Muffin Top

What had he done?

“Not enough,” he said.

And losing Lucy was his punishment for that.

Chapter Twenty-One

Sitting in The Pink Narwhal when it was packed to the gills for ladies’ night, Lucy turned to her companion and shared a real world truth.

“You know, there are few times in a woman’s life when having female friends is as important as when you’re contemplating murder.”

Zach Blackburn just sat there like a silent hockey Yoda and lifted one eyebrow.

Of course he did—because he was a man, and they did not know the magic answer to not-really-serious homicidal ideas post-breakup.

Could it be a breakup if we’d never really been together? Oh, that was even more depressing.

However, every woman in the world would know that the proper response to kinda-sorta plotting the demise of a man who did someone wrong was not silence, but to share in a low, conspiratorial voice, “I have a shovel.” That was what women did for each other. They were ride or die. Tend and defend. They weren’t silent hulks of muscle and wry glances who drank whiskey neat.

When the need for a bar buddy arose, though, her choices were vastly limited in this situation.

“But I can’t call my girls because Gina is marrying into that damn Hartigan family, Fallon is already a member of it, and poor sweet Tess shouldn’t be stuck in the middle trying to pick between friends.”

Another lifted eyebrow—this time it was the one with the metal bar through it—and another drink of whiskey before Zach finally said something. “I’m so glad that you, as the woman who recently chewed my ass out for punching a guy who literally hocked a loogie in my face for costing the team a trip to the playoffs, have begun to see the beauty of a little violence.”

See? A girlfriend would never have thrown Lucy’s hypocrisy back in her face. Well, a really good friend would, but she’d pick the right moment after all the initial I-am-woman-watch-me-bury-him-in-an-anthill-naked feelings had abated. Tactical error on Zach’s part.

“Oh boo-hoo,” she grumbled. “Your asshole insulted your pride. My asshole broke my heart.” She took a long drink of her third (fourth?) vodka and Mountain Dew, relishing the burn as it went down. “Although the whole spitting phlegm thing is pretty gross. And unhygienic. Why are men so nasty?”

He laughed. That was his tell. The first time she heard the soft rumble, she knew she had a tatted, pierced, growling grizzly bear with a Pooh Bear center on her hands, and she knew she could work with him.

“That is a longer conversation than I think you’re going to stay conscious for if you keep going at that rate,” he said.

“What?” she squawked at a loud enough volume level to turn heads and make her realize that she just may have had more than she’d thought. “I’m just keeping pace with you.”

“One, as an athlete who hits the gym hard every single day, my body can take five of these in a row.”

Shit. Five? Also, did he just break out the metabolism thing? With her? He had. Asshole.

“Fuck you.”

He chuckled at her. “Oh, ow. If I had feelings, that would hurt.” He sipped his whiskey. “Two, don’t worry, we haven’t had five drinks. I’m on my second and you’re on your third. Yes, I could see you trying to figure it out because your lips were moving when you were counting.”

Of all the signs in the world that she should go home now, being told by her most troublesome client that she was drunk in public—not that he used exactly those words—was pretty much the equivalent of a massive neon sign. Instead of heading out, she held up her hand and waved the bartender back over.

Before the guy could make his way over, though, he made eye contact with Zach, who did some kind of silent man-to-man mind-meld thing. The bartender turned his gaze to Lucy, shrugged, and turned in the other direction.

She shot back the rest of her drink and set the glass on the bar before turning to the man she knew was trying to help, but damn she was tired of men thinking they knew what was best for her, beginning with her dad thinking that calling his overweight daughter Muffin Top was okay right up to the now, with Frankie spouting off about how she was the best sex to those assholes who only thought fat women were good for banging because they worked more for it. Way to feed right into the stereotype. How could she stay with a guy like that? It wasn’t that she was scared of putting herself out there, of ending up like her dad, mooning after someone who didn’t really want them but only saw them as a soft place to land when things got rough.

Oh yeah, that doesn’t sound like you’re projecting on Frankie at all.