Kiss the Stars (Falling Stars #1)(118)

Never had I imagined I’d come to make this place a piece of my own. The many grueling years spent priming and molding and shaping me for one singular goal, and yet my path had led me straight back here. Irony.

But I learned early on some things are much more important than any ambition.

I wound around the tables set up on the hardwood floor and made my way back to the gorgeous antique bar that sat like an island adrift in this sea of revelry. The massive oblong made a full circle, and besides the times when the stage was serving its purpose where it was positioned at the very far end of the colossal building, the bar commanded the focus of Charlie’s.

I leaned my elbows on top of the dark polished wood. Even though I was tall, I always felt inclined to lift up on my toes, as if to match the lift of my voice. “Hey, Charlie,” I shouted over the din of the noisy room, “I need a gin and tonic and two amber ales.”

Charlie’s back was to me as he hustled behind the bar. He reached up to grab several hurricane glasses from the bar racks suspended on chains from the high ceiling.

Over his shoulder, he shot me a crooked, bearded grin. “You got it, darlin’. Give me a sec to fill your last order. You’ve been firing ’em at me faster than I can fill ’em.”

“That’s because the place is packed tonight. I can’t keep up, either.”

With a short shake of his head, he spun around and began mixing drinks in front of me. “You keep up just fine. This place hasn’t run so smooth in years…not until you came back to me.” He sent me a wink and slid two drinks my direction, which I quickly arranged on my tray. “I was five minutes from shuttin’ this place down until you came and rescued it.”

I rolled my eyes at him affectionately.

“Oh, aren’t you the charmer.”

Always the charmer and always completely full of it. Charlie’s had been a staple in Savannah for years, and he’d never been anywhere close to shutting it down.

Really, it was Charlie who had done the rescuing.

That charmer who scrambled around the gorgeous antique bar? He was also my uncle, my mother’s brother. He was the only one who had been there for me when I didn’t have anyone else to turn to, because everyone else had turned me away. He never once told me it was a waste or called it a mistake. He just encouraged me to live my life…on my own terms…terms that everyone else had previously tried to set for me.

Charlie stepped back and wiped his hands on a towel before he ran it over the bar top, eyebrow quirked as he cast me a teasing smile. “That’s why you love me, Shea Bear.”

The soft spot I’d always held for him glowed with the pet name he’d used for me since I was a little girl.

I balanced my tray in my hands and eyed him over the top of the bar. “I love you because you’re the best, Charlie.”

It was just a flash, but I saw it there in brown eyes the same as mine, that he cared for me just as much as I cared for him.

In my twenty-three years, I’d come to recognize there were three types of guys.

Maybe it was wrong of me to lump them into categories, but I’d learned to do it for my own self-preservation. As a way to survive in a world that wanted to use me up before it hung me out to dry.

First, there were the assholes. They were easy to spot. They were always after one thing and one thing only.

Pleasure.

It didn’t matter if it was sex or money, fame or comfort. It all amounted to the same thing. Every move they made was purposed to bring them self-gratification and they were all too happy to reach out and take whatever they wanted to make it happen. Most of them didn’t give a second thought to those they hurt in the process. Hell, they usually took a little more pleasure in doing it.

Then there were the nice guys. These guys were a little harder to read because they didn’t set out to do people wrong. They were sweet and nice and treated you like a princess right up to the point when they didn’t get what they wanted or after they’d had their fill of it. These guys would hit you with all kinds of valid excuses, rationalizing their actions to make themselves feel better. Half the time they left you feeling like you were the one who’d done something wrong in the first place.

Last, there were the good guys.

Guys with character. The ones who’d sacrifice for someone else, even if it meant it cost them something, or they had nothing to gain. Even if it meant the end result might not stack in their favor. They just did it because it was the right thing to do.

Charlie Cohns?

He was one of the good guys.

He gave me a little salute before he turned to grin at Tamar, one of the other bartenders, who slipped under the small opening at one end of the bar, arms full of bottles needing restocking. She was older than me by a year or two, had flaming red hair, and pretty much looked like a modern-day pin-up girl, all curves and tattoos and flawlessly applied makeup. Plus the girl took crap from no one. She was the perfect fit beside Charlie who was as casual as they came.

Her full red lips spread into a seductive smile. I was pretty sure she didn’t know a different one. “I leave for five minutes and this guy is already slacking off? Get back to work, old man.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” He cocked his head her direction, eyes on me, and mouthed, “Slave driver.”

Laughing, I situated the last of the drinks Charlie had poured onto my tray. “Now Tamar is the real reason this bar is still afloat. You’re lucky she headed east when she did.”