Page 26 of He Has Pluck

Rafe, sitting two tables over, tells her to put down her camera and join us for a drink. “This outing is off the record,” he says.

She sits facing away from me, and I know it’s against her rules to mingle with her subjects and wonder how much of her behavior is a protest against the assignment or if it’s all about sending me a message.

I shouldn’t mind the reprieve from the camera lens.

But I do. I resent not being her focus, even from behind the goddamn camera. Finn joins me while I sit in my corner drinking my second beer. It should be my last, but I flag down the server, a perky young girl who gives me a pleased onceover.

“I’ll have another Sam Adams and a shot of your best whiskey.”

I ignore the raised eyebrows of judgment coming from Finn.

“I’ll take the same,” he says. I turn to him, and he gives me a grin and a shrug. “I figure you could use some company going down this road, and it’ll be our last party trip for a while with the playoffs starting in a week.”

“A pair of partiers,” the cute server says.

“We sure are. Want to join us?” I ask mostly because I know she can’t, and I don’t mind flexing my flirtation muscles. They need a work out if I want to keep up with Ice Chip—and for whatever insane unreasonable reason that lives inside my soul and can’t be extricated, I do feel the need to more than keep up with her. More than the need, I feel the drive, the balls to the wall determination.

“I wish. How about a raincheck, hottie?” She leans in and shows me some legitimate cleavage. I wish the show moved me, but my dick yawns.

“Who knows?” I say, and she grins and sways her hips extra wide as she struts off, presumably to get our drinks.

“What devil has taken possession of your soul?” Finn asks.

“Her name is Ice Chip,” I say with a straight face.

He nods and smiles that resigned kind of smile of someone who’s been there. “Then you need more than a drinking partner, you need a conscience. I’d sign up for the job, but I’m not very good at that role.”

I raise my empty bottle. “No worries. I’ll pretend you’re my conscience, pretend you’re going to beat me senseless if I make a wrong move.”

He laughs and taps my bottle with his. “Maybe I will. I may not be a good conscience, but I’m good at throwing a punch.”

“Good to know.”

I watch Juliette as she picks up her camera again and films the action as Tony heads in our direction at the same time as the cute server returns with drinks for me and Finn.

“Hey, sugar baby,” Tony says, throwing an arm around the server.

She smiles gamely and gives me and Finn our drinks. “Can I get you anything?” she asks Tony as she slips out from under his arm.

“What are you doing later?” he says and lowers his voice though I still hear him. “I have a room upstairs and a king-size bed.”

“You get right to the point, don’t you?” She laughs. “What’ll you have to drink?”

“Looks to me like he’s had more than enough to drink already,” I say. He gives me the finger, but it’s not exactly a friendly gesture if the scowl on his face is an indicator.

He wraps an arm around our server again and crowds her, whispering something in her ear, and she pulls away from him.

“You’re a little too frisky for me, big boy,” she says, but he follows her, reaching for her again when she tries to leave.

My blood is already agitated, and I can’t stand his obnoxious behavior.

Jumping from my chair, I reach for him and grab onto his shoulder. I stop him before he grabs her again.

“Hey, what the hell,” he says. If he’s tipsy, I can’t tell because maybe I am too though I didn’t touch the whiskey yet.

“Leave the girl alone. She’s not interested.”

“What? You think you’re the only one who can score around here?”