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She wondered what Grant was doing. Was he making more mysterious calls? Sure, he’d said it was the office, which made sense, but there was something going on that felt just a little sneaky.
And it was making her brain tick with the slightest anxiety.
Maybe he has another woman in New York?
Tick, tick, tick.
Maybe his business isn’t exactly legal?
Tick . . . Tick . . . Tick . . .
Maybe he’s hiding something—
“Hey, woman!” the drunk guy yelled and stomped toward her, ramming into people. “I’ve been waiting on a drink and you’re fucking ignoring me!”
“Glad to see you’re still astute,” Hannah yelled back at him, mixing a martini.
“Bitch,” he grumbled, but yeah, she heard it. Every once in a while she got a customer like this. Some douche who got too drunk and mouthed off. She had a bat behind the counter, but in her years of experience, she’d only needed to break it out three times. Which wasn’t bad. Occupational hazard.
“Watch it, asshole,” Adam, the local mechanic, said to the drunk. The drunk guy shoved Adam, which made the large mechanic stand up, his tattooed muscles pulsing against his T-shirt.
Shit. This was about to get bad.
Adam stepped toward the drunk, and Hannah grabbed her bat and hopped over the bar. Everyone was backing away, creating a small circle of drama and watching intently. The crowd hummed as Hannah got between the two men.
“Adam, go sit down,” she said in the cool yet demanding voice she’d come to harness over her almost thirty years. “You, douche bag, get out of my bar.”
The drunk laughed at her and then threw his beer glass down, shattering it on the floor.
“No fucking woman is going to tell me what to do,” he snarled and took an aggressive step toward her.
Hannah went to hold her bat out, but Adam tugged her back. Hannah wasn’t ready for that, and it made her lose her footing. She crashed into a customer, catching an elbow to the eye.
Fuck, that hurts!
She stood just in time to see the drunk take a swing at Adam. The mechanic staggered back, the drunk pressing forward.
“Call the cops,” Hannah said to the woman standing near her; she nodded and took out her cell phone. Hannah lunged at the drunk before he could stomp on Adam and hit him in the kneecap, taking him down.
“Fucking bitch!” he yelled.
Then the drunk was off his feet by some magic antigravity breeze . . . only it wasn’t magic at all. It was Grant. He’d come in behind the drunk, lifted him by the shirt, and thrown him back.
Grant’s wild dark eyes landed on Hannah, and whatever he saw there infuriated him more. He turned back to the drunk and punched him in the nose, blood gushing instantly.
The drunk wailed in pain and cursed at Grant. “You fucking broke my nose.” He couldn’t even stand straight, but Grant clearly had no sympathy and threw him out on the street.
The entire bar clapped and cheered, but Grant made a beeline for Hannah, rage and anger and a wild need in his eyes. He grabbed both of her shoulders and shook her.
“What the hell are you doing?” he said loudly.
“I’m breaking up a bar fight,” she said, wiggling out of his grip.
“You put yourself between two men twice your size!” He was seething.
“I’m fine. This happens sometimes,” she defended.
“Well, I’ll be damned if I let it happen again. This is no place for you. You’re not staying here.”
