“Listen to me, Taylor,” he said, his voice steely. “I can’t let this marriage happen, and neither can you. Do you want Aaron to marry that woman? Do you want to turn on the TV next year and hear all about the two mil they dropped on a fucking baby shower? This is the kind of mistake that lasts forever.”
“I know that.”
“Then goddamnit, come with me.”
“No.”
He growled. “Why not?”
“Because.”
“Well now that you explained it.”
My lip curled. “Because you only want me there to lure him away from your ex, Mason.”
“And if that were the case?”
“Then that’s fucked up.” I tried to writhe away from Mason but in a second flat, his hands were on the door, his frame caging me in.
“How so?”
“You figure it out.”
“I’d prefer that tongue of yours enlighten me.”
Chest heaving, I stared up into his eyes, trying to find the words I knew he doubted I had in me. Wetting my lips, I finally regained composure. “You’re counting on me being weak, Mason,” I whispered, my voice shaky but knife-sharp. “Aaron disappeared on me after three years without telling me why. He let me find out on my own that he was getting married to another woman, and on top of all that, he left me with a hell of a financial mess to deal with alone. So if you’re hoping for me to run back to him, then you’re basically banking on me to have a catastrophic lapse in judgment. You’re hoping I am so dumb I might still try to pursue a life with a man who ruined mine without thinking twice, well, sorry to break it to you, but I have a little more respect for myself that that.” I blew blonde locks from the eyes that burned so fiercely into his that he took a step back. “Enlightened yet?”
Mason blinked, stunned for half a second. But lifting his eyebrows, he recovered. “I’m definitely something,” he said. I shook my head and turned around so I didn’t have to watch him adjust his package.
“You’re also leaving now,” I muttered, unlocking the door and ignoring the heat of Mason’s body on my back. My heart beat faster when I felt him graze against my backside before sliding my hand off the knob to grab it himself.
“Alright,“ he conceded with a sudden ease. But in the hall, he held the door open for the last word. “Let me know when you change your mind.”
“I won’t.”
“You will,” he said with a nonchalance that drove me insane. “Feel free to call me when you do. And don’t be shy. Any time of the night works for me.”
My cheeks flushed red and I tried to retort, but with a dirty little wink, Mason was gone.
Chapter Three
I dragged my feet out of the empty break room with its fluorescent lights and broken vending machine. It was no paradise, but I still wished I could stay there instead of return to my dead Friday night shift, or my remarkably unpleasant coworkers. It’d been awhile since I’d dealt with cliques, but at McFadden’s Ale House, there was a clique, and it hated me. Loathed me, really, because as I’d come to learn, they didn’t take kindly to new meat at Faddy Ales. New meat meant a crowded tip pool, and a crowded tip pool meant less money for all.
Except me.
Thanks to Aaron, I was there to make whatever cash I could get, so I endured the mean girls because on good nights, they at least ignored me. Of course, on bad ones, they nitpicked my every move, called me “bitch” to my face and hip-checked me at service bar. It sucked but money was money, so I swallowed my pride and reminded myself that I hadn’t come to make friends. In fact, McFadden’s had remained my dirty little secret since I was hired because by day, I was an event coordinator for the esteemed Vandermark Restaurants on Fifth Ave, so I really didn’t need anyone to know that by night, I was slinging lagers in a cropped sports jersey, Daisy Dukes and knee-high socks – at a bar known locally as “Shitty Hooters.”
According to Yelp, the nickname derived from the wait staff’s attitude, which was described as “aggressively apathetic.” On a normal night, I couldn’t argue that. But tonight, my coworkers seemed oddly impassioned about providing service – at least to some table that had arrived during my break. The second I got back to my shift, I saw my fellow waitresses burst into the back station, clamoring over their queen, Brielle, and the alleged babe at her table twenty-eight.
“I will literally give you fifty dollars if you let me serve him tonight, Bri.”
“I’ll give you half my tips and cover your Sunday.”
“I’ll give half my tips and cover your whole weekend!”
Damn. In the doorway, I watched in awe because on any other night, these were three of the greediest and pettiest girls in the world. I’d seen them argue for two hours over a six-dollar tip, so it was like a sad breath of fresh
air to witness them offer everything short of their firstborn just to flirt with a guy. But their efforts were in vain because Brielle declared, “Sorry, sluts!” before yanking her shirt down, grabbing the water pitcher and glaring at me. “Out of my way? Thanks,” she muttered, still hip-checking me on her way to the floor.