Page 5 of Junkyard Dog

She lifted her head reluctantly, freezing as the bartender came into focus.

“Well, hey there, Miss Charlotte.” The bartender grinned, tossing a cloth over his shoulder and sliding two shots of tequila across the bar. “Taking a break after a long day of just looking?”

A blush rose in her cheeks as her hands instinctively smoothed down her ponytail. “Oh, uh, hi. Alex, right?” she asked, straightening her back and looking up at the towering beast of a man. “How was the mine trail?”

Alex slipped Max’s money into the till and smoothly slid the change toward him, his attention wholly on her. “Long and hard,” he replied, tucking a stray strand of his blond hair behind his ear.

“That’s what she said,” Max whispered beside her, further firing her cheeks.

Amusement danced across Alex’s face before his attention was caught by another customer.

“What the hell, Max?” she muttered, gripping the small glass of tequila. “Maybe you should be drinking a shot of shut-the-hell-up.”

He snorted, lifting his glass toward her. “Oh, uh, hi, uh, Alex, uh,” he mimicked. “I think I know why you can’t get a date, Chuck.”

She tossed her drink back, wincing as the alcohol burned down her throat and into her empty stomach. “Don’t want to get a date,” she corrected as a shiver ran through her. “I hate tequila every time I have it.”

Slamming his empty shot glass on the counter, he looked pointedly at the hot bartender. “Yes?”

“That,” she muttered, nodding toward Alex, “has fuck-boy stamped on his forehead with another warning label on his ass. No.”

Max rubbed his own forehead and grinned. “You know, just because guys like us are genetically blessed doesn’t automatically make us cheating dogs.”

Turning her back to Alex, she nodded toward the empty tables at the back of the lounge. “I’ve bought into that lie enough times, thanks. Let’s go sit.”

As their coworkers filtered into the bar and the music began to get louder, she kept her attention on the animated conversations surrounding her while her fellow rangers compared horror stories of past assignments. The women in their group had spotted Alex the moment they filed into the tavern, their conversations peppered with sly comments regarding the size of his hands and the fit of his jeans whenever he bent down to grab a beer from the bar coolers.

Not that she noticed.

She was busy keeping her back to the bar and, more importantly, to the bartender. Her weakness for dangerously pretty packages had given her enough emotional battle scars to last a lifetime.

She definitely hadn’t noticed the way his shirt rode up when he reached for a wineglass.

Hadn’t seen him playfully flex his arm for a group of elderly women at the back table, showing off the expanse of tattoos that disappeared under his sleeve.

And she definitely hadn’t noticed how he leaned across her every time he brought another round of drinks to the table, inundating her with the scent of his intoxicating cologne.

“Chuck!” Max yelled over the din of music and conversation. “What do you want?”

She blinked a few times, her mind desperately sorting through the last remnants of discussion around the table.

“Yeah,Chuck,” Alex’s amused voice echoed behind her, “what do you want?”

“Uhhh…” She trailed off for a moment as her cheeks reddened again. “Nachos. No tomatoes, no chives, no sour cream, no—”

“Nachos, just cheese?” Alex offered as Max’s barking laugh crossed the table.

“Yes, please,” she confirmed, narrowing her eyes at Max in a death glare.

“My pleasure, Miss Charlotte.”

*

Alex could hearthe squeals of the women as he pushed through the kitchen doors and passed the food order over to the unimpressed cook and owner.

“Food cutoff’s in ten minutes.” The stocky man snatched the bill out of his hand and read it over. “Just cheese?”

“Picky eater,” he replied, pulling a fry from a greasy bowl. “How long have these been sitting here, Thomas?”

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