One Moment Please (Wait With Me #3)(10)
He turns on his stool to face me full on. “I know that you like hospital cafeterias and apparently tasting assholes. That’s plenty to make a general assessment with.”
My eyes fly wide. “God, you are so full of yourself! I can’t tell if it’s you or that horrible beer making my stomach churn…but if I had to guess, I’d say it’s you.”
The doctor’s eyes alight with amusement. “There you go, feigning another illness.”
“Shut up,” I exclaim and then smack the bar to get the bartender’s attention. He finally looks up and apologetically begins extracting himself from the blonde.
“What can I get you?” he drawls, clearly annoyed the nerve I have for interrupting him.
“Another Birds and Bees, please.”
Dr. Dick chuckles softly beside me. “I’ll have a whiskey. Neat. And put hers on my tab. I’m feeling charitable tonight.”
My head snaps to him. “I don’t need your charity, pal. In fact, I’m working on forgetting you and I ever met.”
He fights to hide his enjoyment. “Amnesia now? What ailment will you come up with next?”
A tiny growl rips its way up my throat. “What is your problem anyway? You just look for people to torment for the fun of it? Don’t you have a patient to go kill or something?”
Suddenly, his amused expression falls away, and his eyes hood into thin slits. The atmosphere shifts, and I could almost swear the lights turn more red. I open my mouth to apologize, but the bartender appears to place our drinks in front of us. Without a word, Josh grabs the glass tumbler and tips all the amber liquid down his throat in one fell swoop.
He nods to the bartender for another. He tightens his grip around his empty glass, the muscle in his square jaw ticking as he watches the bartender fill his glass back up. As soon as he’s done, Josh stands and walks away without so much as a look back at me or the bartender.
Holy shit, what just happened?
One minute, he’s going at me full force with a hint of flirty amusement in his tone, and the next, he completely shuts down and goes mute? Was my joke really that horrible?
Why am I even trying to figure out what I did wrong to a man who is so clearly socially dysfunctional?
Then again, despite what this guy thinks of me, I’m not a bad person. In fact, I’m normally pretty kind when I’m not being treated like a petulant toddler in need of a spanking.
There I go with the spanking again! God, I need to get laid!
With a heavy sigh, I search my purse for my phone.
This night is turning out just as disastrous as the day. I pull up the Uber app so I can go home and curl up in my bed.
Dean bellows, “Lynsey, what are you doing?”
I huff an indignant grunt. “I’m calling an Uber.”
“You can’t leave! We’re celebrating!” He drops onto the empty stool.
“No, we’re not. You’re schmoozing, and I’m getting my ass handed to me by Dr. Dick,” I argue, trying to shake off Dean’s grip on my arm. Asshole should be ashamed for abandoning me. “I just want to go home.”
“No, Lyns,” Dean groans, his dark eyes wide and pleading. “You can’t leave yet. Max wants to talk to me about a local bakery he thinks I should invest in with him. He thinks we can franchise it and go national. This is exactly the kind of investment I’ve been looking for, and Max is the kind of partner I need for this. Please don’t leave. Come sit and have a drink with us…I think maybe you’re misunderstanding Josh. Max says they’ve known each other since they were kids, and Max would never be friends with an asshole.”
I cut a disbelieving look at Dean.
He sticks out his bottom lip in a flirty way that does absolutely nothing for me. “I just need an hour.”
“An hour?” I groan, pressing my hand to my forehead. “My shoulders are already sore from how tense that asshole makes me. He has it out for me, and I don’t want to sit with him for an hour.”
“He doesn’t have it out for you. I’m telling you, Lynsey. I think he likes you.” Dean waggles his brows playfully. “But more importantly, Max is a hard man to get face time with, and he seems eager to talk.”
“Seriously, Dean. Go talk to him. You don’t need me to do this.”
“Yes, I do. This is your big night, and you didn’t get all dressed up to go home now.” He pins me with a pleading look. “I’ll buy you a giant charcuterie board and all your drinks. Then, as soon we’re done here, I’m your wingman for the rest of the night.”
I stare at his apologetic, hopeful expression. It seems so desperate.
Hell, I am on a serious budget, and I can’t say no to charcuterie to save my life. “You promise it’ll be just an hour?”
“One little hour!” He winks flirtatiously at me.
I’m so going to regret this.
Two and a half hours later, I’m two sheets to the wind. Or is it three sheets to the wind? What do sheets really have to do with this saying anyway? Is it in reference to the hours you drink alcohol? The quantity of drinks consumed? The number of times an image is multiplied in your vision? Hell if I know!
I just know that I’m tipsy and playing a fun game of building a cute little cabin using toothpicks as fasteners with the pretty cheese on the charcuterie board. It’s like a gingerbread house but with meat and cheese.