An Optimist's Guide to Heartbreak (Heartsong #1)(24)

Nash, clearly eavesdropping on the conversation and now privy to my eternal shame, chuckles as he swipes a rag down the bar top.

“Nice,” he says.

I catch his amused glance and slide my hands down my face because I need to use one of them for balance. Latching onto a chairback, I beg my legs to stop quivering. “Riesling, please,” I squeak.

He grins as he moves down the bar, pointing at the space beside Cal.

There, a full glass of wine already sits.

My blush blooms tenfold when I spot the familiar scribbling on the napkin underneath it. “Thank you.” I fumble with the stool, the legs screeching along the floor, mimicking my dignity. When I maneuver around it to climb up, my knees graze the rough denim of Cal’s thigh, and that tingly feeling races through me again.

I’m a mess.

He glances at the contact but doesn’t move away. “You were good,” Cal says, watching as I manage to situate myself in the seat beside him.

The compliment warms my already feverish blood. “Oh, thanks. I feel like a different person when I’m performing.” My humiliation finally ebbs as I finger the wine glass and lean down to take a sip, eyes skipping over to him. “It’s like this rush of adrenaline. Something freeing.”

Long, dark lashes nearly touch his eyebrows as he stares down into his glass, the ice cubes tinkling. “That last song is hard to sing.”

He’s right—it is. It took me months of daily practice to perfect my acoustic version of it. “I love Stevie. I’m kind of an old soul,” I confess, realizing our shoulders are a hair’s breadth away from kissing. “So, um…what made you stop by? I didn’t think you knew where I played.”

“You mentioned it.”

That’s all he says, but I’m almost certain I never told him.

Cal shifts his attention to the little napkin I’m attempting to cover up with my forearm, his own tattooed arm inching to the right and brushing against me. “You sleeping with the bartender?”

My eyes round at the bold question and abrupt subject change.

I suppose it’s not any worse than my shameless fishing about his sexual conquests on Monday, so I shake my head a little and chug down a few swallows of wine. “No. He just leaves me a note after every set. It’s sweet.”

Peeking at tonight’s message, I silently read it:

“I pissed off three customers tonight because I was so distracted by the way your lips move when you sing.”

Oh.

There’s a tightness in my chest that crawls up my windpipe. Nash’s notes have always been cute and harmless, but this one is much more suggestive, leaving little room to wonder what his intentions are. Clearing the boulder from my throat, I flip the napkin over and chuckle lightly, “So sweet. Anyway…” I swivel toward Cal, observing the dubious arc of one espresso-brown eyebrow and the tic in his cheek. “What are you doing here? You don’t strike me as a social butterfly.”

“What makes you think that?”

Violet bar lights illuminate his deadpan expression, and I bite my lip to hold back the smile. “Nice try. You’ve dodged my question twice now.”

Blinking away from me, he takes a sip of his drink. “Have I?”

I huff.

“What’s with the stage name?” he pivots.

Sighing, I resign myself to the fact that he’s not going to share his deep, dark thoughts with me tonight—or likely, any thoughts at all. I’m determined to get them out of him one day. “Emma,” I admit softly, watching as he pauses with the glass halfway to his mouth.

Cal’s eyes flash with something tortured before he takes a sip, then sets the glass down with more force than I anticipated. Those two syllables always seem to bring out the worst in him, and I long for the days when they brought out the best.

“Her favorite pianist was Imogen Cooper,” I continue. “She wanted to be just like her one day. I thought it would be a nice tribute—”

“I got it, Lucy,” he practically snarls, stroking his five o-clock shadow and looking everywhere but at me. “You don’t have to keep fucking talking about it.”

His temper is tangible; I can taste it.

It’s caustic and bitter, so I take a giant swig of my wine, needing the chaser.

I know better than to say anything else, and instead, cower in my seat like a scolded child, untucking the hair from behind my ears as a means to curtain the reddening of my cheeks. I twirl my glass, staring at my nails painted in a nutty taupe, while I wait for the cloud of contempt to evaporate.

And then there’s a large palm pressing gently to the small of my back.

When I realize it’s Cal, actively touching me in a way that feels apologetic—intimate, almost—my brain short circuits, my heart skipping a beat or six. It’s an innocent gesture. Casual, friendly. He probably didn’t give it a second thought when he lifted a hand etched in ink, grazed his fingertips up along the bow of my hip, then splayed that hand over the narrow arch of my lower back.

But, it does something to me.

Heat blossoms everywhere—in my face, my chest, my ears, my throat. His touch is a shot of warmth to my womb. I’m so taken aback by the feeling that I go completely still, freezing in place, my fingers curling around the stem of the wine glass until my knuckles turn opaque.