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He had zero appetite. Just the thought of food made him nauseous. “You don’t have to be here. I’m fine.”
“The closed bar and the broken glass on the floor suggest otherwise.”
“Really, Angel—”
“Trent. Stop,” she said, touching his arm. “I know what you’re going through, and I may not know how to help, but I can make food and just…be here.”
He hesitated. Finding comfort in Angel wasn’t a great idea, but he was a mess, and she did know what he was going through, having suffered a similar fate. If anyone could help him try to make sense of this shit, it was her.
“You’ve been there for me and the boys; I just want to return the favor,” she said.
He swallowed hard and simply nodded.
Twenty minutes later, the smell of hamburgers and fries had his stomach growling. When she placed a plate in front of him on the bar, he begrudgingly reached for a French fry and popped it into his mouth, burning his tongue. “Hot.”
“That’s typically what happens when things come out of a deep fryer,” she said, sliding the ketchup bottle toward him.
He squeezed some onto his plate as she climbed up onto the stool next to him. “So, want to talk about it?”
“Not really.” He didn’t even know where to begin, and rehashing things would only make him feel worse.
Angel leaned over the bar and reached for a bottle of bourbon. She held it up, but he shook his head. Leaning back on the alcohol was a bad idea. He’d finally gotten over the buzz he’d had that morning.
“None for me,” he said, shoving more fries into his mouth.
“Well, I’m going for it,” she said, pouring a shot.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Better than you, but only slightly,” she said before tipping the alcohol back. “My kids have informed me that they want to go back to L.A. and live with Brad. They left last week, and until we can get a court date where I can fight for custody or Brad gets tired of having them underfoot, that’s where they will be staying.”
That was why the boys hadn’t been to football practice. “Damn, Angel, I’m sorry…”
“Apparently, they told Brad that I’m dating Max, so I was the lucky recipient of nasty text messages.”
Trent’s jaw clenched. That prick. His anger and sympathy for Angel’s situation gave him a momentary respite from his own troubles. “Why didn’t you tell me all this?”
She sighed. “I kinda got a vibe that you wanted to keep the working relationship professional. We’d already blurred lines, becoming friends, and technically you’re my boss…”
So she’d caught that. Trent felt like an idiot. Of course he could be friends with Angel. There’d be no harm in it, and he’d let some insecurity make him unavailable when she could have used someone to talk to. Luckily, she’d had Max, but he wasn’t sure his buddy was a great listener when he struggled to keep his lips and hands off the woman. Max meant well, but it was his ear that Angel might have needed.
“Sorry about that. It was…”
She waved a hand. “I get it. It’s hard for some people to believe that a man and a woman can just be friends,” she said, and there was an odd note in her voice that he couldn’t quite figure out.
He nodded, and they continued to eat. As he cleared away their dishes a little while later, she turned on the music and poured two shots of bourbon. This time, he accepted it. “Just one,” he said.
She held her glass up. “To shitty situations.”
He’d toast to that all day long. He clinked his glass to hers, and they tossed them back. Angel set her glass down on the bar and climbed off the stool. “Let’s dance.”
He shook his head. “No.”
“Oh, come on. Dancing is one of the known cures for heartache.”
He doubted that, but she yanked his hands, pulling him from around the bar, then dragged him toward the dance floor as the fast-tempo song ended and a sad country western ballad started to play.
He raised an eyebrow. “This is supposed to cure my heartache? A song about a dude losing everything?”
