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Chapter One
T-Minus 30 minutes till orgasms and sleep.
Oleander repeated this in her head like a mantra to distract from the fact she’d been on her feet for eight hours.
That didn’t include the four hours of dance lessons she worked that morning.
And she’d done it all while slinging drinks and being polite to customers even though she was running on no sleep and no orgasms. All she wanted to do was go home, drown herself in a bottle of wine and soak in the tub before passing out for the rest of the weekend.
T-Minus 30 minutes till orgasms and sleep.
Ollie was halfway into her locker at the Hazy Barrel, the bar she’d been working at for the last eight years, taking a few deep breaths before she could clock out. Cassie, the worst coworker ever, came crashing through the doors and grabbed onto her shoulders. Ollie groaned at the contact, already aware of what came next.
“Ollie, Ineedyou to take my shift.”
“Nope. Grant is waiting for me at home and I’m tired.” Ollie snapped, refusing to let Cassie knowGrantwas her vibrator—because hegrantedher multiple orgasms without talking. Everyone at work thoughtGrantwas a new boyfriend and Ollie used that to her advantage.
“There’s an emergency at home. You need to take my shift.”
“Oh well, because it’sanotheremergency.” Ollie responded as sarcastically as she could given her exhaustion. Cassie had an emergencyeveryFriday evening.
“I’ll even give you my paycheck, nobody else can cover for me.”
“Cass….”
“Thanks doll, you’re the best.” In an intoxicating haze of whatever perfume she was wearing, Cassie was gone. It was a miracle she still had this job, considering Ollie took home most of that money since she worked all her shifts without complaint.
Okay,somecomplaint.
There was absolutely nothing glamorous about this job, but in a small town like Wildes, Delaware, you took what you got. It helped pay some of her bills, but on nights like this when other staff members found lame-ass reasons to run out early, Olliehatedher job. The Hazy Barrel had been an empty warehouse 15 years ago before Killian Graham turned it into a bar. Some called it a dive bar, some called it the best place to drink in town. Ollie called it work.
When Ollie walked out of another desk job, she’d walked into the Barrel with her best friend and proceeded to get very drunk. A few hours into their binge drinking, Ollie decided working at a bar would be fun. Sure, her traditional Indian grandmother would lose her shit, but it was a paying job. She was 29, unemployed and unable to save any money to pay her parents back, so she practically begged Killian to give her the job. For the first six weeks, he trained her and then set her up behind the bar. And Ollie had stayed.
Eight years later, much to her grandmother’s disappointment, Ollie was still there. Sure, she got a promotion and she was the head bartender, but it wasn’t great. Even though she taught dance every weekend, her grandmother wanted more from her. How else could she brag about her only granddaughter to her friends? Ollie was never going to sit behind a desk again. It was confining, boring and not satisfying enough.
Besides, where else could she wear vintage tees, cuffed jeans and comfortable sneakers all day?
Granted, bartending wasn’t her ultimate goal. Ollie wanted to dance. That was herthing. Her brothers wanted to play cops and robbers, and beat each other up, but not Ollie. Her mother signed her up for ballet when she was little, but when she started to grow up and gained weight, her ballet teacher verypolitelytold her mother Ollie was too big-boned to be a ballet dancer.
Of course, her grandmother liked to remind Ollie that she could always learnBharatanatyam. While an ancient and legendary dance form from her home country, that wasn’t what Ollie wanted to do. Ballet wasn’t even her first choice, but it was so rare for people to teach freestyle. She decided to find a way to do it herself. This was before YouTube existed and you had to rely on MTV to play a Janet Jackson video so you could learn the moves. And it wasn’t like there were a lot of job postings looking for choreographers, but Ollie knew her way to get there was to learn from the best.
So, she started auditioning. Ollie kept getting told she wouldn’t fit—she was too brown, too chubby and too….something else offensive. No matter how thick your skin was, after a point, the words started to hurt and Ollie gave up.
Now, she worked six days at the Barrel and taught dance on two days, so she could pay her bills and pay her parents back for college.
“What are you still doing here?”Killian. The man in charge.
Ollie sighed, looking up from cleaning tables. “Cassie had a family emergency, so I’m working her shiftandtaking her paycheck.”
“That’s not how it works, Bow.”
“You can make it out to her, give me the cash.”
“Baby, you know I can’t.” Killian replied, his voice cloyingly sweet.
Ollie gritted her teeth and inhaled sharply through her nose. “Do you need something?”
“Table 12,” he said with a smirk, knowing he’d won this conversation. “Champagne. They’re celebrating.”
