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“What happened to those legs of yours?”
He took a sip of his drink. “Next question.”
She suddenly looked wounded. “After all we’ve been through?”
He would have fallen for it completely, but he was enjoying her eyes far too much to miss the twinkle in them. “Oh,wow,” he said. He sat back and started to laugh. “You’re good.”
Her grin was back. “More than good enough for an honest answer.”
“I won’t lie to you,” he said solemnly. “But I refuse to tell you everything.”
“Aaaand now!”The booming voice belonged to Dynamite Don, of Dynamite Don’s Karaoke. “It’s time for Nick Freeman to come up to the stage for a little million-dollar magic!”
Nick looked over his shoulder at the stage. “I didn’t put that one in,” he explained to Hayley. “Sometimes he calls me up to do this one with him.”
“Then get the hell up there,” she said.
He slid toward the end of the booth, and the better part of four drinks made the world start tilting as he stood to climb out. “Oh,” he said. “Okay. Slow and steady.”
Hayley hopped out of the booth—how the hell did she make everything look so easy?—and stood next to him as he slowly backed out. “You ready to rock?”
Nick was hanging on to the table with a viselike grip. “Well …”
“Here.” He felt her hand on top of his, saw fingers expertly tipped with lilac nail polish. “Put your arm ’round me.”
He kept a hold of the booth with his right hand and let her guide his left hand off the table and around her shoulders. He stepped back cautiously, but his feet still found the ground a little more abruptly than he would have liked. Hayley’s arm shot around his waist to steady him as he stumbled, pivoting him in the process, and suddenly their faces were inches apart. Nick wasclose enough to see the light freckles on the bridge of her nose, and a tiny scar under the corner of her eye, a thin line no longer than the width of his fingertip. He felt his pulse drumming in his ears, and then she smiled—real, spontaneous, and warm. For the first time since he’d seen her dance, he felt like he was basking in the sun.
“Easy does it,” she said. “We’ve got this, rock star.”
He was being pulled into her gravity. Hayley’s gaze flitted from his eyes to his lips and back again. His mouth went dry.
“Why do you keep calling me that?” he asked.
“You own that stage when you sing,” she said. “And you own this bar the rest of the time. Youarea rock star, Nick.”
He told himself his body was tingling because of the whiskey.
“You’re right,” he said, backing into the walker. “We’ve got this.”
Hayley let him go, and she joined in the applause and even gave an enthusiastic whoop as he turned toward the stage.
This was not good.
She has a boyfriend.The thought played on a loop in his head; he recited it with so much determination that he was afraid he’d sing the words when the karaoke track started. Mel Beckett could scold him all she wanted about the type of woman he was liable to take home, but Nick had never—would never—move in on someone’s girlfriend.
He walked through the crowded bar and thought of his ex, Vicki, of feeling physically ill at the thought of her being with anybody else—and if he’d had that reaction when it was over, when she had every right to move on, he couldn’t fathom what it would have been like to find her cheating.
Nick shook his head to clear it of Vicki, of Hayley, of anything but the song he was about to sing. He wouldn’t let himself hurt Hayley Burke anymore, not even if she kissed him.
Not even if he wanted her to kiss him.
He was at the steps of the stage, and Stephanie and Alexa were helping him.
“Doing okay, champ?” This from Steph. “You look a little shaky.”
He nodded. “Maybe some ice water after?”
“I’ll leave it at your booth,” Alexa said. She and Steph waited to back away until he had both hands firmly on the walker. “Knock ’em dead.”
