“A rat? Damn, girl.” She places the butt of a gun back into her bag. “I don’t have a permit for this.”
At the doorway, Michie laughs, watching me reach down to pick up my cell phone. “I would give the two of you a ride home, but you talked too much shit about the new guy. If he doesn’t come back tomorrow, I’m gonna. . . .” He runs a sharp hand past his throat, lips in a tense snarl.
Justice grunts. “Oh, shut up, Michie. You love to threaten.”
“Is a threat the extent of what I do?” He cocks a brow.
I glower at my cracked cell phone and almost have an itch to pitch it at his handsome face.
“How much you paying that guy?” Justice asks. “Fresh out of bartending school or did he—”
“Oye, Chevelle was fresh behind the ears when I gave her a chance.” Michie points a stiff finger at me.
With the facial recognition not working, I hold the phone to my side and return my attention to him. “First of all, don’t include me. I only talk shit with a bottle of alcohol in hand. Second, the sexual tension between the two of you is—”
“Chevelle,” Justice whispers through gritted teeth.
A panty wetter beam is on Michie’s face as he steps back into the bar.
I smile wickedly as the blood rushes beneath Justice’s skin. For someone who once had a perpetual angry face, she can be pretty shy.
I flick my wrist. “I get it. You’re never gonna love again. Michie is a stingy bastard. All the smiling and winking he does, I’m sure he can’t be too stingy where it counts.”
“Chevelle,” she says again. This time her voice pitches in a shy gasp.
“You at a loss for words?” I cock a brow.
“Yes!”
“Save it for a poetry line.” Laughing, I stroll across the street with Justice following. Just as we step onto the curb, our Uber ride drives away.
Cutting my hands through the air, I call out, “Hey, wait!”
Justice screams an obscenity then huffs. “Crap, he probably thought we might not hold our damn cookies.”
“Ye could always try again.” A Scottish voice calls from behind us. “Show ‘em howye came prepared with wee baggies for yer boke.”
Eyes rolling, I turn around. Approximately five yards down, my sworn enemy for life, Brody MacKenzie, leans against a burnt-orange Cutlass.
Justice glances past the few parallel cars separating the distance from the guy I’ll hate until the end of time and me. She whispers, “You know him?”
“Aye, she’s known me since those cheeks were softer, and those bonny brown eyes not so angry, too.” The burly beast glances me up and down, moving with purpose toward us. “Look at ye, Chevelle, dressed up nicely, wee one. Who is the lass?”
“Thanks,” I mutter. Though we haven’t been on the same page since I was fourteen, I slink an arm around Brody in an apathetic hug. Quietly, I mumble how Justice isn’t interested before sharing her name.
“Piuthar bheag,” he calls me little sister, “all the bonny lassesloveme.”
“Not this one,” Justice responds with a sickly-sweet smile.
“Och, give me a few. I’ll teach ye how, sweetheart.”
“Hmmm.” I cut in. The feel-good buzz wears thin. “I doubt it. Why are you here anyway, Brody?”
“Funny thing, I got a message from Cam ‘bout girls’ night out. Mybrathairhad ye catching an Uber.”
“I’m confused. Wouldn’t you want me on the bus that topples off the edge of the Earth? Or abducted and sold into sex trafficking, so that you could have your brother back?”
With an attractive, yet smug smile, Brody pats my cheek. “Och, I forgot about that sense of humor, Chevelle. But nay, ye’re a MacKenziealready. Nae getting rid of ye.”