Page 7 of Under Pressure

A few minutes later, I’ve finished with the dishes and taken my gloves off when Callie pops her head around the door.

“Still want to help? I’m starving.”

The gloves come off with a loud snap, my fingers sweaty from wearing them. “Sure. Give me a sec.”

Her lips spread into a smirk before she ducks her head out of view. Immediately, my hackles rise. I glare at the door, annoyed, as I realize punishingly fast that I should have told her no.

A few calming breaths are all I allow myself before adjusting my damp apron at my front and tucking the loose strands of hairsticking to my cheeks behind my ears. I feel warm, as if I’ve spent the last ten minutes outside jogging instead of hunched over a sink, scrubbing dishes. It’s too familiar a feeling.

Fixing my expression into one of nonchalance, I shoulder open the door and step back into the café. The sunlight burns my eyes as I squint past the rays beaming directly into my face. Even half-blind, I can make out the shape of him on the opposite side of the counter.

Suddenly, Eli and Callie are both too busy to tend to the till. My sister is already scurrying out of the café and onto the busy sidewalk with a Blank Page–branded cup in her hand, and Eli’s fisting a carton of oat milk while his shoulders shake silently.

I force my shoulders back and lift my chin when I approach the till and avoid looking into the alarmingly bright green gaze in front of me. Instead, I stare at the dimple in the customer’s chin and refuse to indulge in any further examination.

“Good morning. What can I get you today?” I bite out, forcing a smile.

“Good morning, Quinny. I’ll take my usual.Please.”

The low, confident drawl of his voice when he says my name like that is so ridiculously sexy that it pisses me off even more than him coming here again does. My eye twitches with the need to look up or down or in any direction that will provide me with more of a view than just his chin. A very chiselled chin with a pink, inch-long scar that cuts right through that dimple.

I grind my teeth. “And what is that again?”

“You remember,” he purrs, a plump, red lip appearing in my vision.

“How about you just tell me again?”

He hums, and I lose my grip on the tether that was keeping me focused. Flicking my eyes upward, I find twin glimmering emeralds watching me.

Beckett Rourke stands before me with a dirty smirk that makes my toes curl into my sneakers despite the fiery rage that’s boiling in my belly. I sip in a breath and brace my hand on thecounter, leaning forward enough to stabilize my suddenly weak knees. Because, of course, they’re damn near trembling.

It’s simply not possible to be in this man’s presence without being shaken by it. He’s well over six foot, with muscles that constantly fight against the seams of his clothes and the looks of a god from some Greek tale. Piercing yet enthralling green eyes, a jaw that could slice without you so much as feeling the sting, and a cocky, crooked grin that makes it obvious he knows exactly how hot he is.

The dark brown-black hair that curls beneath the edge of his baseball cap and behind his ears has been that length for as long as I’ve known him, and it’s certainly no mullet. I almost wish that it were, just so he could have at least one thing about his appearance that I didn’t find attractive.

Unluckily for me, his wrapping is perfect enough to trick my brain into thinking he isn’t as bad as I know he is. For a few moments, at least.

I stiffen and drop my gaze, only to find it stuck on the cropped hem of his roughly cut muscle tank. The dark trail of hair cutting a line between slabs of muscle and beyond the elastic waist of his gym shorts causes my cheeks to flare with throbbing heat before I clench my teeth and yank my eyes up and away.

The sight of his grin spreading wider and wider drives me to insanity.

“Do you not have anywhere else to get your coffee?” I snap, hating how winded I sound.

His tongue swipes along his bottom lip, making it glisten. “When the customer service here is so warm and fuzzy, why would I wander elsewhere?”

“I’m being serious.”

“So am I.”

I jab my fingers into the screen in front of me and input the coffee order that I can’t seem to shake. “Anything else?”

“Aren’t you going to ask for a name for the order?”

“Silly me,” I bite out, clasping my hands on the top of the screen. “What’s the name?”

“How about you write your phone number instead?”

I blink, keeping my mouth pressed in a straight line. His chuckle rumbles across the space between us, carrying the scent of his cologne with it. Refusing to inhale it, I scrunch my nose and steal a look over his shoulder, expecting to see a long line of customers behind him.