Page 20 of Wicked Little Secret

The bartender quickly retrieved it and seconds later, set her receipt in front of her with a smile that seemed forced.

As she hovered over the tip amount, she wavered between a penny for making her feel embarrassed and overtipping, with the hope he’d help her.

She decided on the latter and handed him the merchant copy with a fifty percent tip and her phone number written on it.

“It really is important that I talk to Pete. Can you please make sure he calls me?”

He didn’t even look at the receipt, just gave her a dismissive nod. “Yeah, sure.”

Dick. Now she wished she had stiffed him.

****

Maverick

It was Tuesday night, so that meant he was having dinner at Flannigan’s—something he did almost every week, despite Olivia never showing up again. A guy could hope.

“When are you heading to New York?” Derrick asked as he pulled a draft from the tap and handed it to Maverick.

“Thursday morning. What about you?”

“Probably the same.”

“So are you bringing someone?”

“Nah. We went out and I quickly realized I could not spend a long weekend with her.”

Maverick chuckled. “I wish I could say I was surprised.”

“Yeah, my luck with dating lately seems to be as good as yours. Speaking of… did you block that doctor chick’s phone number? The one who was stalking your social media?”

He cocked his head. “Janice? The woman with the PhD?”

“Yeah, her.”

“How did you know I blocked her?”

“’Cuz she showed up here last night.”

Maverick let out a groan. “You’re kidding. How did you know it was her?”

“She asked for ‘Pete,’ and said you two had gone out, so I was immediately suspicious. Then she left her business card. Doctor someone, so then I knew.”

“What’d you tell her?”

“I acted like I didn’t know who she was talking about. Except numbnuts,” he jerked his head toward Tyler, the younger bartender at the other end of the bar, “asked her if she was talking about Maverick after she described you. It took him a second to catch on that we were playing dumb.”

“Fuck,” he grumbled, shaking his head.

“You must have given her some good D to have her come looking for you in person,” Derrick said with a shit-eating grin.

“I didn’t sleep with her. Hell, I didn’t even hug her!”

He hadn’t slept with anyone since Olivia, the gorgeous ER nurse.

“Well, it’s probably a good thing you’re getting out of town, then.”

Indeed.

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