Page 20 of My Favorite Mistake

With that, he knocked on the door before closing it, and she turned her face forward and tilted her head back against the headrest. “I need to get to Constance Street and Eighth.”

“You got it, miss.”

The driver pulled away from the curb and the ache in her chest returned, but she focused on what she’d said to Brennan. It was nice that he wanted to make her feel welcome, but right then she didn’t really want to be welcomed. She just wanted to go home. And home was not New Orleans. So Liza had to focus on her job. That was now clearer than ever, because it was the one thing holding her hostage in this place, and all she wanted right then was to get it over with so she could go home.

* * *

Connor watchedLiza stomp away from the table and stop at the front corner, engaging in conversation with Jimmy and Scott. She’d plastered what Connor knew was a forced, but pleasant smile on her face as she spoke to them, and then to Carson and Luke. She had the posture of a grunt freshly broken by basic training and spoke with her chin confidently lifted and held the attention of all the men with ease. Not that he imagined any man could tear his attention from a woman like that. Even Scott, who was older than them by at least ten years and madly in love with his wife, was still just a guy, and when a beautiful woman with a commanding presence requested the attention of a heterosexual male, he gave it without thinking twice.

And Liza was certainly beautiful. Uncommonly so. Since she’d shown up and he was forced to sit with her all afternoon while she shook up the label’s standard operating procedure, he almost couldn’t look at her. She had always been beautiful, but this confident, polished, thirty-one-year-old version of her was on another level, and a far cry from the innocent, fresh-faced ingénue she’d been. She had become battle-hardened in her own way, and he was sure that had a hell of a lot to do with what he’d done. They’d fallen so hard, so fast, and she was so young that she’d believed in him as much as he’d believed in himself when he’d promised her forever.

That night in his car. The day before he was set to leave Fort Hood, Texas after his service had ended and come back home to New Orleans. That moment when it collectively hit them both that everything was about to change, and if they wanted to keep what they’d built over the course of six months, they’d have to sacrifice and work. Sacrifice and work had never been a problem for Connor. That new mission shouldn’t have been any different. He had full confidence in himself to go home and lay the foundation for a long life of happiness together, so she could later join him for their happy ever after. He’d survived four years of bullets and RPGs and roadside bombs, so he could survive finding a stable job. He’d believed it, and she’d believed in him. But it took only a single weekend to prove that civilian life was more than he could handle, and then he’d lost himself, and then he had to lose her.

He’d dropped her like a bad habit, but he’d done it to protect her from what he saw as the most imminent threat she could possibly encounter—himself.

Connor knew how badly he’d hurt her because he’d hurt himself the exact same way in the process. But he told himself things would be better that way. At least hurting her like that immediately and while she was still young and full of potential would allow her to pull herself up by her bootstraps and create a good life for herself. At least he hadn’t dragged her into his own personal hell and wasted the best years of her life only for her to come to the conclusion on her own that he was a lost fucking cause.

And now, watching her confidently smile and speak with his closest friends, after his beer-buzzed brain and loosened lips had lashed out at her, Connor turned his back to them and knew he’d done the right thing ten years ago. She was better off without him. She was better than him,period. And he was going to obsessively meditate on that fact during his run every single morning for however long it would be until she disappeared from his life not all that dissimilarly from the way he’d disappeared from hers a decade ago.

“Hey.” Jimmy slapped Connor’s shoulder, shaking him out of his thoughts and causing him to turn around just in time to see Liza step out of the club withBrennan.

Connor felt his face contort as he whipped out his phone and shot a text to Brennan.

Connor Deneau: I swear to fuck, Riley, if you go home with her, I’ll chop off your dick and stick it in your own mouth.

He set the phone on the table and turned on the stool to face Jimmy, tilting the beer bottle toward him. “What up.”

Jimmy poked his sausage-sized index finger into Connor’s chest. “You better watch yourself, son.”

“Huh?” Connor’s jaw slackened, and he drew his brows together. “What’d I do?”

“I was watching all of that, and you pissed her off.”

Connor closed his mouth and drummed his finger on the neck of the bottle. “She’s just sensitive. That’s not my fault.”

Jimmy flattened his palm on the table and lowered his face to the level of Connor’s eyes, his features firm and unamused. “If she’sjust sensitive,then you need to figure out how to be sensitive tothatso you don’t piss her off again. Don’t forget what I said. You and I got a deal, in case you already forgot.”

Connor shifted around to drop his elbows on the table and slump over it. “I didn’t forget shit.”

“I’m not fuckin’ around, Connor.” Jimmy tugged at his slacks before easing onto a stool. “I thought we were in kinda sad shape before she showed up, but after talking to her all day, I’m convinced we’re a sinking ship if we don’t turn this thing around. And I don’t know how to do it. I’m kinda shocked we’re still afloat at all.”

“We’re still afloat because we have solid talent.” Connor took a pull from his beer. “Solid talent’ll always be what carries us.”

“Not if nobodyknowsabout the talent, you dipshit.” Jimmy threw his palms at the ceiling. “Don’t matter how good someone’s product is, if buyers don’t know it exists, they can’tbuyit. And buyers buy differently now than when I started. Now it’s all instant gratification and immediate delivery. Kids don’t hang around the record store anymore after saving up their allowance to buy a new CD. They see a YouTube video and then tap a button if they like what they hear. We aren’t reaching them. The only things keeping us afloat right now are New Orleans jazz purists, and people who like the novelty of old school, and Brennan fuckin’ Riley.”

Connor grumbled from deep in his throat as he dropped his forehead to his folded arms.

“Solid talentwillkeep us going, but only if people know about it,” Jimmy went on. “You’re responsible for the talent, and Liza’s responsible for getting the word out. This is gonna make or break us, and, not to give you performance anxiety or anything, but the outcome is on both of your shoulders. And she’s got a reputation of past success a mile long, so I know if this don’t work, there’s only one person at fault.”

“I don’t get performance anxiety,” Connor mumbled into his arms.

“What?”

Connor lifted his head. “I’ll handle it. I’ll play nice, and I won’t piss her off again, but I don’t like her.”

Jimmy screwed up his face as he pulled his chin close to his neck. “What the hell do you not like about Liza? Are you blind and deaf? Or did you hit on her, and she shut you down?”

Connor drew his index finger across his upper lip as his torturous mind flashed a long-repressed memory of her bare skin against his. His hands scooping her perfect ass as she rolled her hips against his, while her lips sought his ear, and she murmured his name on a hitched breath.

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