I took the cup.
The drink was bright blue, creamy at the edges from coconut, sharp with lime, and rimmed in black salt that clung to my lowerlip. It tasted like trouble and sugar and the first clean breath after a fight.
Nella watched my face. “Well?”
“It’s good.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t you dare stop there.”
“It’s dangerous, too pretty, and it tastes like something tourists will order because they think they can handle it.”
Her smile widened. “Better.”
“It needs a name.”
“I’m aware.”
“The Shifty Shark.”
Nella blinked.
Then she stared at me. “Absolutely not.”
“It’s accurate.”
“It sounds like a man in wet swim trunks named it after an emotional crisis.”
“I’m wearing linen.”
“And having an emotional crisis.”
“Still accurate.”
She looked at the cup, then at the neon shark over the back mirror, then back at me.
“I hate that it works.”
“I know.”
“I’m putting it on the board tomorrow, and if it sells, I’m taking credit.”
“It’s your bar.”
Her fingers stilled on the cup.
“Yes,” she said. “It is.”
I set my cup down.
Nella set hers beside it.
The bar stretched between us, clean, sticky in a few places, still smelling faintly of sugar, fryer oil, and summer money. Shestood on the other side with her hands on the counter and the scarf slipping in her hair.
I’d wanted women before. I’d wanted relief, sex, distraction, the clean hit of getting what my body demanded.
This made me stand there too long with my hands at my sides.
Nella lifted one brow. “Don’t go quiet and tragic on me now.”
