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“Well, it stopped me,” I started. “Not that if I wasn’t married, there would be …” I groaned in frustration. “Can you just get me another beer?” I said, needing him to stop looking at me and Anthony in that way.
“Yes, sir.” The bartender smirked before turning away.
Rolling my eyes, I shook my head and turned to face Anthony. At this point, with the number of times I shook my head, it was just going to come loose from my neck and fall off.
Anthony looked like he’d been through hell and back. His curls lost their luster. In fact, they looked just a tiny bit matted. My leg shook against my stool in indecision as I looked him over. He didn’t smell, but he looked like he’d slept in that plaid shirt and black pants for sure, and he’d just thrown the black jacket on top of it to leave the house. His under eyes were dark, and he looked like hell. My lips twisted up in guilt, sadness, and resentment. My chest grumbled like thunder with the conflicting emotions that overtook me.
Clearing my throat and taking a deep breath, I decided. Tilting my head to the seat beside me, I invited him to join me. “We need to talk.”
He looked between me and the door, narrowing his brows.
Chapter 32
Anthony
Okay,whatwasheup to this time? It felt like he was a lion, and I was his prey. The bass and intervals of the bar music made me feel like I was watching myself on a wildlife documentary about to be devoured.
The last time we were in this bar together, he seemed friendly to begin with, and then he attacked. And honestly, I wasn’t in the mood to be attacked again today. My legs trembled, not necessarily out of fear of him. But well, with my body entering fight or flight and my mind being drained, I wasn’t in the frame of mind to take a couple of hits and walk away. And hurting him more than I already managed to do didn’t interest me.
It wasn’t that I didn’t understand his fury. His wrath was justified. To be knocked around a few times by him, that was expected. He was betrayed by me and my intimacy with his younger sister. Okay, understood. But I came here for some peace, was avoiding Tiffany and him, and had been minding my own business. So, if he called me back just to attack me again after he stopped me on my way out of this motherfucker, my guilt wouldn’t win this time. This prey would fight back.
He looked at me in confusion as I hesitated, still standing in the doorway.
“Come on, sit down. Please,” he said.
Meanwhile, the bartender looked at me and him with a smirk on his face. He’d served another customer and was hanging by the counter, pretending not to watch us. Whenever my eyes caught him, he would look down at one of the coasters or grab a cloth to “wipe.” If he thought this was drama, he should’ve been here when Chris knocked my lights out.
How he could even think that Chris and I were a thing was beyond me. The fight was on the other bartender’s lips the other day, and the reason must have spread like wildfire throughout the rest of their staff. Unless he thought that the whole reason Chris got so angry was because I’d cheated on him with his sister. Uh oh, plot twist.
Or maybe a fight wasn’t of much interest to him. But a possible relationship with gay lovers on the downlow definitely was. Ooh, he was eating it up.
Eh, I supposed Chris was the male version of Tiffany if I squinted hard enough, and if I had no other choice, he could be an option. If I was drunker than the time when those women had to rescue me from committing a drunk driving felony or worse. So basically, if I were on the brink of death, maybe I could consider sticking my you know what into his hoo ha.
Damn, I needed a drink just thinking about it. If being near Chris wasn’t so damn nerve wracking, I would’ve laughed with the bartender. It would have been worth paying money to hear all the stories the bartender had made up in his head about us on the spot. But as it was, my eyes were focused on Chris the entire time, while I gingerly approached the stool next to him.
He was in his white button-down, long-sleeved shirt, which was wrinkled and rolled up to his elbows. His black tie was swung over his shoulder, and his short red hair looked like he’d run his hand through it a thousand times. By his whole sunken demeanor, I was guessing he just had come back from court.
It struck me as strange that he would be back from court so early though. Unless he pulled a ‘me’ and never bothered to show up. I wouldn’t ask him; he’d think my interest was a ploy to find out how Tiffany was holding up, which it would have been. And well, that wouldn’t lead to the best results.
Hovering on the edge of the seat, my ass barely touched the chair in case I had to jump up and defend myself. He wouldn’t catch me off guard this time.
“What are you drinking?” he asked. His face was calm, and it seemed as if he even attempted to smile at me. If he planned to hit me again, he was being sinister and cruel about it.
“I’m all right, thanks,” I responded.
As much as another drink would’ve made this interaction far more bearable; there were enough drinks in my system, and there was no need to become impaired. If he swung at me, I had to be ready to block him. My heart was beating out of tune, and my nerves were on the edge of cracking.
My awareness and sensitivity made the hairs on my skin vibrate. “What do you want?” I asked him.
“Hmm, come on, hot stuff. I could tell you that,” the bartender whispered from behind me.
“Please, could you give us some privacy?” Chris said with a shocked exhale, and there was a sense that he was holding in his laughter, which made me want to laugh too but well, I held it. Grinning on my way to the morgue wasn’t an aspiration of mine.
“Aww, you guys are so cute. I understand. My lips are sealed, cuties,” he said with a wink before hurrying away.
Chris let out one of those breathy sighs again, and the smile he was fighting became more evident.
“I felt like we needed to talk about everything,” he said, tapping his fingers on the side of his cold, frosty beer glass. Damn, that beer looked good as bubbles of water drizzled down the glass mug. The thought of it trickling down the back of my throat was so real, and it made me regret not getting one for myself.
