Bound to Darkness (Doubeck Crime Family)

His breath tickles my ear when he shifts closer again. “So what are you doing out here all by yourself?”

I try to smile but can’t bring myself to let it reach my eyes. “Oh, you know, just want to relax.”

In my mind, I’m trying to ramp myself up to asking him to get a room or go back to his place so we can get this over with. Something tells me that if I get pushy, Dan is going to get turned off, which is another quality I absolutely hate about my new friend.

“Oh, same here. I just wanted to take the edge off, you know?” He’s almost shouting in my ear now, even though nothing about the bar has changed in the last few minutes. He must have started way before I got here. The idea of letting him touch me, of letting him put his hands on me, is such a turnoff that nausea rolls through me. Shit. He’s not going to sleep with me if I puke on him.

I order a couple of waters from the bartender and ease a glass in front of Dan. He takes the hint without a fuss, thankfully. “Thanks,” he yells.

It’s then that I start to accept that I can’t do this. Not even if I wanted to, or for all the drinks in the world. Dan repels me, and he’s not Kai. There’s no way he can make me feel safe. Not for a second.

“Well, Dan, it’s been nice meeting you. I hope you get your edge off.”

His eyes go a little wide, and he shifts closer, somehow reading something more in my comment. “I mean, you could come with me to another place, somewhere quieter, maybe?”

I shake my head. “Thanks, Dan, but that’s not a good idea. My boyfriend would probably have to murder you afterward, and no one would ever find your body.”

His smile slips, and then he starts laughing. “Oh, that’s a good one. But really, you have a boyfriend. What are you doing in a bar then?”

I glare at him now, no longer disguising my disgust. “Sometimes people like to have a drink.”

“You weren’t drinking when I got here, though. Or were you just waiting on some dude to buy you a drink, so you can stiff him when the tab comes due?”

I sit up straighter and fully face him now. “Excuse me?”

“You were flirting with me.”

“For a second, I considered flirting with you. For the record, you smell like cheap alcohol, and I’m not going to fuck you for buying me a bottom-shelf glass of scotch. Go home and sober up before you mouth off to someone who wants to hurt you.”

He sits down heavily on the stool, and the bartender brings another round. I shove it back toward him. “No thanks, I’m good. Wouldn’t want to run up that invisible tab you keep in your head, Dan.”

His scowl is nothing compared to Kai’s, so I don’t flinch when he tries to lay it on me. “Gonna have to look a lot meaner than that to scare me.”

Thankfully, he takes the hint and swivels to face the bar, leaving me alone. I leave his scotch untouched and sip on the water I got for myself. He can’t add that to his tab, at least.

This was such a bad idea. I don’t know what I was thinking.

Dan turns to look at me again, and I shake my head, not even bothering to look at him. “Not going to happen.”

He opens his mouth, then snaps it shut, his gaze shifting over my shoulder. Oh, goodie, maybe he found himself another target. I feel a bit guilty for being an asshole to him, but to be fair, he was being an asshole right along with me.

A hand lands on my shoulder, and I’m about to get pissed until I notice the scars on the fingers and trail my eyes up to his face. “Is this your whiskey?” Kai asks.

I nod. “It’s really shitty scotch, not whiskey, though.”

He shrugs and throws the liquor back. His grimace says he agrees with me. “What are you doing here?” His voice is eerily calm, like the silence before a tornado.

I can’t meet his gaze now. “Thought I’d get out of the house for a while, you know, sightsee.”

“Sightsee,” he echoes. “And your new friend, Dan, over there, were you really going to fuck him?” This tone is not calm. The tornado has touched down, aiming right for me.

“No, not really. I thought it might be a good idea, but then I reconsidered it pretty fast. Besides, he’s drunk.”

He looks over at Dan trying to hit on another woman. “Doesn’t look like he’d care too much.”

Kai picks up the abandoned scotch and tosses it back too. “Let’s go.”

“No, I just got here. I don’t want to go back to your apartment to mope around. You’re the one who has been pushing me to get out into the world.”