She smiled. “I heard that too.”
“I’ll set you right up. My mom says extra ice and the carbonation are a sure cure for a bad stomach.”
“Bless you.”
He turned to fill her soda. She checked her watch and cursed that she’d overslept. What the hell ate at her lately? Control seemed to be slipping from her fingers at every corner.
Brad glanced back and set her soda on the counter. “Fresh bagels are in the back. Be right back.”
“You’re a god.” Angie slumped down on an empty counter stool and took a sip of the soda. Her stomach protested then eased a fraction.
“Maybe it’s the hair of the dog that you need. Sodas are for kids.” The comment came from the man sitting on the stool beside her.
Surprised, she glanced up, feeling defensive and ready to tell him to back off. But the sheepish smile on his face stopped her short. He was cute. Shoulder-length brown hair with auburn highlights, an open-collared button-down and long slim hands that wrapped around a coffee mug. “Thanks for the advice.”
He shrugged. “I’m not one to throw stones. I’ve been there a lot myself lately.”
She sipped her soda. “What do you mean?”
He winked and dropped his voice a notch. “Hung over.”
Angie faced him, trying to ignore the way her stomach groaned at the slightest movement. “I’m not hung over. I’ve got a bug.”
“Right. Right. What’s it called? The vodka virus?” He pretended to study her. “Or the white wine syndrome.”
She glanced back toward the kitchen door hoping Brad would bring her bagel so she could leave. She wasn’t sure why she should care what a stranger thought about her, but she did. “Very funny.”
“It’s no crime to drink a little too much now and again.”
“You’re wrong about me.”
It troubled her that he had cut right to her darkest secret. Secret. The word put such a torrid spin on everything. She didn’t have anything as tawdry as a secret. It wasn’t like she was an alcoholic. She’d had a few too many glasses of wine last night. And maybe the night before.
The man sipped his coffee. “I do that too.”
Brad appeared at the dinner bar with a paper bag. “Here ya go.”
Angie glanced at the ten on the counter, no longer willing to wait for change. “Thanks, Brad. See you tomorrow. ”
“I’ll be here.”
The stranger held up his cup to her. Small lines creased the corners of his eyes as he smiled. “You have a good day. Remember what I said about the hair of the dog.”
Angie snatched up the bag and started to leave. She walked two steps before the need to defend her actions took over. “Just for the record, Mr….”
He set his cup down. “Walters. Jim Walters.”
The guy didn’t look like a Jim Walters. The name sounded too plain for him, but who was she to question a decision his parents made well over thirty years ago. “Well, Mr. Walters, I do not have an issue.” She lowered her voice. “I am not hung over. I have a bug.”
“I hear ya.” His eyes twinkled in away that charmed and irritated. It had been a very long time since someone had looked past the tailored suits and the schoolteacher bun to see her as a woman. Feminine pride rose up. Just her luck it would happen on a day when she felt like crap. “It’s okay. Really.”
She leaned toward him, ready to argue her point again, when she realized she must look like the biggest fool. “Okay, fine. I had a little wine last night.” The truth sounded too harsh so she softened it with an innocent lie. “I settled a big case last night and I did have a few too many with my partners.” That was a lie. She drank almost the entire bottle alone in her house.
Walters winked. “Like I said, the hair of the dog will fix what’s ailing you.”
For a brief second the walls dropped. She was so tired of pretense and arguing shaky cases. “Honestly, hemlock sounds better.”
He chuckled. “Aspirin and ginger ale. Pain relief and hydrate. You’ll be as good as new by dinner.”
A faint smile curved the edge of her lips. “If I live that long.”
He picked up his cup, pausing by his lips. “If you do live until dinner, would you like to break bread with me?” He sipped his coffee, so relaxed and confident.
“Did you ask me out on a date?” Angie didn’t hide her shock.
Walters set his cup down softly on the saucer. “Yeah, why not?”
Automatically, she shuffled through her brain trying to remember the last time she’d been asked out, couldn’t remember and then immediately came up with six reasons why she didn’t want to go out with him.
“Let me guess,” he said easily. “You’re a lawyer.”
“You can hear the debate in my head right now, can’t you?”
“Loud and clear.”
“Sorry. I’m just out of practice.” But before one more objection could rear its head, she heard herself saying, “Sure. Dinner sounds good.”
His impish grin managed to ease her hangover. He rose. “Great. Seven?”
She tipped her head back so that she could maintain eye contact. “Perfect.”
“Now are you going to tell me your name?”
Laughter bubbled inside her, clanging against the insides of her throbbing head. “Angie Carlson.” She pulled a business card from her pocket and handed it to him. “You can text me later with a place.”
He studied the card, flicking the edge with his index finger. “I’ll text you later, Ms. Angelina R. Carlson, Esquire.”
“Great.”
Beer sloshed all over Eva’s hand, making her curse and snap the tap closed. Annoyed she’d zoned out, she set two overflowing beers in front of a couple of customers, so hard the beer again sloshed on her hands.
“Whoa,” a guy said. He was a regular named Doug. He looked like a thinner version of John Belushi. “What’s eating you?”
His buddy Pete grinned. “Must be that time of the month.”
The look Eva shot Pete and Doug wiped the smiles from their lips, however the twinkle in their eyes remained.
“Ah, come on, Eva, don’t be such a sourpuss. We got wives. We get it.”
Doug and Pete were basically good guys and they tipped well. She sure wasn’t going to get into it with them. “Right, I’m the Wicked Witch. I get it. Better I retreat now before I explode or something.” To soften her entire demeanor, she gave each a fresh beer. “On the house.”
Without a word she turned her attention to the crate of clean glasses waiting to be restocked. She started pulling glasses from the dishwasher and stacking them on the glass shelf behind the bar.
Lisa and Sara’s deaths. Micah’s visit. Seeing Kristen. Life kept dragging her back to those missing moments when Josiah died. Two weeks ago, she would have fought the journey back to the past as she chanted “Eyes forward.” But she now believed that unless she sketched in those missing minutes, the future was in peril.
“So what’s a gal got to do to get a beer around here?” Sally’s gravelly voice had Eva turning back toward the bar.
Despite her mood, Eva smiled. “For you, anything. How’s it going?”
Silver bracelets dangled from Sally’s slim wrist as she brushed a strand of hair from her face. “Hanging tough. But you don’t look so good.”
Eva set a soda in front of Sally. “Long day. You want the regular?”
“Thanks, doll.” Sally sipped her cola. “Tell Mama Sally about it. ”
The edge of Eva’s mouth tipped into a smile. She could count on one hand the number of people she liked. Sally numbered among them. She punched the order into the computer. “I’m doing fine.”
The sun had etched deep lines into Sally’s face, giving it a sagelike quality. “Yeah, and I’m a rock star diva. Where’s my guitar?”
Eva smiled wearily, so tired of not trusting and of keeping her past hidden. She’d wanted to push it aside, but the old wounds had been clawed open and wouldn’t be ignored. “I saw a frie
nd from college today as well as a guy I knew back then.”
Sally cocked a brow. “Ah, college. I’m still not too old to have forgotten that. That’s the kind of encounter that can go either way. Good or bad?”
“Not well.” She picked up a rag and started to wipe the counter. She wished she could wipe the past as easily as a spill. “Real bad.”
Sally pushed her drink aside and leaned in. “Want to tell me about it?”
The words danced on the edge of Eva’s tongue. “It’s a can of nasty worms.”
“I’ve never run from nasty. Really, kid, whatever you say ain’t gonna scare me away.”
“I’ve heard that before.”
Sally’s eyes hardened with startling intensity. “Not from me.”
Eva stared into the sharp blue-gray eyes and knew Sally was no quitter. Eva sensed she could toss her worst secrets out on the table and Sally wouldn’t flinch. “I went to talk to this woman about something that happened in college.”
“That’s old news, isn’t it?”
“You’d think, but the past has a way of hanging on sometimes.”
“Tell me about it. ”
“If I had a bit of common sense I’d have left well enough alone.”
“But you don’t have any sense,” she said, teasing.
“I’m all out. Anyway, I tried to talk to her and discovered she’s kind of rewritten history. She says what happened was all my fault.”
“Was it?”