I’d always been a boob guy, and Ali’s were my favorite. The first boobs a guy gets to touch always stay in his mind. Since being back in town, I hadn’t had the chance to really appreciate her rack, but now there it was, for all the world to see. I shifted on my bar stool, because suddenly my jeans were tight in the crotch.
The dress dipped low to give a tantalizing view of her cleavage, clung to her figure and then ended just about an inch below her ass. The fabric fluttered, giving the illusion that it might offer a better view yet, should just the right breeze come along.
Ali flipped her hair back, her smile huge as she spoke to someone behind her.Sam.Okay, so she was here with her brother. That was okay, right? And then I spied a redhead and realized Meghan, Sam’s girlfriend, was here, too. As I watched, another guy, in jeans, a black T-shirt and a cowboy hat approached her and laid his hand on her bare shoulder.
I was on my feet before I knew it, and if it hadn’t been for Alex’s hand on my arm, I might’ve bolted through the crowd and slugged the guy. But he held me back.
“Don’t do it.” His words were low, but I could hear them well enough. “At least, don’t do it if you’re not ready to follow through.”
“Follow through? What’s that supposed to mean?” I growled, still on my feet.
“I mean, if you’re going to punch that guy for touching your woman, you better make damn sure sheisyour woman, and that you’re willing to throw her over your shoulder and haul her out of here. Not just for tonight, not just for this month . . . for good.”
I swallowed hard. Alex was right. The fury that pounded in my veins and in my head was still pushing me to rip that douchebag’s hand of Ali and knock him flat to the floor, but what would I do after that? Bow to Ali and walk away? Grab her and kiss her crazy? I didn’t know. And if I didn’t know, I needed to back down.
I swung back to the bar, dumped the shot of whisky into the beer and slammed it down. Mason had moved to the other side of the bar to attend to other customers, but I caught the attention of the shorter man.
“Tequila shots. Double and keep them coming, okay?”
The bartender flicked a glance at me, over my shoulder and then back to my face. Whatever was there must’ve told him I was serious, because he pulled out the bottle and set me up.
Alex met my eyes. “So we’re doing this?”
“Fuck, yeah.” I poured the first shot down my throat and without pausing, followed it with a second. “We’re doing it.”
Across the room, the band began to tune up, and the crowd roared in anticipation. Baldy, the bartender, set up me up again while I leaned against the wooden bar, scanning the crowd, seeking out one light brown head. I spied her in the middle of a group of men. One of them handed her a shot—I was pretty sure it was whiskey—and like any good Georgia woman, she tossed it back without hesitation and with nary a grimace. Another guy supplied her with a second.
The DJ who was playing the music before the band kicked off started another song—I was pretty sure it was Luke Bryan. Ali grabbed the hand of the nearest man and hauled him onto the dance floor. She danced with the same abandon I remembered from our high school dances, tossing her head, gyrating her hips and running her hands over the back of her neck, lifting her hair. She used to do that when we were making love, too—a sudden, vivid memory flashed across my mind of her straddling my body, grinding herself against me, fingers dug into her hair to get it away from her sweaty neck. Her eyes were closed and her lips just slightly parted as pleasure washed over both of us . . .
Fuck.I wasn’t near drunk enough yet if I could still remember that. I reached for the shot glasses again and began to remedy that situation.
“Hey. Aren’t you Flynn Evans?”
I glanced to my left. A pretty blonde with wide brown eyes and a tight tank top over a denim skirt that barely hid her bikini line was smiling at me.
“Yeah, so I hear. Do I know you?”
She giggled, and it went up my spine, until I had to grit my teeth to stop from wincing. “You were three years ahead of me in school. I’m Shayna Parkins.”
The name didn’t ring a bell, but I smiled and nodded. “Sure. Good to see you again.”
Whether or not Shayna bought my line didn’t seem to matter. She clutched at my arm, rubbing her tits into the side of my body.Shit.She wasn’t wearing a bra. I waited for the same reaction from my body that the memory of Ali had evoked, but there was nothing. Absolutely frickin’ nothing.
She was holding a beer in her free hand. Draining it, she set the empty glass on the bar and leaned into me. “Want to dance?”
I didn’t. I wanted to stay on this bar stool and brood about Ali, but since the girl in question was currently on the middle of the dance floor, grinding against the guy who stood behind her with his hands way too close to her breasts, I nodded and stood up. “Sure.”
Alex shook his head. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” He shouted it into my ear.
“Maybe you should be asking your other best friend that question.” I jerked my head toward Ali.
“I’m not here with Ali. I’m here with you.” His fingers curled around an empty shot glass. “Sam and Meghan are in charge of Ali tonight. I just want to make sure you don’t do anything you regret.”
“Way too late for that one, buddy.” I clapped a hand on his shoulder. “I’m going to dance. Keep my spot warm, okay?”
There were so many bodies undulating on the wooden floor that at first I wasn’t sure there’d be room for Shayna and me. But I’d underestimated her determination. She dragged me through a couple of groups and between a few couples until we found a space big enough for the both of us . . . providing we stood very close together.
I dropped my hands to her hips as she linked her hands behind my neck. The front of her body pressed into mine, swaying side to side. Gazing over her head, I tried to look for Ali without being obvious about it. Her back was to me, as she faced her partner, who I realized with dawning horror was Trent Wagner.
