Page 86 of Told You So
“Fine,” she grumbles, “but only because I’m starving.”
I kiss her lips, silently telling my libido to calm his ass down in my pants, and I clear my throat. “So, about that Gouda?”
Forty-Six
Bethany
“Okay, so,” I say, appraising the half-empty glasses of tester cocktails on the coffee table. “Are we officially giving up on a pickle juice drink then?”
With a heart-stopping smile, Nick lifts a shoulder and glances between them. “You tell me.” He hands me his high ball. “I like the dirty pickle martini, myself.”
I sniff it, wondering if I’ll enjoy it at all, given I don’t like martinis to begin with.
“Just try it,” he urges, intrigue lighting his eyes.
I take a sip and find I’m pleasantly surprised. “The martini isn’t that bad, actually. Then again, it might just be that my taste buds are in shock from the salty dog, pickle drink you concocted.”
“Yeah, that one was definitely a bad idea.”
I take another sip of his drink and hand it back to him. “The more I drink the better it gets.”
He chuckles and holds his pinky out like he’s fancy and takes another sip. He cringes. “I think it might actually be getting worse.”
I nestle into the couch a little deeper, completely comfortable and at ease as I watch him study the concoctions we’ve been testing for an hour now. “So, where are we at with the name?” I ask. “We’ve crossed Church and Nick’s off the list. What about Shortstop, since that’s the first one you thought of.”
Nick stares into the fire with a faraway look. “It was my position on the team for three years, and the nostalgia of it—I dunno. I thought it would be cool.”
“I think it’s great, and it has a nice ring to it. ‘I’m gonna make a short stop by the bar’—no wait, that doesn’t really work.” I nearly giggle, feeling sated by a few, albeit gnarly, drink choices.
“And you can’t forget the hot baseball outfits for the female bartenders, you know, keeping the theme going and all.”
I snort a laugh. “Yeah, right.”
He winks at me and sets his drink down. “I think that’s enough pickle infused drinks for one night,” he says.
“Yeah, I’m pretty pickled out.”
“But you’re right about one thing, every bar needs a signature drink.”
Laughing, I wipe the table off where his drink dribbled. “And, of course, gross pickle drinks should be yours.”
“Hey, it was your idea.” He pulls me to my feet. “Come on, I’ve tortured you enough. Let’s get you a real cocktail.”
On bare feet, I follow Nick over to his bar cart, eyeing an array of liquor bottles and mixers. “You’re a whiskey sour girl,” he says, mostly to himself as he takes stock of the ingredients in front of him. “What I really want to make you is a mint julep.”
“You mean like the horse races and big hats kind of mint julep?”
He nods. “That’s the one. I think you’d like it, and it’s a nice summer drink. Plus, I can totally picture you in one of those floppy hats and a big frilly dress, looking all proper. It sorta turns me on just thinking about it.”
I shake my head, amused and filing that fantasy of his away for later. “Well, then, make me one.”
“I don’t have any mint. Have you had a Manhattan before?” He looks over his shoulder at me.
Digging in the recesses of my mind, I try to remember. Eventually, I shrug. “I don’t know—I don’t think so.”
“Do you like vermouth?”
I shrug again.
