Page 17 of Bad Boy for Hire
He joined his friends on the customer side of the bar and took a deep drink of his beer, admittedly more relaxed than he’d been earlier. So relaxed, he found himself blurting out, “I was thinking about Tracie when I broke the glass.”
“Ah.” Ant nodded.
“Who’s Tracie?” Donny asked.
“Ex,” Xavier said. “Cheating, lying ex. You know the kind.”
“Used to be the kind.” Donovan offered a self-deprecating smirk. “I never committed to anyone. Except Sofie.”
To Xavier, Ant explained, “He stayed celibate for seven years to punish himself for leaving Sofie behind.”
“Jesus.” Xavier glanced over at Donovan, whose face was a placid mask. “I don’t know whether to be impressed or sympathetic.”
“I don’t do well with sympathy. Be impressed.” Donovan held up his glass.
“Okay, I’m impressed.” Xavier was impressed. He hadn’t been pursuing permanence with a woman since moving to the Cove, but he sure as hell hadn’t become a monk in the process, either.
“There’s no way around, you know,” Donny offered. “There’s only straight through. Straight through the shit she put you through. Otherwise, you carry it around and weaponize it against yourself.”
Ant nodded. “He knows that. He’s not punishing himself. Are you, Xav?”
“Does not being able to keep my mind off her count as punishment?”
“Depends. You talking about Tracie? Or May?” Ant’s grin was slow and knowing.
Xavier drank his beer rather than answer.
“She likes you,” Ant said.
“She say that?” Xavier asked.
“She didn’t have to. You should do something about that. May is no Tracie.”
“Hell, I know that.” Tracie had made Xavier immune to desiring long-term relationships, but that didn’t stop him from having relationships on his terms. In May’s case, however, he didn’t have much input. She set the terms. “Lou suggested May hire me to be her date to the wedding.”
“Like an escort?” Ant laughed.
“Reason being,” Xavier stated patiently, “to circumvent her rule.”
“What rule’s that?” Donovan leaned in, interested.
“‘No hot men,’” Xavier said.
It was Donny’s turn to laugh. “She’s not going out with you because she’s attracted to you?” His face pinched. He was clearly having trouble understanding that logic. “Sofie’s best friend, Faith, did that with Connor before they were together. She liked him so much she wouldn’t let herself date him. She wanted to establish her own independence at the time. She had a cheater ex too.”
“Goes around.” Ant wasn’t speaking from personal experience, but of his former best friend, Liam, who also happened to be Lou’s cheating ex-husband. “I’m with Donny. May needs an excuse—any excuse—to let herself off the hook for the rule she’s no longer interested in following. Why don’t you give her one?”
“I can give her more than one,” Xavier muttered. He and May had been dancing around each other for a few years now. He’d made it his job to chaperone when she’d come into Salty Dog with a date, or flirt with her when she was here with the ladies. Just this past weekend, she’d stood hip to hip with him while admiring his bedroom, for God’s sake. He hadn’t been holding back so much as letting her make the first move. She was softening toward him, he could tell. She was far less committed to her “rule” than before.
She’d run away from him the night of Brady’s party not because she was tired—that yawn was as fake as they came—but because he’d broken through one of her barriers. Maybe a couple of them. And when he’d caught her body against his, he hadn’t been alone in noticing the heat between them. Time had frozen, the rest of the party had fallen away, and her flaring pupils had broadcasted her every thought.
She was losing the battle of resisting him. He knew it, and he wasn’t going to play it safe any longer. It was past time he told her that when it came to her, he was all in.
By Friday night, May had almost forgiven Lisa.
Almost.
“You can’t hate me forever!” Lisa looped her arm in May’s as they scanned the outdoor patio for seating. Salty Dog was busy, as usual, but they lucked out and found an empty table for four.
