Page 2 of There's No Us Without You
Words aren’t something I’m capable of right now.
“Two more, Tommy,” the man calls out, gaining the bartender’s attention.
So, he’s a regular? Great. He probably knows everyone here, and I’m the only loser hanging out with myself.
“I’ll make you a deal,” he says when Tommy places two shots of what I assume is whiskey in front of him. He doesn’t wait for an answer before he continues. “If you can guess my favourite colour, I’ll leave you alone.”
“No thanks,” I say, choosing not to be the biggest arsehole in this room by ignoring him completely.
We’re still yet to make eye contact, and if his deep voice is any sign of his potential attractiveness, then I want none of it.
I’m not a one-night-stand kind of girl. Although, it would be the perfect revenge. Suck on that, Mum. Even chubby girls—as she likes to put it—can have sex with a hot stranger.
My vision blurs as the reminder of what I witnessed today threatens to take me down, so I lift my face to the high ceiling and blink back the tears as I stare at the exposed beams. The low-hanging industrial lights almost blind me, and when I drop my face, I have to blink away the bright spots dancing in my vision.
Maybe I should have stared into a blinding light before opening that door today. In my defence, I covered my eyes, but it was too late. I’d already seen too much.
Or too little.
Whichever way you want to look at it, I guess.
My mother insisted I needed to marry Kent as soon as possible because a man like him only came around once in a lifetime, and I should be grateful he wanted to marry me at all.
After she got caught with her underwear literally around her ankles, excuses flew out of her mouth a mile a minute—the first time I’d ever seen her lose her restraint—before landing on how they never meant for it to happen.
It just did.
Yeah, right. His penis just fell into her vagina.
“Want to talk about it?” The man leans in a second time and again invades my personal space, his shoulder brushing against mine.
Yes.
“No,” I say, jerking my head towards him. “Can’t you see I jus—” The rest of my sentence gets caught in my throat the moment our eyes meet, and a wave of heat rushes over my already-hot skin, my cheeks now burning.
This man is a walking fantasy. Those hazel eyes of his dancing over my face in amusement could light me on fire. And the white shirtsleeves rolled up on his forearms show off the veins and muscles under his light-brown skin.
Holy moly.
The saying “god’s gift to women” doesn’t even come close to describing this man’s beauty, and it seems I’ve made another massive mistake today—making eye contact with him.
“You okay?” he says, a slight smirk lifting the corners of his full lips.
No, arsehole, I’m not okay.
Nothing about this situation is okay.
My forehead and ears are now burning too, which leaves me with no other option than to drop my head again and stare at the empty shot glass I’m gripping with both hands.
Maybe if I stare at it long enough, it’ll erase the last three hours of my life.
“Well,” the man says, pushing a glass in front of me with the back of his hand, “here’s to making shitty life choices.”
Here, here.
He lifts his glass and takes a sip while I stare at the full one in front of me.
Do tequila and whiskey go together?
