When I'm with You (Hope Town #3)(28)

The shirtless man just nods as he turns around to grab one of the bottles of liquor behind him and a shot glass. He slides it forward, but when I push the money toward him, he shakes his head and walks away.

With a shrug, I lift the cool glass to my lips and take it down with one swallow. My eyes sting as the liquid burns down my throat and into my belly. I blink a few times to clear my vision as I slam the glass down and wave the same man over.

This time, he takes my money, and I wave him off when he goes to get change. I shoot the drink back before pointing at the glass again, silently demanding another.

He leans against the bar and just tips the bottle over the glass again.

Three more shots and no more cash, I’m finally able to handle the burn without wanting to gag.

Of course, that would be when I open my eyes expecting to see my new best friend the bartender’s brown eyes, but instead, I see the emerald fury of Nate Reid.

Maybe it’s the shots or maybe it’s just the hold he’s always had on me, but I don’t move. Not even when I see him moving his arms as my old friend, brown-eyed bartender, hands him a cup and a few bottles. He does something with them, but I couldn’t tell you what because my eyes never leave his face.

When a body collides with mine from behind, pushing me against the bar painfully, the trance he had me stuck in is broken, and I look away to watch some drunken man stumble after a group of girls. Before I look back at Nate, I peek over at the table our group of girls is occupying. Gazes locked on us, they all wear expressions with slack jaws.

Well, everyone except Nikki. She looks like she just discovered Santa was real and won the lotto in the same sweep.

I feel something cold hit the hand I have resting on the bar, and I turn back around, glancing down to where Nate is pushing a drink into my hand. I look at the colorful drink instead of the man pushing it toward me. He’s swirling the drink around with a stick, mixing the colors inside the glass for a second before he pulls his hand up. I watch as the stick becomes a lollipop, then follow its path up until Nate’s smirking lips open to suck the candy in his mouth once before popping it out and dropping it back down into my glass.

My gaze doesn’t look at the drink this time, nope … no sir, this time, I study his mouth as his tongue dips out and wets those thick lips that had me coming undone just minutes ago. I feel my breath pull in a choppy inhale and look up to meet his eyes. I’m not sure what to make of the expression on his face, and if I’m honest, fear and self-preservation are what keeps me from trying to figure it out.

At that moment, all rational thoughts die a shocked death.

Nate reaches forward, tags the lollipop from my drink again, and before I realize what’s happening, he begins to paint my lips with the wet, sticky candy of the lollipop, and the music changes from some Justin Timberlake song to something I haven’t ever heard before. His features morph into a sadistic grin and an equally wicked gleam shines in his eyes before pulling the candy away and dropping it back into the glass.

Call it intuition, but the second I see both his palms press against the bar’s surface, I reach out and tag the glass in my hand, pulling it toward my chest just as he literally jumps from where he had been standing on the ground to a crouched position with his feet on the bar.

I hear the whole club go electric and notice just out of the corner of my eye that my brown-eyed friend is also standing on the bar as the song’s lyrics hit my brain. Something about lollipops.

Holy shit.

Nate stands, his body moving with the music, and I back up to see him a little better. A small step, but that’s all that is needed. He reaches up, his eyes never leaving mine, and grabs some handle thing that is hanging above him.

You know that scene in Magic Mike when Mike is spinning and all that on the stage … well, that’s the only way I can describe what Nate does next. One large fist around the handle holds his huge body up while spinning him in quick circles. I gasp when he lets go and slams his feet back down on the bar. He doesn’t even look the slightest bit dizzy when he drops down to his hands and knees against the wooden surface.

He flips his loose hair from his face and turns his head to look directly into my eyes, pulling his thick bottom lip into his mouth as he starts to f*ck the wood under his body. I have to squeeze my legs together with the vision before me because I know, I just know, if I were under him with my legs spread, his dick would be drilling into my body, deep and hard.

When he pushes up and spins on his knees to face me, his crotch eye level with my face, he slowly starts to move his shirt up. As he reveals each deliciously hard ab, I can hear the screams around us getting louder.

I hear the music increase in tempo as he leans forward, dropping his shirt and covering his beautiful body. I stand there in shock as he pulls the lollipop back up from my drink and presses the cold, wet candy against my lips. They part without conscious thought to take the lollipop inside my mouth.

The song ends and he gives me a wink as he pulls the candy from my mouth and into his own before he jumps from the bar to the space in front of me. I feel lightheaded when he leans down and runs his nose against the shell of my ear, making me gasp.

“You.Are.Mine,” he growls before taking my earlobe between his lips and biting my flesh roughly between his teeth. A moan rumbles from deep in his chest and his breath echoes in my ear.

And what do I do?

I stand there and come, again, from just the simplest of touches.