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“Perfect. Liam here was just convincing me that I was too tipsy to make the short walk home. Do you mind, Sheriff?”
“Not at all,” he said in a tone that indicated he’d rather do just about anything else.
Before the smile could fully bloom on Olive’s face, a fight broke out near the pool tables in back and Xander was being summoned to break it up. “Looks like duty calls,” I said when he stared at the fight reluctantly.
“Guess so,” he grumbled and walked away. “Get Olive home,” he growled as he made his way over to the drunk cowboys. “Safely!”
A full minute later Olive turned to me with a neutral expression and defeated shoulders. “Fine. But we’re walking.”
I held my hands up defensively. “I’m not the one who’s drunk and walking on stilts.”
She growled and the sound was so damn unexpectedly sexy, it shocked the hell out of me. In ten seconds I had Olive outside where there was plenty of fresh air and space.
Lots and lots of space.OliveThree drinks, or was it four? Not that it mattered, three, okay four cocktails and I was going home with a gorgeous man who saw me as nothing but a sexless creature. No, not sexless, what had Liam called me? Oh right, good clean fun. It made me feel like the ultimate failure. Millions of women all over the world, plenty right here in Texas, managed to get dolled up for a night on the town and they have to keep the men away with a bat. They do, but not me.
Liam let out an uncomfortable sigh and slid an equally uncomfortable look my way. “What’s wrong?”
“Like you care,” I snorted angrily. And unnecessarily. It wasn’t Liam’s fault that he went for tall women with long legs, big boobs and bigger hair. It wasn’t his job to find me attractive. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. Just let me know if I’ve done something to piss you off.”
“Not today,” I told him and tried for a smile. “No Liam, you’ve been pretty great actually. It’s just me,” I told him and put a hand out, squeezing one of his gigantic biceps to steady myself.
“I’m a good listener and since you don’t care about what I think of you…,” he left the rest of that sentence hanging and stopped walking. I stared at him like he’d grown an extra head, trying to figure out his motive. “Why are you being so nice to me all of a sudden?” There was no way Eva or Sophie could know what happened at lunch today, but there had been a big enough audience that word might have spread. “Oh my goodness! You know, don’t you?”
Liam folded those big arms over his massive chest and hit me with a dark, confused stare, one black brow arched in question. “I know plenty, care to be more specific?”
“Do you think…what do you think of me?”
His hazel gaze darkened but I only got to see it for a moment before he started walking again. “Well, that’s a loaded question isn’t it?” I let out a low growl and Liam chuckled. “Fine. You’re cute but you hide it all behind ugly ass clothes that don’t fit you well. You’re a little uptight but I think you mean well.”
“Ugh, never mind.” That wasn’t just unhelpful, it was somehow worse than the words Wyatt had thrown at me earlier.
“Look Olive, what I meant was-,”
I held a hand up to stop his attempts to backpedal. “Stop Liam. It doesn’t matter, the truth is the truth. Right?”
“The truth?” He nodded for me to catch up with him and I did with a nod.
“Yeah.”
“The truth is that you’re far less annoying in that dress because it gives me something to look at while you piss me off.”
I smiled because it was nice to hear, but I didn’t believe it for a second. “You’re only saying that because I said you were handsome.”
“You did, didn’t you?” He stroked the stubble growing on his chin with a smile. “I’m saying it because it’s the truth.”
“Thanks, but I really don’t believe you Liam. I’ve seen the women you hook up with and they, well they look nothing like me.” In fact, they couldn’t be more different from me if he tried to find my exact opposite. “Bet they’re not frigid either.”
“Frigid?” He frowned at me and tossed his head back with a loud laugh that echoed in the empty streets of Pilgrim.
“Thanks a lot, Liam.” I didn’t bother waiting for him to catch up but I wasn’t running since there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell I could outrun a former Navy SEAL.
“Come on, Olive. Wait up!” His loud footsteps sounded behind me, growing closer by the second but still I kept on walking, hoping that by some strange twist of fate I’d get home before we had to continue this conversation. “Olive.”
