“You ready to go home? I don’t want to keep you up.”
Home for me is just a walk next door. My dogs outside stay in the back behind the bar and the German Shepherds walk me down the stone path to my little raised ranch. They’re my babies and the only family I have left.
The second that house next to the bar went up for sale, I bought it. I was only twenty and my dad had to help me, but it’s mine and it’s the perfect set up. I have my dogs, the bar, I have my house, and I have the people who have been here all my life in this small town. And then there’s this man right here.
I try to ease his conscious, “You aren’t keeping me up.”
“You look tired.”
“Hmmm,” I hum and lean back so I can get a good look at him.
“I don’t mind walking you home and helping you get to sleep,” he offers with that smile I love.
“Dean Andrews, you are the biggest mistake I ever made.” I love saying his name. Dean Andrews. Grandma loved it too. She always shooed the guys away, but never Dean. I could curse her out for that with the way he’s played with my heart. But then she’d slap me silly and I was always taught to respect my elders anyhow.
“Made as in past tense?” he offers me a charming asymmetric smile. “I was hoping you weren’t done with me yet.” That smile is one that knows how to bring heat to my cheeks, a blush rising up my temples. No man has ever made me feel like he does. Maybe that’s why I just can’t say no.
I don’t answer him, wiping down the rest of the liquor bottles, even though I’ve already wiped them down once, with my back to him. Very well aware that my hips sway just slightly with every movement I make. Let him watch. Let him want me even though he’s not able to have me. It’s only fair.
“You come into town once a month for a weekend, maybe twice a month at most… and you think you aren’t a mistake for a girl like me?” I question him, peeking over my shoulder just in time to see him gaze shift from my ass up to my stern gaze. He knows I’m all his. He knows I’ll bring him home and my bed will be filled with both of us tonight. This push and pull is just a game.
A game that’s going to break my heart one day. Since I gave it to Dean Andrews and he doesn’t even know. Shoot, I didn’t even know I’d done it until it was too late.DeanIT’S BEEN AT least four years since I first saw Lysa Hart. My father was showing me “a hole in the wall” bar he’d found. Since I was a little kid, every summer I’d gone with him in his truck for the rides during the summer. My dad’s a truck driver, my uncle, my brother. So it just made sense to me that I would be too.
I was twenty-three and I’d had my own truck for a while when my dad brought me in here four years ago. Craft beers, football games, a pool table and a small town vibe that made you feel at home. That’s what he told me it was like, but when I walked through those doors, there was only one thing that felt like home to me.
It was her laugh that I heard first, and I caught her swinging her hair around to the other shoulder and telling someone to ‘shut their mouth’ before swatting them with an imaginary towel. Her long hair matched her deep brown eyes and her smile… her smile was everything.
It only took one look… and that was years ago. Just before her life changed forever.
I work on drinking the beer quickly, knowing she’s got to want to get out of here.
“How long have you been on the road?” she asks; she only ever makes small talk. The thing I learned about Lysa first was how guarded she was. She could make friends with anyone, but to get to know her took time. And I know her, I know every little thing about her. Because after I’m inside her, after pulling down all of those walls and giving her everything I have, she bares it all. Heart and soul.
“Came in from Georgia, so a little while I guess,” I joke and she winces, the idea of spending nearly ten hours on the road isn’t her kind of fun. I don’t mind it. With the audio books and the sites along the way, it’s been good to me. But she’s better.
Every time I come back, Lysa’s made at least one change to the bar, this time the felt on the pool table’s new. She does that, trying to keep the place updated… but a few things never change.