessing he was in his twenties when he met his ex. I was probably still in middle school at the time, so…
Argh. I should probably ask him exactly how old he is.
Or go Google it in the bathroom.
I should also probably tell him that I’m twenty-four.
I don’t look especially young. I have one of those faces that will probably look thirty-something until I’m in my sixties, like my dad.
And all Dean knows about me is that I’m friends with Blue and Beatrice, both of whom are quite a bit older than I am.
He might honestly have no idea that we’re at different places in life.
Time to come clean, I guess.
Instead, I ask, “Want to play darts?”
“I do want to play darts.” He rises, his half-empty beer in hand, and reaches for mine. “I’ll bring yours over?”
I nod, chest tightening. “I can carry things, you know.” I slide to the edge of the booth before using my cane to get to my feet. “I just have to get up first. I’m not a total damsel in distress.”
“No, you’re a damsel on a date, and I’m trying to be a gentleman,” he says, before adding with a wink, “for now. But when it comes time to beat you at darts, the gloves are coming off.”
“I would hope so,” I purr, following him past the popcorn machine to the ancient dart boards in the corner. “I don’t like it when people let me win. I want to dominate the field of play fair and square.”
“Dominate.” He clucks his tongue as he sets our beers on a high-top table nearby. “Aggressive language. Am I going to need a safe word?”
I shrug. “Maybe. Guess we’ll see. If you do, what would it be? Just in case?”
“I don’t know,” he says, pulling the darts from the cork. “Pickle juice?”
I laugh. “Pickle juice?”
“Definitely, not a phrase I’m going to shout out by accident.”
I bite my lip, flustered by the thought of Dean “shouting out things by accident,” a fact I cover by taking a drink of my beer. When I emerge from my glass, he’s staring at me expectantly. “What?”
“You never told me your safe word,” he says.
“Oh, well…” I search my brain, but there’s nothing there.
Nothing but the nagging certainty that I have to be honest with him. Pretending to be this wild, confident girl who bullies men into buying her drinks any night of the week is fun, but it’s not me. Even if this is just a one-night thing, Dean deserves to know what he’s getting into here.
So, I sigh, and do the thing I always do, the thing where I ruin a good time by being annoyingly, buzz-killingly honest.