Page 75 of Secret Submission

That was something his mom had tried to help drill into him when he was younger, and mostly, he managed to remember it.

You need to ask before you try to help someone.

Connor not only hadn’t asked, but he’d ignored what Julie had said she wanted—he’d been so determined to impress her family. Then he’d gotten mad at her for not being grateful, which was why he’d been so pushy at the end. But she’d already been pushed too far, and he’d been so far up his own ass about what he’d done ‘for her’, he hadn’t been able to see it, and he hadn’t backed off.

In hindsight, he could see a hundred places where he wished he’d made a different choice yesterday. All he could do today was hope she’d be willing to give him another chance to get it done right.

“I can’t believe you’re choosing her over me!”

The words weren’t shouted, but they were loud enough to be heard over the rest of the conversation happening in the bar.

“Noelle, we’re not.” That was Sam. Connor recognized her voice even though he couldn’t see her face from where she was sitting in the booth. She and Morgan were on one side with Noelle and Amy across from them, and Morgan and Noelle were sitting on the outside of the booth.

“You are!” Noelle’s voice was bordering on hysterical. He could see her face perfectly clearly and Amy’s, who was now flushed pink as she put her hand on Noelle’s shoulder, trying to soothe her. “All of you are! You don’t care about me, you don’t care about my feelings, or you wouldn’t be taking her side! Did she put you up to this? Did she tell you that you have to choose?”

“The only person who has made me feel like I have to choose is you, Noelle,” Sam said sharply. Even though she wasn’t as upset as Noelle, her voice carried, especially as conversation around the bar dropped, eyes and ears being drawn in by the drama. “And any friend who tries to make me choose between them and another friend is going to be sorely disappointed. Iris, on the other hand, has never asked me to choose. She never has anything to say about you, period. The only one badmouthing anyone is you.”

“Oh, yes, because Iris is just perfect. I see how it is. Well, I’m not going to stay here where I’m not wanted.” Noelle ran toward the door, covering her face with her hands.

Giving Sam and Morgan a resigned look, Amy scooted out of the booth and followed her.

“And there goes another people pleaser,” Asad murmured, watching Amy go. He sighed, shaking his head.

Realizing he’d had his own urge to chase after Noelle and make sure she was okay—or at the very least that she got home alright, even though he didn’t particularly even like her, and she’d definitely brought that upon herself—made Connor realize that his people-pleasing was maybe a little more out of control than he’d initially thought. He wasn’t even sure that she was actually upset or if she was faking it, but he’d still felt the urge to go check on her… and relief that Amy was handling it.

Would he have followed her and risked Julie coming down to find him gone?

The hesitation he felt about answering was a little disconcerting. Noelle was definitely not as important to him as Julie, so it should have been an immediate and easy answer, yet he hesitated. Yeah, he needed to work on getting his priorities in order.

That was pretty bad and not a particularly comfortable realization to have about himself.

“What on earth is going on?” The familiar voice made him sit straight up, spinning around in his seat, but Julie wasn’t looking at him—she was watching Amy chase Noelle out the door. Connor drank in the sight of her.

She looked as tired as he felt, with darkish circles under her eyes. Still dressed for work, she was wearing a pair of beige slacks with a white button-down shirt that had a lacy collar and black jewel buttons. Her hair was pulled back into a bun, but several long strands had come loose and were hanging down over her shoulders, giving her a slightly disheveled look.

She was fucking beautiful.

“Noelle,” he said, and apparently didn’t need to explain further because Julie snorted and nodded, finally turning her gaze to him. There was worry in that gaze, along with a softness that hadn’t been there yesterday, and a bit of the same happiness he felt just looking at her. Her lips curved slightly into a rueful smile.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey.”

“Wanna go grab a booth?”

“That sounds good.” He glanced at his friends, who were conversing quietly, before looking at him and Julie.

“Ya’ll can have this table if you want,” Q said, picking up his beer. “Asad and I are going to go join Morgan and Sam.” He gave them a little wave, turning away. Asad was already moving toward the women’s table.

Connor looked at Julie. She shrugged, then pointed to a booth tucked in the corner which was currently empty. There was only one booth connected to it and that was also currently empty.

“Want to go over there?” she asked.

Relief filled him. Not that there was anything wrong with the current table, per se, but it was a lot less private than one of the booths.

Catching the eye of Marquis’ bartender, who was also serving the tables since it was a slow Monday night, he indicated that they were moving. Shane gave him a nod of acknowledgment before turning to one of the patrons who was sitting at the bar to take his order.

Following Mistress Julie over to the corner booth, Connor smiled when Asad and Q saw him going, and both gave him an encouraging thumbs-up. Knowing his friends didn’t think he’d fucked up beyond redemption helped a lot.

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