Finding Mr. Write (Business of Love #5) - Ali Parker Page 0,14
better, you know?”
I smiled and hoped it looked trustworthy and unthreatening. “I’m sorry. I just… well, I saw you come in and you looked rather defeated sitting here by yourself. I can spot someone new to the city trying to get their bearings and I’d say you had a hell of a day today. Am I wrong?”
Her green eyes flicked back and forth between mine and she pursed her full lips. “No, you’re not wrong.”
“Then let me make up for how hard my city was on you today. Let me buy you a drink. Charlie here makes the best Old Fashioned in the state. It’ll take the chill out of your bones.”
She licked her lips and glanced down the bar at Charlie, the bartender. When her shoulders dropped a little, I knew she was going to agree before she even nodded and said okay.
When Charlie made his way down to us, I ordered the two drinks. He went about pouring them and I left my credit card on the bar beside my notebook. He took it after he dropped off our drinks. I slid one to the pretty stranger beside me and tapped my glass against hers.
“Welcome to the big apple,” I said.
She smiled in earnest this time. “Thank you.”
The first sip of the drink tingled on my tongue. She grimaced, sputtered for a minute, and went back in for a second sip which I always found went down easier than the first. She nodded appreciatively at it and set it down.
“Not bad,” she said.
“Right? New York can be a torturous bitch. But a stiff drink fixes everything.”
“A torturous bitch,” she mused. “You hit the nail on the head.”
“Tomorrow morning before you do anything else, get yourself an umbrella. Then you’ll be ready to face whatever the city throws at you. Rain, hail, snow, general douche-baggery of the human variety—whatever it is, an umbrella will help. Trust me.”
She held her hand out to me. “I’m Briar.”
“Wes.” I shook her hand. Her fingers were small and cold but her palm was warm.
Briar turned to face me squarely on her stool, crossed one long leg over the other, and nodded at my notebook. “So what’s with the notebook? Are you one of those brooding dudes who likes to sit in dark corners and write poetry about dying trees?”
I grinned. This girl had an edge to her.
I liked it.
“Poetry? No, but I am a writer.”
Her eyebrows inched upward. I enjoyed her facial expressions. A lot of people were good at hiding their emotions on their faces. I’d gotten good at searching for micro-expressions and slight suggestions that might hint to what a person was feeling or thinking. I was good at catching the slightest twitch of the lips, a hair raise of an eyebrow, a scrunching of the nose. All of it pointed to an emotion.
But Briar?
She didn’t have micro-expressions. She wore her emotions boldly.
“No shit,” she said, surprised. “Sorry about the writer crack. I didn’t actually expect you to be one.”
I chuckled. “Personally, I have no soft spot for poetry, so you can go right ahead and say whatever you want about those pretentious wordsmiths.”
Briar giggled.
The sound bubbled out of her like a joyful tune being strummed on a harp. It made me smile and instinctively lean in toward her as she leaned back, sweeping a drying strand of red hair over her shoulder.
“What do you write?” she asked.
“Oh you know, a little of this, a little of that.”
Briar clasped her hands together. “This and that, huh? Wow, sounds fascinating. You must be terribly talented and well paid to write about such precise, relevant subjects.”
She was the definition of the perfect muse. Inspiration seeped out of her and I wanted to harness all of it and channel it onto the page. Her attitude was charming and the playful banter made it easy to go back and forth with her. She was still guarded, that was easy to see, but so was I.
Then again, this was the first time I’d ever told a stranger that I was a writer. Usually, I played that close to the belt with someone I didn’t know. I never wanted to risk them finding out who I was. It complicated things every damn time.
Briar rested her cheek in one hand. “You’re really not going to tell me what you write? Not even the genre?”
I shrugged. “Guess.”
Her lips curled in a devilish smile. “I like guessing games.” She sat up a little straighter and scrutinized me like I was