Page 27 of Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

Chapter 11

Liza

Why don’t you do those fancy bartender moves I see in movies?” I asked Rabbit as he poured another shot.

“Look around, woman! Who the fuck would I be impressing with those moves? My brothers or their Old Ladies?” He shook his head dramatically back and forth. “The BRATs want to sleep with me anyway, so I don’t have to bother trying to impress them do I?

“I suppose you have a point,” I laughed as I agreed with him. “Want me to show you some tricks I learned when I worked in the casino bar?”

“Oh, hell yeah!” One of the guys sitting at the bar shouted. I wasn’t familiar with him since he wasn’t around often.

“Shut it, Mech!” Rabbit hissed at him, then he turned his bright smile on me. “Okay, Ms. Bartender Badass, show me your skills!”

“Be prepared,” I stated, building up the tension. I took a fifth of rum, a glass, a lime wedge, and pulled the spray nozzle that the soda came out of so that it was closer to me. I popped the lime wedge in my mouth peel side first so the wedge was facing outward. Then, I flipped the cup, started a slow pour of the rum, and took the soda spray nozzle and started spraying while I had it aimed at Rabbit. It took a full minute, me spitting out the lime wedge as I laughed, and the other guys joined in for Rabbit to get over his shock.

“You little bitch!” He yelled as I continued to double over in laughter. That was until he pulled the seltzer water sprayer and began hosing me down. We were both laughing so hard that it took us a minute to realize we were being pelted with maraschino cherries. “What the hell?” Rabbit yelped as one nearly got him in the eye. “Damn women!” He hollered as he stood up and I glanced over to see Charlie laughing at our antics.

“I hope you both know that you’re cleaning this mess up before I go back to work behind the bar.” Both she and her man, Rage, were standing there with Iceman and Rabbit’s brother, Spinner, laughing their asses off.

“Guess she taught you a trick after all, huh, brother?”

“Fucking hell. I knew not to trust a woman!” Rabbit joked as he popped me with a coiled up hand towel that he snapped at my ass.

I started mopping up all the soda spray as I continued laughing. “Totally worth it!” I giggled out.

Rabbit looked at Iceman then, “I hope you know we’re keeping her around. I don’t care what goes down for her brother back home. I vote Liza gets to stay.”

“Oh, me too!” Charlie seconded the motion while hopping up and down in her seat as she hit Rage in the side to make sure he knew she meant business.

“Well, you get my vote by default, because I like sex!” Rage announced, clearly not ready to go against his woman’s vote.

“I don’t know why you assholes are voting like it counts. If she wants to stick around, she can stick around. I have no problem with that. Now, get this mess cleaned up, and give me a beer while you’re at it.” Iceman’s smirk gave him away though. He liked me too!

For the first time in a long time I felt like I belonged somewhere. More importantly, I felt safe here with these people. That feeling meant everything! My happy-joy-filled feelings were somewhat short lived when little miss “I’m pregnant with every man’s baby” came strolling up to the bar.

She ignored the rest of the people gathered around, and just gave a cursory glance to the wet state of things – me being one of those things – before launching in with her request. “Can you and I talk?” I turned to glance at Rabbit who just shrugged at me, as if to say that was entirely up to me.

“Sure, why not.”

“Of course you’ll talk so you can get out of cleanup,” Rabbit joked. He also tapped his cell phone to let me know he was just a text away if I needed him. “Use the bar break room in back there,” he said as he tipped his head to the door behind where we had been working.

“Good call,” Iceman told him for some reason. I just tipped the hinged section of bar back so that Amy could get back there, and then we both walked to the little room beyond the storage area.

“What did you want?” I asked bluntly.

I hadn’t expected an actual apology, and the venomous glare I was getting let me know I wouldn’t be receiving one. “I’m not sure how you’ve hoodwinked Tango, but I’m going to need for you to find your own room in this place. There are plenty down the hall with the Sweet butts now that you’ve had four of them fired and none have been replaced yet.”

“Where I sleep, or why I sleep there, is of no concern of yours,” I told her as I crossed my arms over my chest. It wasn’t a defensive gesture. I was trying really hard to not want to hit a pregnant woman. Keeping my hands locked up tight to my chest was part one in keeping my hands to myself.

“It is when you’re clearly having an affect on one of my men,” she started to say.

“You can stop right there. As if he didn’t make his stance clear enough earlier, Tango isn’t your man. He doesn’t want to be your man. He never wanted anything more from you than friendship, and sweetheart, I hate to tell you but your crazy bullshit has the friend-ship sailing away at this point. I’m not sure it will ever return.”

She stepped closer, menacingly so. I kept my hands locked tight, but ready to spring into action if necessary. I didn’t want to hit a pregnant woman, but I’d be damned if I didn’t defend myself if one happened to attack me. “You WILL stay away from him. We were all just fine before you showed up, and we’ll be just fine once you and your problematic ass is gone. I still don’t know why you’re here, but I refuse to lose what’s mine, because you don’t know your place.”

Someone must have clued the guys in to the fact that Amy sought me out, because a booming voice carried over what she was saying in that instant. “Amy, you will back away from Liza now. You’re about to lose a whole lot more than just Tango’s friendship if you keep this shit up.” It was Fox talking.

“W-w-what?” Amy sputtered out as she turned around to see Whiskey, Tango, and Fox all glaring at her.

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