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“Hi.” She glanced at him, but she looked away quickly. Too quick for him to read anything in her expression. What he could see without a doubt was her lips in that straight line on her face.
Maybe there was a story there, a reason she didn’t smile much.
He hoped someday she would tell it to him.
“You okay?” His voice was gruff with worry, anxiety over how they’d left things last night. Had she told his mom he was hitting on her? Well, she hadn’t yet, since Adele wasn’t here. But would she? Charlie was a grown man, but that didn’t mean his mom wouldn’t lay into him if she thought he was being a dick.
But he wasn’t. Was he? Asking her to join him at his table last night? Talking to her?
Tatum tipped her head up and tossed her hair over her shoulder. She eyed him curiously as she reached for her coffee and took a drink. “Why wouldn’t I be okay?”
Touchy.
“Just.” He shrugged. “After last night.”
She arched her brows, and finally, she shot him a full-on radiant smile. But it was cold and tight and didn’t reach her eyes.
“We had dinner, Charlie,” she said simply. “It’s not like we slept together.”
He flinched at her direct shot.
“Yeah, well, you hightailed it outta The Bullpen like we did sleep together, and you weren’t impressed. Wasn’t sure you would want to see my face this morning.”
She sighed, opened her mouth to speak, and apparently thought better of it.
“You didn’t tell anyone?” she finally asked a moment later.
Exasperated, he looked over his shoulder at his brothers and Everleigh.
“We bumped into each other at a bar,” he reminded her. “We didn’t sleep together.”
“Would you have told anyone if we had slept together?”
A little bit unsettled by her tone, by the insinuation that he was the locker room talk type, Charlie tipped his head and narrowed his eyes at her.
“No.”
“Hey.” Sev chose that moment to crash their conversation. Charlie wasn’t sure if he was annoyed or grateful for the save. “You comin’ to the next whiskey tasting, Tatum?”
Tatum held the eye contact with Charlie a moment longer and finally turned to Sev with a smile. A sweet, warm smile the likes of which she’d never directed at him.
Maybe she genuinely had no interest whatsoever in Charlie. If that were the case, he would deal with it. But was she seriously into his little brother? Hell, if she wanted a fling—because she damned sure wouldn’t get more out of Sev than that—Charlie was up for it. He’d be happy to take her for a ride and fuck her until she gushed his name like a prayer.
“No, sorry, I’ll have to miss it,” she told Sev.
“That’s too bad.” Sev sounded sincere. “Hope you can make it sometime soon. It’s always a good time.”
“Me, too.” She nodded and watched Sev walk away. When she flicked her eyes back to Charlie, the smile was gone.
But she didn’t look cold. She looked lonely.
Nope. As much as he wanted to undress her and worship her, he couldn’t do a one and done fling. He didn’t want a cold fast fuck with Tatum any more than he wanted to be on the receiving end of her cold smiles.
“Have a good day.” He walked away without giving her a chance to respond.
Usually, his run-ins with her at the coffee house put a little jaunt in his step and gave him something to feel good, hopeful, about. Today, he went back to work a little bit pissed off.
9
