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This is a pointless conversation. It doesn’t matter what I say to her, how nice I am. Annaleigh is sore about the fact that she couldn’t turn me into husband material. She bragged to her friends that she could. Friends who then came to me and told me. It was part of the reason we broke up. That and the fact that Annaleigh wanted me as a trophy. A way to get under her father’s skin.
“You should watch what you?—”
Marci steps around Annaleigh toward me.
“Did you buy these for us, Taylor?”
She gestures with the beers.
Fuck. She’s still here. She heard that.
“Nope,” I say.
“Excuse me.” Annaleigh whips around and narrows her eyes at Marci. “We’re in the middle of a conversation here.”
“And I’m in the middle of not giving a damn,” Marci says.
“Jealous?” I ask, because it will drive Marci wild.
She blushes an attractive shade of pink. Petals on silk sheets.
“In your wildest, wettest dreams, Taylor.”
“Be careful,” Annaleigh says, dry as a cracker, “he might take you up on that offer, lead you on, and then leave you.”
“If he treated you so bad, why are you so obsessed with him?” Marci asks. The woman isnotafraid of conflict. She doesn’t care whose eyes are on her. “Seems like a great way to erode your dignity.”
“‘Erode your dignity?’ What are you, an encyclopedia?”
“Dictionary,” Marci says, “is the word you’re looking for. And I’m here to tell you that you’re making a dick of yourself in front of the entire bar.”
Annaleigh laughs at Marci. “You have a crush on him? Get in line with the rest of the women who’ve been in his bed.”
That’s a lie. None of them have been in my bed.
“I’m not the type of person who queues,” Marci says, “but if that’s you, you do you. I’m saying, talking about how you got a promotion in lieu of trying to bring another person’s aspirations down is a dick move. And you should be ashamed of yourself.”
And then she turns to leave.
Annaleigh sticks out her foot and connects it with Marci’s ankle. Marci tips forward, her eyes widening, and my hand snaps out and grabs hold of her wrist before she can fall. But I overcompensate and pull her backward a little too hard.
Marci tumbles into my lap, the beers crashing to the floor and shattering.
Heads turn, the noise loud even with the music pumping through the speakers. Annaleigh slinks off with a triumphant smile, and my chest rises and falls rapidly, my teeth set against each other. She tried to hurt her. Shefucking…
Marci’s palms touch my forearm, and I move my gaze down to her face.
“Bette Davis Eyes” by Kim Carnes thrums through the bar, taking up the tiny spaces between us.
My forearm loops around Marci’s waist. Her hand resting against it. Her thighs across my lap. My throat dry. Her pink, wet lips. Green eyes, sparkling, wide. Soft breaths, hot against my chin. Her fingers bite into my forearm then relax.
She glances away, but I keep staring at her. At the top of her head, the side of her face, the wisp of auburn hair resting against her throat.
“I’m fine,” she says, tapping on my arm with her fingertips.
I release her.
She slips off my lap, side-stepping the glass. She looks like she wants to clean it, but I hold out a hand to stop her. I bend and start picking up the pieces as one of Longhorn’s servers comes over to help. Cash and Savage offer to help too, ask Marci if she’s fine, try to make conversation that falls on deaf ears.
