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“You’re not from around here, are ya?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Honey, around here, a guy offers to buy a drink for a woman, and she doesn’t want him to, she tells him to fuck off, not ‘no thank you’. You’re… polite.”
That’s all I know how to be.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
She emphatically shakes her head. “No, not at all. But if you’re gonna hang out here at Barlow’s, you need todirtyup a bit.”
“Dirty up?” I repeat, glancing down at myself. It was hard enough to leave the motel in jeans and a sweater when the last ten years dictated I be dressed to the nines no matter what. “But he was in a suit!”
Jenny snorts. “I’m not talking about your clothes,” she says as she grins at the sweater I splurged on earlier today after making the decision to go out. “That color is perfect for you, by the way. Brings out the color of your eyes.”
She glances over her shoulder, presumably to make sure the other bartender has things handled, but she doesn’t immediately face me again. I follow her gaze, and that’s when I see him.
Holy smokes!
The man standing near the center of the bar has his eyes trained on Jenny, and I can’t stop the jealousy that snakes through me. No man has ever looked at me that way, like he’s starving and I’m the only thing that will satiate his appetite.
When Jenny turns back around, she grips the edge of the bar. Her diamond ring flashes in the dim lighting, and my jealousy deepens.
What I wouldn’t give to have a husband like that.
“You’re very lucky,” I tell her.
Lines crease her forehead when she knits her brows. “Lucky?”
I tip my head toward the man in the leather vest. “Having a husband who stares at you like that…” I blow out a breath.
I feel like I need to take a pregnancy test just from witnessing it.
Jenny’s eyes widen a split-second before she lets out a laugh. “Oh, honey, no.” She lifts her hand and wiggles her finger. “This is all for show. I’m not married.”
“You’re not…” I shake my head. “I don’t understand.”
“I’ve owned this bar for four years now, and it took all of a month to realize that men are pigs.” She smirks. “And men with liquor in their system are the slop that pigs eat.”
“Wow. That’s a—” I wrinkle my nose. “That’s a mental image I could have done without.”
“Anyway, the ring helps me judge a person’s character.” She glances over her shoulder. “And that man you thought was my husband… he’s a good man.”
“So you know him well?”
“Nope, never seen him before tonight,” she says. “But he apologized for hitting on me when I showed him the ring. That doesn’t happen.”
“Seriously?”
I’m so out of the loop with how things work in the real world.
I might not be comfortable in a country club, but at least I know what to expect. Here… not so much.
Jenny glances over her shoulder again and then grins at me. “Why don’t you go talk to him?”
“Oh, no. I couldn’t.”
“Why not? He was staring at you, not me.”
