Priceless (Forbidden Men 8)

“Computer programming. We graduate this spring.”

“Oh, you’re a student too?” Juli paused her cup stacking to send me a startled glance. “At Ellamore? Get out! I’m a junior there, but I’ve never seen you on campus. What’s your major?”

“Physical therapy.” I pulled out the next row of clean glasses to help her stack.

She sent me a smile of appreciation for helping even as she asked, “Because of Sarah?”

I winked. “You know it.” I’d always been fascinated when I’d watched people help Sarah improve her motor function.

“Hmm,” Juli hummed out in a thoughtful kind of way, pausing to watch me take up the slack in her job. “You must’ve known her a long time.”

“Nine years,” I answered. “She came to town with her mom and brother a few months before I showed up here to live with my brother. Actually, our brothers were both bartenders here at Forbidden, and that’s how we met.”

“She mentioned that. Are you working Monday?” The out-of-the-blue last question threw me for a loop since I wasn’t expecting it.

I glanced up confused. “What?”

She tossed me a rueful grin. “I was just thinking, since that’s my next night off, if you weren’t working either...we could maybe try to finish that date of ours.”

I opened my mouth and froze, not sure what to say. I had planned on apologizing to her first thing for the way last night had ended, but she’d sidetracked me with Sarah questions, and now...now she was steering the conversation where I definitely didn’t want it to go, because after last night—with Sarah—my head was so messed up, I didn’t have any business dating any woman right now.

But before I could turn her down and apologize, someone on the other side of the bar said, “You two went out last night?”

Juli and I both spun to find a very interested Colton listening in on our conversation.

I groaned. “Jesus, what do you want from me tonight, you little twerp?”

He held up a finger in my direction. “I’m not here for you, big brother. I actually came to see my future baby mama.” Then he grinned at my coworker. “So you ditched out on him early on a date, huh?

He’s a dreadfully dull guy to go out with, isn’t he? I knew it!”

While I growled at him, Julianna hissed, “I’m not your future anything, asshat.”

Colton blinked, his face a mask of stunned blankness. Obviously not expecting her to say that, he stuttered, “Uh...” A fumbling moment later, he let out an uneasy laugh. “While the idea of making babies with you is...damn, very appealing, I, um, wasn’t exactly—”

He coughed and scratched the back of his neck, murmuring, “Awkward,” under his breath just as someone else said, “Colton? Is that you?”

Spinning away a bit too eagerly, he faced the waitress who approached him, setting a hand against her swollen pregnant belly as she waddled close.

My little brother’s face lit up. “Hey, there you are! Happy birthday.” He tugged a small black box with a red bow on it from his pocket and handed it over. “This is for you.”

As Felicity’s face brightened with pleasure, Juli stepped closer to me. Out of the side of her mouth, she murmured, “That whole future baby mama shit; he wasn’t talking about me, was he?”

I winced. “Umm...”

“Wow,” she whispered. “Embarrassing.”

“He’s had a mad crush on Felicity since he was ten or eleven,” I tried to explain.

Ever since Felicity had helped him get over his nightmares, he’d given her husband a hard time about how he was going to steal her away. And even though he flirted with her mercilessly, I had a feeling he actually saw her as more of a mother figure than any kind of future baby mama.

“He does realize who Felicity’s married to, right?” Julia asked, looking almost worried for his sake. She had reason. Knox was a big motherfucker and looked mean as hell, plus he boxed professionally, so he could back up his sneer.

I laughed. “Yeah, he knows.” And he’d never acted intimidated by Knox’s dark glowers either. The kid had balls of pure steel.

“Yo,” I told him when another waitress called out a two-minute warning. “You gotta get lost, bro. We’re opening.”

He waved a hand at me, telling me to shut up and letting me know he’d heard me all at the same time. Then he hugged Felicity goodbye and turned back to the bar to flip me off before he settled his gaze on Juli.