A Fallow Heart (Tommy Creek #2)(85)

She shrugged. “Okay.” Sitting back beside him, she frowned and sipped on her beer. “Have you tried finding yourself another woman?”

He let out a harsh sound of rejection.

“Kay,” she answered. “Well, the drinking-yourself-dumb attempt obviously isn’t working. Have you tried getting sober?”

He sent her look. “Only for the past ten years. But seeing her again,” actually being with her, “only made it worse. Everyone else is just a sorry substitute.”

“Ooh, one of those, huh?” B.J. shook her head sadly. “I do hate a good woman who turns the rest of us into sorry substitutes.”

“You’re right, B.J.” Coop groaned. “All women suck.”

“Hey now, I didn’t say that.”

“They twist a poor, innocent guy into knots until he just wants to lie down and die.”

“Now, not all women are like that, damn you. All I said was…shit. What did I say again?”

“Hell, I don’t know,” he slurred. “I forgot what we’re talking about.”

“We’re talking about women, ya lousy drunk. And how beneficial they are. Your mama’s a woman and she ain’t a heartless, soul-sucking demon bitch, now is she?”

Coop frowned. “No,” he had to glumly agree. “But mothers don’t count. Neither do grandmas.” He suddenly wanted to defend Jo Ellen too. She wasn’t a bitch, never had been. But defending her to B.J. wouldn’t bring her back. He slumped to a new low.

“We women are good for more than just cooking and popping out babies, damn it. We…we…”

“Y’all smell good,” he decided. He loved nothing more than the smell of Jo Ellen’s floral shampoo. He squeezed his eyes closed as more agony claimed him.

“Yeah, we smell damn good,” B.J. agreed, then elbowed him in the arm and snickered. “Plus, we got boobies.”

Cooper let out a longing sigh. “I do love boobies.”

B.J. nodded thoughtfully. “I have a nice rack,” she added after a moment, as if trying to think up something useful to say to fill the silence.

Sending her a sideways glance, Cooper arched an eyebrow. “Do you? Humph. It’s hard to tell through all the man-clothes you wear.”

She scowled as if offended and straightened her spine. “Do I hear doubt in your voice? I do have a nice rack, *. And I’ll prove it.” Immediately, she began to unbutton the front of her plaid top.

Blinking, Cooper watched, both his eyebrows rising into his hairline. He must be drunker than he thought, because if his eyes didn’t deceive him, B.J. Gilmore was stripping off her shirt in the middle of Rio’s bar. But as soon as she released enough buttons for the blouse to gape open, he saw she wore a black tank top underneath.

A skin-tight black tank top that molded to a lovely feminine torso.

B.J. shrugged the plaid off and arched her chest forward, pulling her shoulders back, to show off the nicely rounded mounds billowing out the front of her skin-tight black tank top.

Cooper’s jaw sagged open. “Damn, Gilmore. You really do have a nice rack.”

She preened. “I know, right?”

He nodded stupidly, agreeing. “I’d definitely motorboat those.”

Her smile faltered and shoulders fell back to normal. “Motorboat? What the hell does that mean?”

His own drunken smile slipped. “You know.” He waved his hand sloppily. “It’s where you get your face in between ‘em and…” Instead of describing it verbally, he shook his head back and forth, imitating a vibrating brr sound.

B.J. stared at him as if he’d lost his mind, which he probably had, explaining a motorboat to a woman. But instead of getting pissed over the idea as any normal female probably would, she studied him a moment longer. “Huh. And you guys actually get into that?”

He gave a loose shrug. “Well, sure. We get into pretty much anything involving boobies.”

“Huh,” B.J. said again, still staring at him as if she feared his head might fall off and roll across the floor next. From the way he felt, the idea didn’t seem too farfetched. “You’re rip-roaring drunk, aren’t you, Gerhardt?”

Cooper nodded sadly. “Pretty much.”

The waitress slid up beside him. “Hey, sugar. Need another refill yet?”

“Na, I’m good.” He cast a curious look at B.J. “You?” When she shook her head, he gave the waitress a messy grin. “We’re good.”

Ignoring B.J., Nan smiled back at him, leaning closer and lowering the timbre of her voice as she answered. “Well, y’all let me know if you need anything, ya hear?”

He lifted his hand in a careless wave. “Yeah. Thanks, Nan.”

As she strolled away, he and B.J. stared after her until B.J. swung around to arch her eyebrows. “She was totally coming onto you.”

“What?” Cooper frowned, then leaned back behind B.J. to glance after the waitress again. She was kind of putting an extra pop to her hips.

“She wants to crawl inside your pants with you,” B.J. charged.

“No…” But when he swiveled his attention back to Nan, she met his gaze and smiled, fluttering her fingers at him in a flirtatious wave. He shuddered and zipped his attention to B.J. “You think?”