"Well, if he can't, he's a really good faker. He did this thing where he threw the bottle up from behind him and caught it in front of him. I know we're supposed to hate him, but he's hot and the ladies will love it."
My jaw tightened. I didn't want ladies loving him. And of course, they would.
He wore his black pirate shirt unbuttoned enough to show off smooth skin and a hint of the line between his pecs hinting at his sculpted muscles. He had a black bandana wrapped around his head and an eye patch that was flipped up, presumably so he could see out of both eyes.
"I figured it would be good business." Dana looked at me with concern.
I shook my head.
"I'm sorry. I messed up."
"It's all right. You were trying to help. I appreciate it." I left Dana, heading straight to the bar. Jared saw me approaching. He straightened like an Army private standing at attention. Then his eyes went wide, a sure sign that I was glaring.
Sam looked at him and then toward where Jared was staring. He saw me and smiled. His gaze drifted down my body and back up again, his smile growing wider. A shiver ran through my body, and I cursed my hormones for responding.
I reached the bar, pressing my palms against the edge of it as I leaned toward Sam. "You need to go."
"But you need a bartender." He gave me his affable smile that in the past worked on me and everybody else to get what he wanted.
"I don't needyouas a bartender."
He put his arm around Jared. "Oh, come on, Kate. Let me help you out. You don't want to be stuck behind the bar. You want to be out mingling with your customers." His gaze dipped to my breasts, and I wanted to poke his eyes out.
“Your customers will want you mingling with them as well.”
Ugh! "What do you know about bartending?"
"A great deal, actually. My brother and I own a couple of clubs, and before that I worked in my aunt Bri’s club."
Behind me, the door opened, and customers dressed in a variety of costumes filtered in.
"You're going to be so busy you won't even know I'm here," Sam said. "And when the work is done, I'll leave. I promise. In the meantime, I'll help Jared get his bearings behind the bar."
I didn't have much choice. "Fine." I whirled around, wanting to storm away, but my too tight dress made it difficult to take the long strides that I would've liked to have taken.
As the night wore on, we were extremely busy, but that didn't mean the temptation to look Sam's way didn’t get the best of me.
Every time I glanced his way, he was sporting a sexy grin as he did stunts with the liquor bottles like he was Tom Cruise inCocktail. The women crowded around his side of the bar were enchanted, giggling and flirting with him. He was eating it up. He looked into their eyes, giving them winks as he served their drinks. I was sure several of them had orgasms as he set their drinks in front of them.
At one point, he glanced my way and caught me watching him. He winked at me then too. I flipped him the finger and turned away, going to check on my customers.
Why did he still affect me the way that he did?
Yes, he had the looks and the swagger, but now I knew the type of man he was. Surely, that would have dulled the shine I’d once seen in him.
His dumping me for Sandra had ripped the rose-colored glasses off, and I could see him for the man he really was, a man who could tell me he wanted to marry me one minute and after a thirty-minute visit with his ex, leave me without looking back. Clearly, my hormones hadn't gotten the message because every time I looked toward him, they started vibrating, humming with desire.
I walked over to a table, not realizing until I reached it that I knew them. Dax Shepard had been Harper's, and later, Anne’s, bodyguard at various times over the last year. He sat in the booth with a man and a woman I recognized as working with him at Saint Security. They occasionally came in for drinks, so I knew them on sight, although except for Dax, I’d never talked to them much.
Dax was dressed as a mobster, while the other man wore a toga. The woman wore a ninja costume. Or I assumed it was a costume. For all I knew, it was her work uniform.
Feeling petty, I put on my best smile and posed in a manner I knew accentuated all my best assets. The men at the table took notice as their gazes took the same tour as Sam’s had.
"Are you all having a good time tonight?"
“We are." Dax shifted over, pushing his buddy beside him into the woman on the other side of him. "Why don't you join us? You're the boss, after all, right? You can take a break."
Normally, I didn't sit with the guests unless it was one of my girlfriends and they were over for lunch.