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I hate crying, but I allow myself the reprieve of breaking down sometimes because I need to.
ChapterEight
Gwen
Istart the next day with the migraine from hell.
It doesn’t surprise me with all the crying I did last night.
Although I look like hell with my red puffy eyes, I do my best to look as decent as possible. It’s a full-on busy day today where I’m going to be at the restaurant from open to closing time.
I need to be on my game, no exceptions and no matter that, I wish I could hide away in a cave and let the world pass by without me.
By lunchtime, I’m exhausted and so worried about Grams and the whole situation with Conrad, I can hardly concentrate.
I get some respite when Dru comes by for an hour to hang out and help me, but the moment she leaves, I’m a mess again.
It’s obvious to everyone that I’m not myself and I’m not coping at all. There were several points during the day when people tried to ask if I was okay, to which I gave the usual faux assurance.
I barely held myself together when I gave Dru the update on Grams, so talking to everyone else would have been awful.
Miraculously, I make it to the end of the night.
We’re an hour away from closing, and it’s just the bars upstairs and downstairs that are open for the customers who want to mingle.
As the waitresses seem to have a handle on clearing up, I head to the bar, where Gilman is busy mixing cocktails for a group of rowdy women.
I slip behind the counter and start arranging the bottles of wine back in their rows, making a note of what needs replenishing.
I try to shove my angst to the back of my mind so I can concentrate. I don’t want to lose track the way I did when I cashed up the register and had to start all over again.
When I reach the end of the row, I suddenly feel eyes on me, heated and so intense I’m not sure how I missed it before.
I turn right around and find myself staring straight at Malik standing in the crowd by the balcony on the upper level.
The sight of him throws me off kilter. A, because I never expected to see him, and B, because it’shim,and despite worrying about Grams, I haven’t stopped thinking about him.
He towers over the surrounding people with his height, but even from all the way down here, his presence overwhelms me, heating up my body like a furnace.
Our eyes lock, and I sense something different about him tonight. Something sensual, predatory, and so potently mysterious that roots my body to the spot.
I would have waved or acknowledged him by now, but I’m frozen in his gaze as that secret something calls to my inner desires and needs, which haven’t stopped fantasizing about how good it would feel to have him touch me.
Touch me and make me forget the way he did during those few minutes we spoke yesterday.
Except, I’m not thinking of talking now. Somehow, I have a strange feeling he knows that. After all, we started this... whatever it is we have, back to front.
Malik breaks eye contact, and his eyes roam down my body in such an overtly sexual way that sets me on fire. Wetness beads between my thighs, and the ache in my pussy grows as his lust-filled invisible fingers touch me everywhere.
Embarrassingly, my mouth waters like I’ve been starving for food for years.
What the hell is wrong with me?
I need to stop this. It’s ridiculous. I know it is, but temptation holds me in the lure of him, and I check him out, too, because damn it to hell, he looks sexier than any other time I’ve seen him. Tonight, Malik is wearing a black button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up his thick forearms and the top buttons undone, showing off the tanned skin on his chest.
Taking in his masterpiece body heats me up once more, and my mind goes wild. His eyes meet mine again, and several moments pass of staring at each other, until a warm hand rests on mine and I look away.
It’s Gilman.
