Bring Down the Stars (Beautiful Hearts Duet #1)(16)

“Hey, Wes,” Connor called, keeping his eyes on mine as the words went sideways. “Look who’s here.”

I followed the tilt of his chin to the three dartboards mounted on the bar’s back wall. Weston turned around, the dart poised in his hand. His eyes widened slightly as he saw me.

So did mine.

Ruby leaned in. “The Amherst Asshole, in the flesh.”

I nodded. Ruby smiled.

“Not bad.”

His handsomeness was equally as potent as Connor’s, yet cut from a completely different cloth. Where Connor was broad and built, Weston was tall and lean-muscled. Connor wore a white shirt that hugged his shoulders, and his dark hair was shorter and spiked. Weston wore black and his gold hair fell over his eyes in the front. Still looking at me, he tossed it out of the way with a jerk of his head.

Connor strode up to us. “Hey, you made it.”

“We did,” I said. “This is my roommate, Ruby. Ruby Hammond, this is Connor Drake.”

It felt strange introducing them since Ruby was more acquainted with Connor’s reputation than I was. Connor greeted her with a friendly smile, then turned immediately back to me.

“Your next drink’s on me, I insist.” He looked back over his shoulder. “Wes, get over here and say hi. Let’s get a game going.”

Weston turned back to his dartboard and lanced the little arrow straight at the bullseye, then moved to join us.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hey.”

“This is my roommate, Ruby.”

His blue-green gaze flickered to her and back. “Hey.”

“A pleasure,” Ruby said with a smirk.

“Until we get some shots into him, my good buddy Wes doesn’t speak unless spoken to,” Connor said with a laugh.

He introduced us to a bunch of his friends, all of them baseball or basketball players. Ruby knew a few of them and was immediately absorbed into a circle of talk.

“Let’s rack ‘em up,” Connor said to Weston. “Decker, you in?”

A dark-haired guy leaning against the wall raised his beer bottle in salute.

Connor turned to me. “Do you play?”

“I’ve played a few times,” I said, with a smile I hoped was flirtatious. I sipped the last of my ale and traded him my pint glass for his pool cue. “Can I break?”

Connor raised his brows. “Be my guest.”

I bent over the table, slid the cue back and forth over my hand, then took my shot. The crack reverberated through the tavern as the cue ball smashed into the triangle of balls, scattering them across the green felt. Two striped balls sunk in the corner and side pockets.

Connor pointed at me and deadpanned, “She’s on my team.”

Decker whistled low in his teeth. “A ringer.”

“Got that right.” Connor turned to me, moved close. His voice was low and deep, and his cologne—clean, masculine, and expensive—wafted over me, making my nerve endings tingle. Somehow, he made the entire bar disappear until it was just he and I.

“You’ve played a few times, huh?”

“I’m from a small town in Nebraska,” I said. “My dad used to take my brother and me into town every weekend to shoot pool.”

“So you’re a shark,” Connor said. “I like it. Unexpected. Makes me want to find out more about you.”

It was probably a cheesy line to someone less inebriated, but I was tipsy from chugging two pints. Having Connor Drake’s full attention was another kind of buzz. He was beautiful up close, with large green eyes under heavy, dark brows, and a broad mouth that looked like it might be as good at kissing as it was at smiling.

“There’s a lot to know about me,” I said, screwing chalk onto the end of my cue.

“Is that so?” Connor’s smile softened. He raised his hand, and for a second I thought he was going to touch my face, but he hesitated. “You have an eyelash stuck to your cheek.”

I brushed my face where he was indicating, my skin warm under my fingers. That he’d wanted to touch me but didn’t, was more of a turn-on than if he had touched me.

“Thanks,” I said.

“No problem,” he said, and then his mega-watt smile was back, and I was basking in it. “Autumn Caldwell from Nebraska,” he said, “let’s shoot some pool.”





Weston



I watched Autumn bend her petite frame over the pool table and break like a pro. Connor moved close to her and they shared a few quiet words. It looked as if he was going to touch her cheek but didn’t. A classic Connor Drake move. Matt Decker, the only other guy in all of Amherst I considered a friend, noticed too.

He leaned in to me, using his pool cue as a mic, and spoke in a low voice, like a golf commentator.

“Connor’s got all the right moves tonight, don’t you think, Wes?”

“Indeed he does, Matt,” I whispered back. “He’s on fire. The signature Drake-Fake-Eyelash-Take. Perfectly executed. Let’s go to the instant replay.”

“Flawless, Wes. What technique. And the red-headed judge awards a perfect ten.”

Decker chuckled, while I averted my eyes and took a long pull off my beer.

I talked to her first.

Pathetic. She wasn’t a territory. I hadn’t planted my flag in her.