Page 102 of Cozen

“That’s thoughtful, but—”

“Cozen, go do your job.”

“I can’t mix the specialty drinks for the restaurant. I don’t know the mixtures.”

Chase shrugged. “If somebody asks for something off the restaurant’s menu of exclusive drinks, just say you’re filling in. Unless they want something you know how to make, you’re not capable.”

“You think that’ll fly over?”

Because The Kingdom was famous for its special menu of drinks only their bartender could make. A good ten percent of the revenue every day came from only those drinks. People had their favorites, and often stopped in just to get their drink.

“Not particularly, but it will work for tonight.”

“Great,” Cozen muttered.

Cozen didn’t even wait to hear what Chase had to say. She untied the small, black waitress apron around her waist, and hung it on one of the hooks before she exited the kitchen. Making her way behind the bar—one with people already waiting to place drink orders—she prepped herself for another six hours of a whole different kind of hell.

“Who’s first?” Cozen asked the waiting people.

A blond, jock-type dressed in a three-piece stepped forward. The equally blonde, plastic-like Barbie on his arm made Cozen want to roll her eyes.

A bartender wasn’t like a waitress. She had to be nice and pleasant to the people on the floor, but she didn’t have to stay with one table or person for very long before she could move on. She considered that a benefit, despite the eight to ten hours a day in heels that make her feet feel like they were on fire.

A bartender, however, had to be something else entirely. Charming, interested, and willing to engage in conversation. It was kind of hard to talk with food in your mouth, but not as difficult when a person was slightly tipsy, and probably had a reason for drinking alcohol in the first goddamn place.

Cozen was a good two hours in to working behind the bar before the number of patrons started to slow a bit. It was days like today when it became a little bit harder for her to remember why she was here and doing this crap in the first place.

For the job.

It was all for the damn job.

The act she had to keep up.

If anything, it made Cozen all the more determined to finish this job, so she could return back to her quiet, content life where she no longer had to do things like this. She wasn’t required to plaster on a fake smile, or spend hours upon hours on her feet in heels. She didn’t have to charm a man just to steal from him.

Not to mention … the beach.

God, she missed the beach.

Sargon flashed into her mind, too, in those moments. A brief second of pause where his features graced her memories, and left her feeling spectacularly heavy in her heart for reasons she could not explain.

Like her heart was trying to tie him to something she found comfort and peace in. Like her heart wanted to take him back with her when she went, too.

Cozen wasn’t even sure she should entertain those feelings or thoughts. They were dangerous—even more dangerous than the game she had been playing with the darkly handsome, sex God of a man.

So he could play her body like an instrument.

So he could delve into her mind.

So he was beautiful.

So … what?

So you like him, her mind taunted, a lot.

Maybe a little more than a lot.

It was difficult and complicated. He had made a hell of a lot of things about a job that should have been somewhat easy and relatively clean very difficult, and particularly dirty for her. He didn’t even know it—or did he?