Page 12 of Whiskey Lullaby
“It’s okay, your dad’s a preacher. I get it.” She nodded toward the door that led into the room the bands playedin.
I just shook my head. I didn’t save myself because of a moral conflict. I almost had sex with Max Summers when I was sixteen and he told me he loved me. I mean, that’s what you do, right? Give your virginity to someone you love, someone who means something to you? Well, he may have meant something to me, but I absolutely meant nothing to him. He screwed every girl he could get his hands on while we were dating, and he tried to use my hesitation to sleep with him as his excuse. But I was never that dumb, not even at sixteen. That’s when I decided boys just weren’t worth it. I stuck to my studies, to the piano and softball, and then, at some point, it became the principle of it. That, and I was afraid of the letdown, the heartache that I was certain would follow when things inevitablyended.
“Let’s see if his face is as pretty as that voice,” Meg said, and grabbed my hand, dragging me into theroom.
The stage was nothing more than a small platform built out of old soda crates, so unless you were at the front of the room, you couldn’t see anything but the top of the person’s head. We shouldered our way through the crowd. The heat from the tightly packed bodies made me claustrophobic. A man in front of me swayed and staggered and I placed my palms against his back to keep him from falling on top of me. His friend lifted his beer in the air. “Woo-hoo,” he slurred. “Sing Sweet HomeAlabama!”
I rolled my eyes. Everyone knew they reserved that song for last call. When we stepped around them, Meg took one look at the stage, and her eyes fluttered shut on a groan. “Oh,hellno!”
My eyes landed on the stage—rather on the guy in his tight, black top and combat boots on stage. I found myself biting my lip a little. There was an edge to the guy. Maybe it was the ripped jeans, the sleeve of colorful tattoos that covered his arm. Maybe it was the confidence that seemed to radiate from him like some nuclear detonator. Whatever it was, it left him just rough enough to maintain that pretty face, and pretty enough that you’d believe all hislies.
He laughed into the mic, his dimples popping as he dragged a hand through his thick, dark hair. “Aw, now y’all aren’t drunk enough for thatshit.”
“Wow,” Imumbled.
“Again,” Meg sighed. “Hellno.”
“Why?” I asked, still staring at him. Even from there, I couldn’t help but notice how blue his eyeswere.
“That’s Noah Greyson, and he is bad news. Absolutely bad news.” She elbowed me. “I see the way you’re looking at him, and let me tell you, he isnota boy you even want to introduce yourself to, Hannah. Trustme.”
Rockford was a small town where you knew everyone and their momma and their uncle’s third cousin—I didn’t know who he was, so what I wanted to know was how Meg knew who hewas.
I turned to face her with an accusing glare. “How doyouknowhim?”
“I met him a month or so ago, right before you moved back. One of those times I got all weak and called Trevorand—”
I looked away from the stage and arched a brow. “You slept with Trevor?Again?” I couldn’t understand her. She cried for two months straight when he dumped her, so why she continued to throw herself on the altar was beyondme.
Huffing, Meg rolled her eyes. “Don’t judge me, and this isn’t aboutTrevor—”
“He’s adelinquent.”
“I know he is, but he’s…” A smile danced over her lips and her cheeks blushed. She was in love with him, even though she refused to admit it. And I must say, sometimes the only way you can live with things is by denying the truth. “Anyway,” she says. “They’re friends and I can promise you, Noah Greyson is just a dirty little player. Nice to look at, stupid to get involvedwith.”
“LikeTrevor...”
“Yes”—she rolled her eyes again on a huff—“likeTrevor.”
I glanced back at the stage, watching the ring on his thumb glint in the light. “He could be the nicest guy in theworld.”
“I promise you he’s not, but suit yourself. Just remember he’s a whore, a player. Another Max Summers...” Meg sang beside myear.
That should have been enough to make me stop watching, to make the anxious knot in my stomach turn to one of disgust. But it wasn’t. I don’t know if anything would havebeen.
Smiling, Noah stared out at the girls hoarding the stage, and then his eyes honed in on me. He smirked. My heart did that stupid flip-flop thing you always read about in romance novels, and as foolish as I felt for it, I couldn’t make it stop. It kept going.Pound. Pound... pound. Pound. Pound…pound.
“Yep,” Meg said. “Pretty voice. Pretty face. Pretty, prettylies.”
“Noted,” I whispered. “Stay away from the guy with the prettyvoice.”
I was like a deer in headlights. Frozen. Unable to look away from the guy I was told I should stay away from. There was heartbreak written all over his smile, but, at that moment, I swear it felt like no one else existed in that crowded bar aside from he andI.
Stay away from the guy with the prettyvoice…
7
Noah
