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I wanted to ask who Mama D was and where she was now, but the way she was talking in past tense, it sounded like the woman was no longer walking this earth.
“Liberty! You can leave early. Shawn is here, and we aren’t busy enough for both of you,” a woman with red hair, pulled tight in a bun on top of her head, called out from the other end of the bar.
The girl in front of me sighed. “Great,” she muttered.
“She talking to you?”
She nodded. “Yeah, that’s the owner. I was supposed to work a double today. I was gonna get a ride from one of the servers to the bus stop after work.” She looked back at my glass. “Want me to get you another before I leave?”
The defeated look on her face didn’t sit well with me. I liked it when she smiled.
“No, I’m good. Rain has mostly stopped. I’ll close my tab and head on out,” I told her, trying like hell not to say more, but I already knew I wasn’t going to be able to do it. “You need a ride?” Yep, there it was. I couldn’t leave her here to walk to a bus stop in the rain. I didn’t know where the closest one was, but if she was hoping for a ride, I was assuming it was a good distance.
She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and glanced toward the windows, then back at me. “Yes, I, um, I do, but I don’t want you to go out of your way or anything.”
I slid a hundred-dollar bill toward her and stood up. “I won’t be. Go get your things and meet me outside.”
“I need to get your change,” she said, taking the money.
“No change.”
She frowned. “That’s a fifty-six-dollar tip.”
I nodded. “Yeah. See you outside.”
I didn’t wait for her to argue before I headed for the door.
I shouldn’t have done that. Putting a woman on the back of my bike was something I never did. But here I was, offering to give a ride to the sexy bartender because those eyes of hers did something to me.
Stepping into the humid, thick air that came after rain in the summer in Florida, I tried to take a deep breath.
Think about the doctor. She was who I was taking out tomorrow night. She was old enough. She was also a fucking doctor with an Ivy League degree. I could be proud of who I brought around my daughter and grandkids.
Picking up my helmet, I adjusted the strap so it would fit on Liberty’s head. I was helping out a girl who needed a ride. I’d want someone to help my daughter if she was in this position. Probably wouldn’t want someone like me doing it though. Not that it even mattered. Madeline would never be in this position.
The door to the bar swung open, and out sauntered Liberty, the hot-as-fuck, too-young bartender.
God, that body.
Why wasn’t some man here, ready to pick her up? She should have a guy ready to drop whatever he was doing when she called him. Maybe there was one, and he was at work. I hadn’t asked.
She reached me, and I handed her the helmet.
“Better put this on.”
Her eyes dropped to it, and she glanced back up at me before taking it.
“Your man busy?” I asked.
She paused and looked at me as if she didn’t understand me.
“A girl who looks like you has a man. Where is he?”
The pain was back in her eyes, and I wanted to let out a string of curses. I didn’t like it when she had that sad expression.
“I did,” she said softly. “I … he …” She took a breath. “I walked in on him and his sister-in-law two weeks ago.”
What?
