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Although his back was turned to me, I saw Caleb perk up the minute I walked in. As he turned, I ducked behind a large biker making his way over to the pool table. If the Harley enthusiast noticed a tiny woman suddenly melting into his shadow, he didn’t say anything. Caleb’s eyes scanned the room before turning back to his beer.
For a few moments, I watched Caleb in conversation with the bartender. He was relaxed, but there was an air of menace in his posture. Whatever had happened before I arrived, he was not happy about it.
I felt something brush against my shoulder as someone moved from the front entrance toward the barroom. The contact surprised me, and I jumped, barely containing the urge to yelp. Caleb’s head turned toward me again, and I scrambled into a nearby booth. Just as I sat down, a weaselly little blond man slid into the seat across from me. He seemed just as surprised to see me there as I was to see him.
The man grinned at me. “Well, hey there, sweetie. How are you?”
I blinked rapidly, recognizing that eager, crooked smile, the bulbous little nose. I’d seen those features in the photos from Caleb’s files. Somehow, I’d managed to grab a booth with Caleb’s quarry. And he seemed to think my rapid blinking was some sort of eyelash-batting gesture.
Fan-freaking-tastic.
5
The Misadventures of Alcoholus Moronicus
If I jumped out of the booth as if my butt was scalded, Caleb would probably notice. If I tried to slink away quietly and offended Jerry, making a scene, Caleb would probably notice. All I had to do was humor this moron for a minute or two and then hightail it before—
Crap. Caleb had noticed.
And from across the room, he did not look happy. He stood, moving swiftly around the tables, approaching Jerry from behind. I shook my head slightly, prompting Jerry to ask, “Everything OK, sweetie?”
Caleb frowned, and I drummed up the ditzy-blonde voice I’d perfected at Oil Slick’s. “Hi! Do you mind if I sit here?”
Jerry’s dim but perfectly friendly grin was back. “Well, since you already are, I don’t mind at all. Can I buy you a drink?”
“I’ll have whatever you’re having,” I said, smiling sweetly.
He hollered, “Beer!” across the barroom, which prompted a rude gesture from the bartender. Jerry turned back to me. “Well, look at you. Here I thought I’d met all the pretty girls in town. You’re new around here, huh?”
Right, right, idle chitchat. I can do this, I told myself. I could keep Jerry pleasantly distracted and maybe even get him outside, where Caleb could intercede without causing a loud, violent scene. Jerry didn’t seem like a sleaze, which helped considerably. He just seemed like a rather sad, lonely guy who had very bad judgment regarding auto loans and business transactions. Part of me sort of wanted to help him escape out the back door. I smiled, although the expression was a bit shaky, and leaned across the table toward him.
“My boyfriend and I just blew into town a few days ago. But I can’t seem to find him. I guess I’ll just have to spend my time with you.” I slowly walked my fingers up his denim-clad arm.
“Well, his loss is my gain, sweetie. I’ll just get us some drinks.” Jerry waved his arms in the direction of the bar and frowned. “Len doesn’t seem to be cooperatin’,” he said, frowning slightly at the bartender, who was pointedly ignoring him. “Why don’t I go get you that beer?”
I smiled, all sweetness and light. “Why don’t you?”
He sauntered toward the bar, grinning at me the whole time.
Now was probably a good time to run. As nonsleazy as he seemed, Jerry could try his own luck with Caleb. When he turned his back to me to order, I hopped up from the table, made toward the back exit, and ran right into Caleb.
There’s nothing like a face full of pissed-off werewolf to get your adrenal responses going.
“What are you doing here?” Caleb hissed, dark eyes flashing faintly golden as he wrapped his fingers around my wrist and pulled me toward the corridor. Although he clearly wasn’t messing around, his grip wasn’t tight enough to hurt, and I felt insistently guided rather than dragged against my will.
“I got bored,” I whispered, in an effort not to attract Jerry’s attention. “And then I got here, and it all just sort of spiraled out of control.”
“I told you to stay at the motel.”
“I’m starting to grasp why,” I told him. “And I’m sorry. I got anxious when you didn’t come back.”
And I grasped exactly how needy that sounded as the words came out of my mouth. Maybe if I started drinking, I would develop some sort of verbal filter around this man.
A fleeting, pleased look flashed across his face, just before another more lasting look of . . . guilt? That seemed like a strange response to an awkward admission of semifondness. He cleared his throat and pushed me away, against the wall, until there was enough room to make the dance chaperones at my old high school happy.
“Look, Anna, I think we should talk.”
And then, of course—
