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Brooks chuckles as if I’m pathetic. ‘You.’
I shake my head. ‘Dude, she’s a cocktail waitress. Flirting is her job. There’s nothing there.’
‘So you’re not attracted to her at all?’
Damn it, Mercy.
‘I can’t deny that she’s beautiful. But she’s taken.’
‘That’s too bad. I had a good feeling about you two.’
‘You’re suddenly so in love with love that you’re taking a page from Norah’s book?’
Norah is his mind-reading ex-wife who predicted Mercy was his one. When it turned out she was, everyone wanted me to pay Norah a visit to find mine. No thank you.
Andrews sits down next to Brooks, two foot-long dogs and a giant soda on his tray.
‘Thanks,’ Brooks says, reaching for one, but the older man swats his hand away.
‘Neither of these is for you, kid. You want lunch; you buy your own.’
Brooks glowers. ‘You’re going to eat two feet of hot dog loaded with sauerkraut, then go back to work?’ he asks, clearly not on board with this plan.
Andrews fills his mouth, now talking between chews. ‘I’d suggest cracking a window,’ he says, his gaze moving to me. ‘Nice ponytail,’ he says with a smirk.
‘Impressive crumb catcher of a stache, my man. I thought those thick broom-style lip warmers died out with seventies porn.’ I return the ‘compliment’ to the silver-haired man and watch him wipe a napkin over it.
‘Thank you,’ he says proudly.
‘Anyway,’ I say, looking back to Brooks. ‘Jade’s not interested like that. We’re just bar friends. I don’t know why Conner would ask me to watch her. ’Cause he’s an idiot?’
‘Perhaps. Or… maybe it’s a sign.’
‘If you pull out a crystal ball, I’m out of here.’
He chuckles. ‘I don’t believe in all this sign shit,’ Brooks defends himself. ‘At least not completely. But that’s the vibe I got when I saw you two chatting at the bar one night. I thought you were charming her, and she was eating it up.’
Why don’t I remember this?
‘Was I drunk?’
In all reality, I can’t pretend it might not have happened because I’m rather flirty under the influence.
‘You may have been a tad inebriated.’ Brooks grins. ‘I can’t believe you don’t remember. You moon-walked for her.’
I did what? Now he’s got my full attention. I feel that whatever this story is, it won’t be as flattering as I hope. ‘Tell me about it,’ I say, returning to my hot dog.
‘It was three months ago. Jade was upset over something, and you found her crying back by the bathrooms during her break.’
I nod. ‘Her mom had just been moved into hospice.’ I remember this part. I was drinking water between shots, my attempt to cancel out the booze (sometimes I’ve got great ideas, but this was not one of them), so I had to pee a lot. During one of these many bathroom trips, I spotted her in a dark corner, her forehead pressed where the two walls came together by the back door, across from the bathrooms. Her sniffling stopped me in my tracks. She was crying. I’m not great at crying women, but when I touched her back and asked if she was okay, she turned and wrapped her arms around my neck, crying into my shoulder as she told the story of what was going on in her life. The only words that left my lips were, ‘I’m so sorry.’ After that, I held her until she let go.
‘That was nothing.’ I wave a hand. ‘I simply hugged the girl. Her mother received a death sentence; I feel like that’s hug-worthy.’
‘Agreed.’ Brooks nods. ‘But that’s not the part I’m talking about. It was a while after that, just before closing.’
With everything I have, I cannot remember leaving the bar that night. That’s not promising whatever I did was charming, cute, or even forgivable.
‘Keep talking…’
