“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Sadie.”
“Are you new around here? Not sure I’ve seen you before.”
She closes her eyes demurely and then opens them. It wasn’t a natural blink. It was forced, and it was meant to show me her long eyelashes.
Yeah, I know the type.
“I just moved here from Denver. I’m staying with my friend. Nora. She’s a waitress.”
“Nora. Right.”
The name sounds slightly familiar. I think she was at our last party, totally hitting on my cousin Henry. I don’t recall seeing her at the party tonight, but I don’t recall seeing this woman either.
I signal to Brendan. “I’ll have another, and the same for the lady, please.”
“You got it.” Brendan gets busy behind the bar.
“What’s your name, cowboy?” she asks.
“Brock.”
“Brock. You look like a Brock.”
“Brock Steel,” I say.
Her eyes widen slightly, but then she gets control over them. “So you’re one of the Steels.”
Right. Like she didn’t know that when she approached me. Like I said, I know the type.
“Yes, I’m one of the Steels.”
“Is it true you guys own this town?”
“Don’t believe everything you hear, Sadie.”
Brendan pushes our drinks toward us.
“My tab,” I say.
“Already done.” Brendan begins mixing another drink.
“So what is this, exactly?” Sadie asks. “Looks like a martini.”
“Give the woman a gold star. It’s not just a martini, but the best damned martini this side of the Mississippi. It’s made with Cap Rock gin, an organic gin made here in Colorado, and very dry vermouth that my uncle makes at his winery.”
She brings the martini glass to her lips and takes a small sip. Again with the wide eyes, and again she tries to make it look like she had no reaction. “Tasty.”
“Not too strong for you?”
“Cowboy, nothing is too strong for me.”
I smile.
Rory Pike may have left me horny, but Sadie is just the prescription I need.
Chapter Five
Rory
It’s after midnight, and I can’t sleep. I head through the Jack and Jill bathroom and into Callie’s room. She’s still awake as well.
“Feel like a drink?” I ask.
“Not really.”
She’s still in her clothes—which for Callie consists of skinny jeans and a button-up blouse that I can’t wear.
“You sure? I’m buying. To celebrate your engagement.”
She sighs. “Why the hell not? It’s not like either of us can sleep.”
“Just what I was thinking. You want to head over to Murphy’s?”
“Yeah. Donny’s helping his mom clean up, and then tomorrow he’s got something going on in Grand Junction.”
“You’re not going with him?”
“You asked me to spend the day with you, remember?”
“Yeah. Right. Except that was your idea. You’re going to work on talking me out of the whole Brock Steel thing.”
She chuckles. “Yeah.”
“Let’s go.”
We make our way to the driveway and get into my car. “You want me to drive?” Callie asks. “I’m not planning to drink.”
“Doesn’t matter. You can drive home if you need to. I won’t drink a lot.”
“I feel like we need to always be on alert with Pat Lamone out there. And those photos…”
“We may have the photos. We’ve got the thumb drive from that box we found.”
“We can’t depend on that, Ror.” She shakes her head. “You know, if you weren’t a few days over eighteen, I’d actually want him to publish the damned photos. Heck, he doesn’t even need to publish them. Just possession of nude photos of minors can get him on child porn charges.”
“Well, he’s in possession of yours. We can still get him.”
“No. I can’t take that chance. If he knows you were over eighteen, he could still publish yours and not risk any fallout. Except for a lawsuit from us, which we can’t afford.”
“Once you marry Donny, I guess you could afford it.”
“Wait… Are you saying you want me to get him charged? Because I’m not sure we can. They’re not in his possession. They’re in ours.”
“But we didn’t take them. We can tell Hardy what happened.”
“We can’t. Not without any evidence that he took them and buried them. I’m just not sure it will work.”
“Well, you’re the legal expert.” My heart falls a bit. It would almost be worth it to have my naked body all over the internet to get Pat Lamone put away for child porn.
We stay silent for the rest of the ride, until Callie finds a parking spot about a block away from Murphy’s.
We walk inside, and—
Brock Steel is sitting at the bar with a woman I don’t recognize. She has dark hair and blue eyes, and she’s flat-chested.
I can’t help a little sliver of gratitude at that.
I may not be able to wear button-down shirts like Callie, but every eye is on me when I walk into a bar.
And, of course, the only two available seats at the bar are right next to Brock and his lady.
Callie smirks at me. Yeah, I get it. It’s her way of telling me I’m seeing Brock in his natural habitat.