Page 27 of What If I Hate You
He shrugs, the gesture pure muscle and aggravation. “Guess so,” he says, but his gaze flicks to Dylan, then back to me, a silent warning buried in the glower. I watch him stalk off toward the edge of the bar, where he stands with his back to the room and his fists jammed into his pockets like he’s trying to crush a pair of walnuts.
Dylan and his friends are still watching, less rowdy now. Cringing slightly, he bumps my shoulder and says, “Sorry if I stepped on any toes. You two, uh…?”
“Absolutely not,” I say with a laugh and a confident shake of my head, but my voice is a little too sharp. “Unless you’re talking about a prison yard rivalry.”
He seems reassured, but the energy’s shifted. The shots keep coming, and I keep pace, but every so often I catch Barrett’s silhouette reflected in the bar’s warped mirror tiles. He’s always within eyesight and always watching me.
Until he isn’t anymore.
For some reason his absence leaves me wondering where the hell he could have gone. Not that I should care.
Because I don’t.
My eyes slip past the guys’ table where I spot him walking toward the bathroom.
I don’t know what makes me do it, but I turn to Dylan and pardon myself with the excuse of needing to break the seal. What I really want to do is give Barrett a piece of my mind. What better place to do that than in a rowdy bar where nobody will hear us or care? I want to get in his face for once and tell him to quit being an overbearing shithead and remind him that he’s not my boss. He doesn’t get to decide what I do or do not do. What I say or do not say. And he sure as fuck doesn’t get to cock block my night.
I make my way to the rear of the bar where the restrooms are located but I lose sight of him.
Dammit.
Maybe he went to use the restroom.
Propelled by the tequila swimming through my veins, I shove open the door to the men’s bathroom and step inside, but surprisingly the room is empty.
I turn myself around searching for Barrett’s broad shoulders in the sea of people but again I can’t find him. I debate returning to the table, but my thighs are sweating and my bladder is genuinely protesting, so I pivot and push into the women’s restroom.
Unsurprisingly, this bathroom is not empty, but what does startle me is who I find inside. For a split second, I wonder if I’m hallucinating because there, arms braced on the sink, is Barrett Cunningham, and he’s not alone.
Barrett’s massive frame crowds the counter, and next to him is a tall, platinum blonde in a bodycon dress that leaves nothing to the imagination. She’s got one hand splayed on his bicep and the other pressed to her own chest, giggling with the wild abandon of someone who’s had enough cheap cocktails to fund a small scholarship. He’s bent low, head ducked, and for a second—just a split, detonate-my-dignity second—I see his lips tug up in a smile.
A flash of something carnal runs through me. Anger, disgust, but mostly the same sick curiosity that’s been haunting me ever since he said,“You ever get tired of being the sharpest person in the room?”Because right now, I am not the sharpest anything. I am a dull, bludgeoned object, and the impact of seeing Barrett with another woman even though he has every right to be with her is a goddamn concussion.
He spots me instantly in the smeared glass. His eyes dart to mine and freeze. Not in embarrassment, not in guilt, but in what looks an awful lot like challenge. Like he’s daring me to say something, to sink to the level everyone already expects.
The blonde sees me a moment later, her gaze predatory, sizing me up as competition and finding me wanting. She flicks her hair over her bare shoulder and says, “Babe, you said we could?—”
“Give us a second,” Barrett interrupts, voice low and all iron, eyes locked on me. The woman pouts, but the force of his tone makes her retreat, squeezing past me with a graze of perfume and enough side-boob to be pictured in Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition.
The door clicks shut, leaving Barrett and me in the fluorescent-lit, lemon and bleach-scented purgatory of the ladies’ room. For a heartbeat, neither of us moves. The roar of the bar is muffled. The vent in the ceiling drones. The mirror, streaked with the fingerprints of a thousand drunk women, reflects Barrett’s face with an intensity that’s almost nauseating.
“You slumming it tonight?” I hiss, because I can’t help myself, and because I’d rather die than let him see any other reaction. “Thought you’d at least find someone with a pulse, Cunningham.”
He wipes a palm across his mouth, something I’ve seen him do a hundred times. “Didn’t realize you had a monopoly on being a mess around here.”
“A mess?” My laugh is sharp and ugly. “You looked pretty cozy with Malibu Barbie just now. She’s cute. She your kink? She’s exactly the type I would expect you to go for.”
He almost smiles. Almost. “You don’t know the first fucking thing about my type.”
“Oh, I don’t?” I fold my arms, letting my bag wedge into my ribs like a shield. “Because it looks to me like you’d rather rub up against anything with a fake tan and half a GED than deal with a woman who actually respects what you do every day.” I roll my eyes, pretending not to care. “Typical rich-boy move.”
He steps forward, and for a fleeting moment, I almost believe he’ll retreat, but he doesn't. He closes the space between us, his way of trying to intimidate me, until the cool edge of the sink presses against my back and the only air left is what we're exchanging in heated breaths.
God, why does he have to smell so fucking good all the time?
"You know, you could have any guy in that bar wrapped around your finger,” he seethes, his eyes narrowed, and his nostrils flaring. “But that's not enough for you, is it? You still have to come after me."
I scoff. “Wha?—”
