Brutally Beautiful(64)

Leaving my brother to mull over my past on the floor of his office, I made my way into the bar to look for my obsession. Lainey was standing behind the bar pouring a beer. Bree said something to her and she laughed, smiled, eyes dancing. My God, she was pretty already, but when she smiled like that, she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.





Chapter 9





Fran graciously sat me down and broke the delicate news to me that our relationship was not proceeding at the speed he liked, and that we would be better suited as friends. Valiantly (you can’t see me, but I’m laughing here) he expressed his extreme guilt for going home with Natalie the night I left to have coffee with Kade. He believed she was the speed–relationship wise-he needed. Eh. Gotta give him props for honesty, right? I was still wondering where in the world he got off thinking we were in a relationship when I blatantly told him I was NOT in one of those WITH HIM. Two make-out sessions does not a relationship make, this wasn’t high school.

Natalie was completely nervous and stressed about how I might take the news. I hugged her and whispered a relieved thank you in her ear. I didn’t think she understood, but she would when she orders a beer in front of him, or wants a coffee, or tries to spit gum out of the window of his moving smart car, or God forbid, forgets to recycle a can of soda. Mentally, I was high-fiving her with my vagina.

It had been five days since I went for coffee with Kade. Five days since I’d seen him, and five days since he followed me. Five days since I opened my big mouth to get him to talk to me. Five days of uncontrollable itchiness to jump in my car and hightail it out of here to find another hiding spot.

That night, there was a huge last minute bachelor party at the bar, which I wished I had known about in advance. Say, like when I was dressing for work, so I could have opted out of wearing the short denim skirt I had on. I wasn’t comfortable with all the men that night, I was just afraid of unwanted touches and looks that I wasn’t emotionally stable to deal with. Worse than the strangers was Fran, who was sitting in the corner, pounding back an insane amount of red wine, two whole bottles to be exact, and bothering the hell out of me about how ‘soft the legs of my skin look.’ No, I didn’t just say that backwards, it was an exact quote.

When Kade walked in from the back hallway, I was stunned. His eyes blinded me. His stare made my knees go weak. He looked angry, enraged, and murderous. There was a new bandage around his wrist, making me wonder what he did to himself. I knew I would never be able to save him, but it was ingrained in me to save, and I wanted to be able to so badly.

From the corner of the room, his eyes claimed me, all of me-my eyes, my neck, my legs…making me feel like he was touching my skin… The heat that spread over every inch of where his eyes looked had me dizzy, like an acute case of vertigo, and I wanted to spin in it, spiral out of control and drown in it. Sitting on a bar stool, I let my skirt ride a bit further up my legs to watch his eyes widen and his breath quicken. I was swept up in a frenzy. I wanted to make him look at me; I needed him to.

“I really need to talk to you,” Fran slurred behind me, practically pinning me to the edge of the bar.

“Maybe later, Fran. I need to use the restroom,” I lied, squeezing my way around him and rushing into the back hallway. Glancing back over my shoulder, I smiled at Kade, hoping he’d find his way to talk to me.

Locking myself in the stall, I heard the bathroom door open and footsteps squeak in. I opened the stall door thinking that Kade would be there, his face, smirking at me, but it wasn’t. The muscles in my shoulders tightened when I stepped out to see Francis. Drunk on either the wine he was guzzling, or some sort of nontoxic environmentally safe fumes of maybe, I don’t know, bacon grease or something. My thoughts were quick and precise. He had me cornered by the sheer luck of me thinking about another man, and I was going to need to fight him. “I think you’re in the wrong bathroom,” I said. He just laughed condescendingly, as if I should know better.