accept your terms.”
She tries to sound like she’s still just playing along, but her voice sticks a little.
“To me proving that I only have lips for you and the promise of mad make outs,” I declare.
She lifts her glass and says, “Cheers” as she clinks.
“Cheers.” My voice is soft and low, and I love the way her eyes focus on my mouth as I throw the drink back in a single seductively fire hot sip.
I don’t have to turn to know she’s watching as I stride down the bar to my dad, cuff my sleeves, and get to work mixing and pouring, refilling, closing out tabs, hopping the bar to fix the feedback on the karaoke machine, and making myself generally useful while avoiding my old man as much as humanly possible.
I have a little bit of a hard time keeping my promise to Mila. Not because I’m fishing for kisses or anything else. I’ve never been so keyed up by a girl that all other girl’s kind of fade to the background like this, but that’s how it feels with Mila.
But I may have a tiny bit of a reputation.
Dad hated it, but it made sense for me to play my angle. He liked to jaw with the guys, get elbow deep in misery and complaints. He was mostly respectful to the ladies.
I liked to hand the guys their drinks and share an assortment of winks, smiles, and thinly veiled romantic suggestions with the ladies.
It was an art, and there were rules.
No married shenanigans.
No flirting with a girl who was clearly with a guy.
But tons of single women—or women unattached enough that they were willing to show up in public on their own and on the prowl — came to the bar, and they tipped well. It was easy enough to lean over and oblige their rowdy demands with the occasional kiss.
I have no problem turning the pretty young things down. There was no point playing with their hearts anyway.
But the older ladies, the one who cooed and crowed about how happy my being back made them...not throwing them a little peck seems in opposition to the spirit of the season.
But Mila watched me like a hawk, and she was a stickler for games and rules; I know for a fact she had a Dungeons and Dragons Guide and a multi-sided die in her room in Boston.
I wanted to roll around with her in bed, and I knew I’d need to be on my best behavior to reach my goal.
I did double duty with winks, slow smiles, and extra potent drinks in an attempt to satisfy my pouting regulars. Maybe it was a little slutty of me, but this business requires me to be part actor, part drink-maker, and I tried to embrace both aspects of the job.
“You got the girls on the end with the sweetie drinks?” my dad asks over the roar.
I look at them by instinct and salute the one girl who’s definitely using her cherry garnish to communicate sexy things to me. My tips will take a hit for all this toned-down flirting, but Mila is so worth it.
The girl peeks her tongue out, and there’s the cherry stem, tied in a knot, and I chuckle under my breath and grit my teeth.
“They’re all doing great, Dad.”
“What about the guy who needed the brews for the pool players? He was here a minute ago...” He looks around distractedly.
“Done with him. I got his order together while he hit the john. They’re all squared away.”
“Shit!” Dad curses under his breath. “I forgot to give Bergin his holiday—”
I grin at him. “You’re going deaf and blind in your old age, aren’t you? He snuck in half an hour ago. I found his envelope in the lockbox, and it’s all good. Take a breather.” I hold up a sopping wet, bleached white rag. “Look, we’re so caught up, I have time to wipe down the bar.”
My dad reaches a hand out, slowly, and gives me a pat on the back. It’s kind of jerky and uncertain, but I don’t have given an asshole thought or response to it.
It’s good.
And, since I’m not naturally a positive person filled with happy, nice thoughts, I wonder if all of this has anything to do with the fact that all night, between every drink I poured and mess I wiped clean, after every refill and trip to the cash register, I got to look down the bar and see Mila sipping her