A Little Combustible Chemistry (Cactus Creek 0.5)(3)

“Holy shit,” breathed Isaac, jabbing him in the gut. “I think that goddess at the bar is pointing at you. Do you know her?”

Luke could barely hear him. Or much of anything for that matter. The echoed statement from their other friends at the table that the woman was way too much for Isaac to handle? Practically white noise. The rest of the sounds all around him? Becoming more muted by the second.

His sole focus remained on the other bartender—the hardest working one there by his estimation. Even as her friend was telling her something that obviously involved him, the woman hardly paused long enough to spare a quick glance in his direction.

Just as well. He wasn’t sure he would’ve survived a lengthier look than that. Though she’d doused it quickly, a sizzling, ultra feminine awareness had flared in her eyes in the brief moment they’d met his, and now a sweet, honest-to-god farm-girl blush was pinking her cheeks.

Man, oh man, was he in trouble.

If the girl next door had an unpredictable, feisty twin sister, this woman would be her. With her adorably stubborn frown and quiet, kitten gaze still mulishly refusing to look directly at him again, she was drawing him in—hook, line, and sinker.

Luke stopped trying to hide his interest then. He was doing a lousy job at it anyhow. He decided instead to up the blatancy level of his gaze considerably. Dare her to play. When she eventually, reluctantly, briefly succumbed—to politely glare him off mostly—he let his triumphant grin deploy his dimples, somehow knowing that would rile her enough to make her drop her defenses just a little bit more.

It did.

To his competitive delight, she instantly went on the offense, covertly returning his stare head-on and dropping the checkered flag for the silent game of Chicken that followed.

Hot damn.

One scorching, hard-fought minute later, victory was his.

Not just because she’d broken the connection first, but because a touch of humor had ghosted her lips when she had. Immediately following, the next hour found their gazes colliding across the room with increasing frequency. It was all more friendly than flirty but still, Luke was captivated.

And officially clueless as to what his friends had been talking about for the past twenty minutes.

The fact that the whole guys’ night out had been his idea in the first place just made his bro-code infraction that much worse. The four of them hadn’t hung out in months. He’d been stressed as hell relocating his chocolate shop to Cactus Creek, and Isaac was practically living at the new mixed martial arts gym he’d opened up this past year in Tempe. Connor had the best excuse seeing as how his now two-month-old was apparently going through diapers on the hour every night, while Connor’s brother Brian took second place honors having just gotten married a little while ago to a firecracker who was keeping life thoroughly interesting from what they’ve heard.

Yep, the guys were definitely going to ride him about this one for a long time. He quickly pardoned himself, however, when his continued lack of attention to his friends allowed him to catch his mystery bartender bending over to grab something from a floor shelf. No, his basal response to that wasn’t evolved at all, but for some reason, the biologically encoded heat swell in his gaze didn’t seem to offend her when she caught him smiling appreciatively. Instead, it prompted a nose-scrunching twitch of a smile that she tried hard to hide behind a droll eye-roll.

Damn, she was cute.

Absently, he joined in the laughter at his table over some joke Connor had made—or perhaps that had been Brian—before glancing back over again at his mystery girl.

He did a double take at the transformation.

She was frozen in place behind the bar. Stopped in her tracks, breath held, eyes intent on the vintage bar clock on the wall. Completely in her own world.

No longer even pretending to pay attention to the guys anymore, Luke leaned forward and watched in growing curiosity as she soundlessly counted down a few more seconds with the clock before tucking a secret grin away and heading to the wall phone. Her expression was serious as she made a call that lasted just a few seconds, after which, she hesitated, chewed on her lip in debate, and then slowly lifted her eyes to find...his.

He tilted his head in question.

The shy, happy smile blooming across her face was a heck of an answer. Rippling with a deep pride obviously born from cherished memories, that incredible smile sucker-punched him, drove him crazy because he didn’t know the meaning behind it.

When she went right back to working as if they hadn’t just shared a moment, he couldn’t help but frown. She was still smiling, but it wasn’t the same. He felt a pang of disappointment. Sappy as it sounded, he wanted to learn everything there was about that earlier smile, have her share it with him and him alone again. Be the one to make another one like it appear.

Whoa. He leaned back in his seat, surprised. Pulling his eyes away from her to avoid earning stalker points, he took another drink of his Black and Tan and began dissecting his intense interest in the woman. He’d listed at least dozen unique reasons when his thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the raucous sound of singing bursting out over the brewery PA system.

Weird.

Weirder still was the eruption of ecstatic cheers and wolf cries echoed all around the brewpub.

Huh, must be a thing.

All eyes flew to the glass partition to the brewery where its workers—whom he hardly saw working in these large numbers at night—were lined up on the other side, arms linked and beer mugs sloshing as they crooned out the lyrics to an infectious old school British drinking song. Their mostly off-key singing blared over an old speaker affixed above the glass, normally only used to announce brewery tours during the day. Then, as if this were some sort of musical, the entire joint was soon joining in and rocking out. A few beer-happy dudes even ran to the brewery glass like super fans at a hockey game.