Page 25 of Mysterious

Nothing to disagree with there, so I point toward the door of the bar and smile. “Want to try this one?”

“Yeah.”

“You know, I just realized with you in this blond wig, our first time really can’t be considered our first since you’re a different person,” I joke.

Mia tugs at the bottom of her new blond hair and winks at me. “I do like how you think, Liam. Let’s go in, have a drink, and then go back so you can have sex with the brunette me.”

The man at the door doesn’t give us a second glance, just as she predicted, and as she passes him, she turns to give me a knowing look. I guess my follow-the-rules personality assumes everyone is like me.

Mia isn’t, though. I’ve known that from the first day I met her. She is definitely not a woman who’s about to let herself be restrained by rules.

When we reach the bar, I give her the only seat left and stand next to her, my nature needing to protect her as much as my desire to be near her wanting to touch her. Much larger than most people around us, I wave over the bartender, a guy with his dark hair in a man bun wearing an earring in his nose.

Leaning down, I say in her ear, “What do you want to drink?”

Without answering me, she leans over the bar and says to the bartender, “We’ll have a pitcher of kamikazes.”

The guy looks up at me and smiles like he’s in on some joke between Mia and me before turning on his heel and walking away to make our drinks. Something tells me after a pitcher of kamikazes, this won’t be the Mia I sleep with either.

“Didn’t I tell you no one would care that I’m not old enough?” she asks. “You worry too much, Liam. I’m thinking after a couple drinks you’ll chill out. Am I right?”

I smile, happy to correct her about who I am after a couple drinks. “Look at me. Does it look like two drinks would do anything to me? I’m thinking it would take two pitchers of kamikazes to make a dent, but tonight’s not about me getting plastered. I can’t do my job if I’m compromised.”

The glee she’s felt since we left the hotel instantly drains from her face. “So you’re here as my bodyguard?” she asks in a disappointed voice.

Quickly, I answer, happy to explain what I meant. “Not at all. That doesn’t change the fact that if anyone gets too close to you or tries to lay a hand on you, they’re going to find out what a world of hurt feels like when a guy my size hits them and doesn’t hold back.”

That makes her smile again. “Okay. So they’ll get to find out what it feels like to get beaten up by my boyfriend.”

“Exactly.”

The bartender returns with our pitcher of drinks, and before I can reach into my pocket to get my wallet out, Mia hands him a hundred. “I’m going to need another pitcher when we get low, but the rest is yours.”

That handsome tip makes him grin from ear to ear, and he happily agrees to check on us to make sure we don’t run low on kamikazes. As I pat my unused wallet in my front pocket, Mia pours us both a drink and holds hers up in the air.

“To boyfriends and bodyguards!”

I smile and hold my drink up to join her, saying, “I think what you did right there makes me a bodyguard while we’re here.”

Her face twists into a confused expression, and she shakes her head. “What do you mean? Because I paid for our drinks?”

I shrug and take a sip of kamikaze. “Call me old-fashioned.”

Mia laughs and tips her glass to her mouth to take a big gulp of her drink. “I will. Liam, you are old-fashioned. Can’t a woman pay for a man’s drinks?”

“Sure. I guess. I just prefer to pay when I go on dates.”

Leaning in toward me, she pulls my head down so she can say in my ear, “Then don’t think of this as a date. Think of this as an interlude between great sessions of sex.”

When she sits back in her chair and takes another sip of kamikaze, I can’t help but think she’s the most incredibly sexy and infuriating woman I’ve ever met. One minute, she’s driving me crazy in bed, and the next minute, she’s buying my drink at a bar and poking fun at my being old-fashioned.

I’m not sure if I want to kiss her or drag her out of this bar to explain to her how I like being that old-fashioned gentleman my parents wanted me to be. Either way, I’d still be crazy about her.

Turning to face me, she smiles and says, “You know, about that whole rehab thing. You don’t have to worry. I was never in rehab.”

Now I’m confused. “That’s what I was told was the reason why my job working with you started late.”

“That’s because that’s what my mother told everyone. She paid the people at Sunnybrook Rehab to say I was there detoxing, but I’ve never used drugs in my life. I don’t have a drinking problem either.”

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