Page 45 of The Cinnamon Bun Book Store
ChapterThirteen
Noah glanced at his phone for the twelfth time in the last half hour. Nothing. No word from Hazel, at all. He grimaced and dropped the phone back in his pocket.
Mac was watching him when he looked up. ‘Waiting for a call?’ he asked, a dark eyebrow raised.
‘Uh ... no ... not really.’ Noah went back to wiping down the bar for something to do with his hands that didn’t involve reaching for his phone again. He’d come in for a shift at the bar since he didn’t have a tour today, but the bar was disappointingly empty. Which made sense for a Wednesday evening, but Noah had really been hoping for a distraction.
Mac didn’t push further but Noah could feel the man’s eyes on him before he went back into the kitchen. His head cook had come down with flu and Mac was on the grill tonight. The man owned the bar but also seemed to do most of the jobs within it as well. Noah never saw him not working.
Amber came up to the bar with her tray and an order for a round of beers for the rowdy table in the corner.
‘That’s your tour for tomorrow,’ she said, laying her tray down and pushing the honey-colored curls from her shoulder.
Noah grimaced. ‘They look like fun.’
‘Oh, definitely. Should get a lot of good fishing done.’
Noah glanced over at the table where the guys were loudly arguing over the difference between a first mate and a skipper.
Amber laughed, her green eyes dancing. She was dressed in her usual waitressing uniform of a tight tank top and shorts and Noah couldn’t help but appreciate the long swaths of skin exposed to him. He happened to know she was just as gorgeous naked, but he hadn’t hooked up with Amber since last summer, and had no intention to now, despite the knowing smile she was giving him.
‘Still not dating locals?’ she asked, leaning on the bar as he poured the drinks.
He shrugged, trying to play it cool even as all his thoughts turned toward Hazel. ‘Rules are rules.’
Amber laughed. ‘Let me know when you feel like breaking them again.’ She winked at him before walking away and he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t tempted. Not because Amber was sexy, which was objectively true, but because things with Amber were simple. Sex and nothing else. They’d made it clear from day one. And when things between them petered off no one was hurt.
And now here he was checking for messages from Hazel every two minutes like a teenager. His feelings were already hurt. Why hadn’t she texted? Was he supposed to text? He didn’t want to come on too strong. Maybe he was supposed to wait until the next clue? He didn’t know the rules to this game anymore.
But all he could think about was Hazel. The taste of her and her little sighs and moans and the way she’d held onto him when she came and the feel of her head resting on his shoulder . . .
He wanted more of that, of her.
He tried to lose himself in the repetitive tasks of the night and luckily as the evening wore on more folks came in for dinner, giving him more to do, more to think about that wasn’t a certain bookseller.
Cliff and Marty sidled up to the bar. The two old fishermen had bailed him out of a crisis or two since he’d moved here, like the time he had a full bachelor party on board and an empty gas tank. Not a great way to start a new business. But they had happily filled him up and laughed their asses off about how stupid he was. It was a ... layered relationship.
‘What can I get you gentlemen?’ Noah asked.
‘A beer for me,’ Cliff said, and Noah didn’t have to ask which one. Cliff would only say ‘the usual’ anyway.
‘Coke, please.’ Marty hadn’t had a drink in nearly a decade but he came to the bar every Wednesday with his friend to get out of his wife’s hair, as he said, and to make fun of Noah.
Noah poured the drinks and served them under the watchful eye of the older men.
‘How’s business?’ Marty asked.
‘Not bad. Been a pretty good summer despite all the rain.’
Cliff harrumphed at the mention of rain as though it didn’t rain back in his day or they didn’t let it stop them anyway.
‘And how are the girls?’ Marty asked with a wink.
‘I wouldn’t know.’
Both men burst out laughing and Noah just chuckled along with them. There was no way he was about to divulge his currently way-too-desperate feelings for Hazel to these two. Not if he didn’t want to get laughed out of town anyway.
He’d almost managed to stop thinking about her for more than five minutes when the door opened and the air in the room shifted.
