Page 18 of Drunk Girl

“Shit!” she says against my lips.

“Don’t worry about it, I’ve got plenty extra,” I say before I forget about the tiles and recapture her lips. She’s sitting on a stool and I’m on my knees on the floor, so our positioning isn’t the greatest for kissing, but I make do until she pulls back a minute or so later.

“We should probably finish,” she says, motioning to the wall.

“Yeah.” I sit back on my haunches and blow out a big breath. “You’re a little distracting,” I say before I grab a new tile from the box to replace the broken one.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she says, a shit-eating grin on her lips.

“Sure, you don’t.” I lean down to kiss her once more before I get back to work on the wall.

An hour later, I stand and stretch my tired back as I look at all we’ve accomplished today. The shower is completely tiled and will be ready for grout in the next day or so. “Thank you for all your help,” I tell Ashley as we look over our accomplishment together.

“It was my pleasure. I had a lot of fun,” she says, leaning into my side. I wrap my arm around her shoulder and pull her closer. “When will you grout it?”

“Maybe tomorrow or the next day. Just depends on how much time I’ve got and how much I can be away from the bar. Mondays and Tuesdays are usually pretty slow, so it shouldn’t be a big deal if I’m not around as much, as long as Kaiden or Katie are.”

“Can I come help again?” she asks tentatively.

“Sure, if you’re not busy.”

“I don’t have any plans. Unless I get called back for an interview by some miracle.”

“I’m sure you’ll get a call back. Anyone would be lucky to have you work for them.”

“Charmer,” she says, nudging my ribs with her elbow.

“Not trying to charm you. If you had even a tenth of the focus on your job as you had helping me, any employer would be a fool not to hire you. Like I said, if you have any interest in being a bartender, you could come work at the bar.”

“Wouldn’t that be kinda weird to work together?” she asks, scrunching up her nose as she looks up at me.

“Why’s that?”

“Never mind,” she says, as her cheeks flush pink.

I tighten my arm around her. “Tell me.”

“It’s nothing,” she insists.

“It’s something, or else you wouldn’t have asked.”

“Fine,” she says, blowing out a breath. “Wouldn’t it be kinda weird for us to work together if we’re doing this?” She motions between the two of us and it dawns on me what she’s getting at.

“Dating?” I question, knowing that’s exactly what I’d like to happen between the two of us.

“Yeah,” she agrees with me. It isn’t lost on me she hasn’t been able to say the word.

“If we make it weird. Katie and Kaiden work together and are now married. Granted, they were together before we opened the bar, but it was never a problem for the two of them. Now, what would suck is, the point of hiring another bartender is so that we can have more time off, and that would have you working when I’m off. So, on second thought, no, you don’t want to come work for us,” I say on a laugh. “It would be a horrible idea.”

“I’ll probably end up with a job at a restaurant serving that has me working similar hours as you,” she says. “Just not usually as late as the bar scene.”

“We can take it slow, see where things go,” I suggest.

“Sounds good,” she agrees. “Slow sounds perfect. I don’t have the best track record when it comes to relationships, so I’m sorry in advance if I screw this up.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. We’ve all made mistakes in the past. But I’m going to guess it was more theguysin your past that made the mistakes than you. Take your ex, for example. He’s the one that was cheating on you. That isn’t your fault. That’s all on him. Any asshole that would make you feel like his cheating was your fault is just trying to make you feel guilt, and try and push his decisions onto someone else.He’sthe only one responsible for those decisions, not you.”

“Where did you come from?” she asks, looking up at me with a look of astonishment. “I’ve never met a man like you.”

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