“I think you should let her work at Smithie’s.” This came from the couches. I braved a look at them, wondering what Smithie’s was. The comment came from a Native American guy with shiny black hair pul ed into a ponytail at the base of his neck, cheekbones and eyelashes to die for and a shit-eating grin on his face.
I also noticed Whisky was no longer looking at me but smiling and winking at Jet.
I felt my heart contract.
I tore my eyes away and saw Eddie was raising his brows to Jet like some point had been made.
It was a weird feeling, knowing these people and not knowing them at the same time.
“I thought you were moved in with Eddie?” Indy asked and I turned around to look at her.
“It was temporary,” Jet said. She caught my gaze swinging back to her and she gave me a smal smile before she stomped behind the counter (the stomping was obviously al show, stil , I could appreciate that she was good at it, my Mom would have given her a high five for form and execution).
This left me looking at Eddie. He noticed me and his black gaze shifted the length of me. I immediately got the strange sense that he did not like what he saw. Not that every guy who looked at me, especial y guys who were obviously very with pretty girls, had the instant hots for me, but stil , it was strange. It made me feel wrong, like I was invading, not wanted and not welcome.
I got this sense because his eyes, which were liquid with warmth and tenderness when he looked at Jet, turned completely blank when they locked on me and Eddie didn’t strike me as a blank kind of guy.
Then he turned, completely dismissing me and walked to the couches.
I also turned, feeling funny about his reaction. I shook it off, put my back to the couches (because I needed to focus and another glance at Whisky would make me lose that focus, I knew this like I knew my favorite designer was Armani) and I faced the espresso counter
The redhead, brunette and blonde were al talking behind the big coffee machine, looking like the Witches of Eastwick, but prettier and scarier. Since the redhead was Indy and the blonde was Jet, that left the brunette as Al y.
Which meant, from what I knew from Uncle Tex’s letters because she was most definitely related to the brothers at the couches, Whisky was either Lee (which would be bad as I knew he was with Indy) or Hank (which would be bad because Tex told me Hank was a cop and thus not likely ever to be interested in the likes of me, a gangster mol or whatever I was).
“I think you should move in with Eddie,” Al y was saying, finishing up my drink.
“I’m trying to break up with him,” Jet said.
I gasped, because even if he dismissed me, who in their right minds would break up with Eddie? He was gorgeous.
They al looked to me.
“Don’t worry,” Jet assured me with another smile. She was pretty normal y, but her smile made her spectacular. “I already tried to break up with him, but it didn’t take.”
“Here’s your coffee,” Al y said, handing me a paper cup.
I took it and set it on the counter. “What do I owe you?” She told me, I gave her the money and then she leaned forward and said, “What did you mean, you know the feeling? Do you have a boyfriend you can’t get rid of? I know it’s nosy but I’m asking ‘cause my brother’s sitting over there and he’s been staring at you since the moment you walked in the door like he wants to rip your fancy-ass clothes off.”
I bit my lip and just stopped myself from looking over my shoulder toward the couches.
I was right, this was Al y and since Indy was standing there, and Al y wasn’t likely to point out that Indy’s boyfriend Lee wanted to rip my clothes off, then we were talking about Hank.
Unattached (as far as I knew) but stil a cop.
I didn’t question the fact that Al y would say something like this about her brother to me. She seemed the kind of girl who cal ed them like she saw them.
I leaned forward and made my first mistake of many that were to come. “Are we talking about Whisky?” I whispered, mainly because I couldn’t help myself.
“Whisky?” Indy leaned in.
“The one with the whisky-colored eyes,” I answered.
Indy smiled at the other two, then al three smiled at me.
“That’s him,” Indy said.
“Are you Indy?” I asked, just to be sure.