Page 6 of Bent, Not Broken

“Water,” I said over my shoulder, and he nodded, but when I tried to get away to head toward the bar, he didn’t let go, just ground faster against my back. “Need water,” I yelled louder.

“Seriously? They said no one would be able to turn me down if they ate that.”

“Haven’t you heard? I’m a wunderkind.” In the moment, I found myself particularly hilarious, cackling, but he dropped me like I was on fire. My skin warmed pleasantly on the way to the bar, and when I got there, I found an empty spot to wedge myself in between a couple of people. The crowd was much larger than it had been earlier. How long was I on the dance floor? The bartender saw me. She flashed a smile and quickly brought me a martini. I stared at it as she slid it across the bar. Wasn’t I here for water?

“That’s your drink, yeah?” She frowned, and I felt so awful for being a bad customer that I gave her a huge tip, took the ’tini, and drank it. My thirst was sort of quenched, but my stomach was still strange. My shirt pulled tight across my chest and my stomach jerked. My nipples were so sensitive it felt like they were scraped by my shirt fabric.

“Oh,” I whispered.

“Celebrating?” came a snide voice from my right.

“Uh….” I turned and inspected a nice, bulging bicep. Then I looked up, and up… and grinned. Hard jaw ticking. Pretty pink lips sneering. Short haircut, perfect for running my fingers through. I loved that little scrape of freshly cut hair against my fingertips. “Slater.” I pointed at him and tried for a finger gun, but my dexterity was way off. I ended up just patting him with one finger on the arm. “Officer Slater.”

He glared down at me, just like he had in the courtroom earlier. My dick tingled at the adrenaline that sped through my veins, bubblier than champagne. I could see that he’d just as soon drag me outside and shoot me as anything else. I gave him another little poke to find out what he’d do. Couldn’t help myself. He merely tensed under the touch, and I tugged my hand away fast.

“So that’s a yes?” He rolled his eyes but smiled nice and wide at the pretty bartender when she walked past us. She gave him a horrifically offended scowl, and he blinked and looked down at the bar. “Oh,” he grumbled.

“You didn’t call back? That happens to me sometimes. A lot.” I nodded in sympathy and he narrowed his eyes on me, but there was a small furrow between his brows.

“You a fuck-her-and-flounce guy too?” Officer Slater actually seemed to be more man than statue. He turned a nearly friendly expression my way.

“Fuck him and flounce, but yeah. Well, I usually am the one who….” I glanced up at him, and his eyebrows hiked pretty high. I turned my attention down at my empty glass and wondered how it got that way before I slid it onto the bar. “You’re pretty hot, though, so she’d probably do it again.” I patted his arm and leaned heavily against the bar, my stomach going back to giving me hell. “God, is it hot in here?” I undid another button on my shirt and eyed him.

Officer Slater had beautiful, thick muscles that stretched the sleeves of his shirt and a trim waist. His wide shoulders could carry the world, and he had one of those faces that could have easily ended up in a smutty cop calendar. He was a walking wet dream. My stomach settled a little and I realized I had another problem going on. Ugh, why wasn’t I home naked? My pants were starting to feel like they were killing me. “Maybe next time you’ll win,” I said.

For a second his expression flashed dark and furious, but then a small wrinkle formed nice and deep between his eyebrows. He had a fun face. “You really don’t care if I win?”

Shrugging, I wobbled and shuffled closer to the bar so I could lean more of my weight against it. “Yeah. I care. I like to win. Don’t you?”

“This is about people’s lives. Good people have died in this city,” he growled, shoving his face closer to mine. “Don’t you give a shit about that?”

His jaw. Ugh, it could cut glass. Diamond sharp. My hand wanted to touch it. Not a good idea, hand, stop trying to get us into trouble. “Good, bad, everyone wants to be alive and on the right side of the prison bars.” I shrugged. “Good is just a point of view.”

“You really feel that way?”

“Yeah.”

He let out a sound I’d only ever associated with bears, deep and rumbling. “Someone needs to teach you a fucking—”

“Hey there, snuggles.” Someone plastered himself to my back. The smell of a bad cologne I didn’t like invaded my nostrils and sent my stomach roiling again. I tried to elbow him off, but he wouldn’t go. I whipped my head around, and it took me a second to recognize… bad glasses… bad shirt. My brain misfired for a second, and I tried to wiggle free again.

“Oh, Greg.” I stilled. “It’s Greg. Yeah, no. That… I cannot look at that.” I wrinkled my nose at the shirt he wore and flicked at his shoulder. Greg didn’t let go. Instead he leaned down and stage-whispered, “Are you ready to leave now?”

“No, I don’t repeat my mistakes,” I said while staring him dead in the eye. “I make new ones, exclusively.”

His nostrils flared.

Before I could think up something nastier to say in the hopes that Greg would take his awful stench and leave—poor old Greg seemed to be stuck seething—Travis, the man who was on the door earlier, came over wearing a black shirt with Security on the front. He didn’t have to speak, he stopped about three feet away from us and crossed his arms. Greg reluctantly let go of me.

“I’m good, man,” Greg said, holding up his hands with a sickly smile.

Travis jerked his thumb toward the front of the club. “Out.”

“Come on, buddy. I’m in the middle of something.”

Travis stepped toward him, and Greg held his hands up higher and slinked off, with Travis stalking along behind him. I lost track of them in the darkness that started not far beyond the edges of the bar.

“That sort of thing happen to you often?” Slater smirked.