Living Out Loud (Austen, #3)(74)

“She is not going with you.”

“That’s not for you to decide,” she shot.

I turned, pinning her with a glare I felt into the depths of my chest. “You are on the clock. And if you leave with him, you’re fired.”

Color rose in her cheeks, her eyes shining with angry tears. “Oh, so now you want to be my boss?”

I didn’t respond, only held her still with my glare.

“Goddamn it, Greg,” she whispered but didn’t move to follow.

“Let her go,” Will said, his shoulders square.

“No.”

His eyes darted to her. “Come on, Annie.” He extended his hand.

“I’ll call you later,” she said miserably.

Fury flashed across his face. “If you stay here with him, we’re through. You don’t need this fucking bullshit minimum-wage job anyway.”

“Watch it, asshole,” I warned.

“You’re both assholes!” she shouted, tears clinging to her lashes. “Screw both of you, and screw your ultimatums.”

“Annie—” he started, but she cut him off.

“If that’s how you feel, then go. I’m through with this, through with you. Through with your jealousy and through with the arguing. I’m through.”

She took a furious breath that shuddered in her chest, a sob fueled by betrayal and hurt, a sob that sent a flash of rage through me, tightening my fists at my sides.

“Get out of here, Bailey. Because if I put my hands on you to make you, I swear to God, I won’t be able to stop.”

Will stood very still, his eyes on her, then me, then her again, as if weighing his options. When he came to his senses, it was with a tug on the hem of his vest and the straightening of his back.

“Your loss,” he said, his cold eyes on Annie.

“Do not show your face here again. If you walk through those doors, I will have you thrown out. Do you hear me?”

After a long, strained stare, he nodded once and turned.

The only people who had heard were those adjacent to us, and the party went on undisturbed but for our little island of blame.

When I turned to her, tears spilled from her accusing eyes.

“I cannot believe that just happened,” she spat. “I cannot believe you just did that.”

Every muscle in my body was flexed and furious. “You can’t believe? Do you realize we could lose our liquor license? Did you happen to forget you were on the clock and working? I should fire you on the spot.”

“Well then, why don’t you?” she cried, her voice full of contempt.

“You and I both know why.”

I turned to walk away, and she didn’t say a word more.

The rest of the night was a blur. Somehow, I managed to get back behind the bar and spent the next few hours in a haze marked by automatic movements—smile, pour, nod. And then it was last call, and the night wound down.

The crowd thinned, then emptied, leaving only the employees. Ruby bussed her tables while Jett and Annie cleaned up their things, running the box of name tags and dance cards and tablecloths back. We were breaking down the bar when Annie appeared in front of me, the bartop between us.

“I’m finished,” she said quietly but not gently.

I didn’t look at her. “Good. Clock out and sit down.”

She took a breath through her nose, the sound frustrated. “I would like to leave, please.”

“You will sit and wait for me to finish. We have things to discuss, and when that’s done, I’ll put you in a cab.”

“I am not a child!”

“Then stop acting like one.”

I looked up when she made another sound, this one somewhere between a gasp and a sob. The hurt on her face was nearly the end of me. Because that hurt written in the soft curves of her cheeks, the brackets on either side of her lips and the furrow between her brows told me she felt every bit the child I’d accused her of being.

I couldn’t take it anymore.

I stormed out from behind the bar with Beau and Harrison watching me, exchanging glances when I rounded the corner. The second Annie was in grabbing distance, I did just that, hooking her upper arm with my hand to drag her into the back.

What I had to say didn’t need an audience.

I let her go once we were in the depths of the store, my chest heaving as I looked down at her. “I cannot fucking believe you did that. I cannot believe you put me in that position.”

“It was just a drink!”

“Jesus Christ, Annie. One drink could cost Rose tens of thousands of dollars in fines and the store’s license. And you don’t even drink! This was his doing, not yours. And don’t you dare lie and tell me that was your idea.”

More tears. So many tears.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I…I just didn’t think it would be a big deal. He said no one would know, and I’d never had a drink, and—”

“This isn’t you. None of this is you. It reeks of that son of a bitch.”

“Greg, you banned him from the bar, and you kept me here, held me hostage when you should have let me go. It wasn’t right, how you handled things. It wasn’t,” she said, angry sobs hiccuping in her chest.

And my own anger won over, bursting out of me in waves. “This is my bar, and I don’t want him here, not after tonight. You’ll do what I say because you are my employee. You’ll follow my rules because I am your boss.”