Page 6 of Good Pucking Luck

Well, mostly empty. A nerdy guy with short, neat, brown hair is standing behind the bar. He looks around my age, shorter than my six feet three, and not as broad or muscular. I wouldn’t put him in the twink category—he’s maybe five eleven, with your typical, everyday build, and wearing jeans and a striped shirt with a suit jacket over it.

He looks up at me with a scowl that is surprisingly cute, and though it’s clear he’s not excited about having a customer, I head over.

“I promise, I won’t be much trouble,” I tell him.

“We close at midnight.”

“That’s fine. I just want a water.”

He fills a small glass with ice water, then hands it over and begins wiping down the counter with a cloth.

Okay…so obviously he doesn’t want to chat, but he’s interesting for some reason, and I’m a chatty motherfucker, so I ask, “Been a bartender here long?”

“I’m not a bartender.”

I cock a brow at him over the rim of the glass and take a drink, looking for any sign that he recognizes me. “Really? Did you rob the place? Knocked out the bartender and I caught you mid-act? But, then, I guess I don’t get why you didn’t pretend to be the one working. I never would have known. Now that I’ve figured out your story, I must save the day, so…should I call the police or just capture you myself?”

The flirting could be a mistake. I don’t know this guy’s sexuality, but something tells me I’m not barking up the wrong tree. When you grow up in a world that tells you straight is the default, you look for yourself in others, recognize similarities to find people like you.

He wrinkles up his nose in a way that’s entirely too fucking cute. “I didn’t…I’m not…you know what? Never mind. It’s been a shitty day, and now I’m closing down the bar when all I want to do is…well, I don’t know what I want to do.”

“Hit me with it.”

“Hit you with what?”

“Your bad day. Though I must point out the role reversal. Usually it’s the bartender talking through the patrons’ problems with them, but I guess since you’re not a bartender, that doesn’t matter.”

“You’re really weird, do you know that?” He crosses his arms.

“Eh. I’ve been called worse.”

“I’m not telling you about my day.”

I shrug. “You don’t have to. I couldn’t sleep, and the gym is closed. You’re alone up here, except for the hog-tied bartender and me. I thought you might want to take advantage and talk to a stranger who will never see you again.”

Something seems to flash in his brown eyes, like what I just said was the right thing and he’s focused on it, but then he shakes his head, silently talking himself out of it.

“There’s no hog-tied bartender, which you know, so I don’t know why I’m arguing with you about it.”

“That’s on you, not me,” I tease.

He scowls.

My cock twitches slightly behind my joggers. Clearly this guy is interesting to me.

“You could always leave,” he throws at me.

“Where’s the fun in that? I have a bartender to rescue and a kidnapper to annoy.” I take another drink of my water, enjoying myself. It feels freeing, just sitting here casually flirting with him like this. “It wasn’t my first hope for the night, which was getting laid, or my second, which was to work out, but I’m finding myself much more entertained than I would have thought.”

His face flushes pink, and something shifts in his gaze. It’s almost…calculating? I’m not sure if that’s the right word. It has a negative connotation, and I don’t think my bartender is like that, but he’s working through something.

“That was my plan for the night too—the first one. Not the second one because gyms are my version of hell, but I was going to get laid. Just with some random man. I’ll have you know, you’re looking at a self-proclaimed slut.”

A laugh jumps out of my mouth, loud and surprising even to me. That’s not on my top-one-thousand list of things I thought he’d say, but I don’t really know the guy. I don’t have much room to be thinking anything about him. “Welcome to the slut club. Are you a new member?”

“Tonight was going to be my first night, and I was looking forward to it. It’s got to be better than other clubs I’ve been a member of.”

His comment strikes me as odd, but then, this whole conversation is weird. We’re talking about being slutty and kidnapped bartenders and whatever else our brains can think of. So I keep it going, play off our club theme. “Chess is cool, but it’s not sex.”

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