Page 130 of The Wrong Side of the Law

Chapter Forty-One

Gabriel

The last of the evening cop crowd has gone home at last, and I’ve got the Shamrock to myself. Finally, some peace and quiet. God love ‘em, but they were some noisy bastards tonight.

The last swallow of single malt burns its way down my throat, smoky and wonderful, and I set the heavy tumbler back on the bar. The sound of glass hitting wood echoes around the empty room.

Huh. Must have put it down harder than I thought.

“Ye break it and we’re going to have a problem, Cooper!” Sam’s fake Irish accent is charming, usually, but for some reason tonight it just sets my teeth on edge.

“I didn’t break your damn glass,” I tell him with exaggerated—and exasperated—patience. “If I do happen to break one, I’ll buy you a case of them. And maybe hire someone to wash them for you too,” I add, squinting down at a hard water spot on the glass.

Sam mutters something I don’t catch.

“Gimme another, hey?” I wag the glass at him.

“And why would I do that,” he snarls, “wi’ you bein’ such a right arsehole?”

“Because I don’t bitch about paying twenty-five bucks a glass.”

“True enough,” he says equably, calmed by the mention of money.

Three more fingers of golden amber splash into the glass, and I stare moodily at my reflection in the mirror behind the bar.

The front door opens on squeaky hinges, a strip of brass sleigh bells attached to it jangles painfully through my skull. Lovely. More people. Hopefully they’ll at least be quiet, and polite enough to let me drink in peace.

I reach for the tumbler of whisky in front of me, but somehow my fingers don’t quite find it. It shouldn’t be this damn hard to pick up a cup. Focus, man. Focus. I watch carefully, sullenly guiding clumsy fingers toward the glass. But a different hand, one with long and slender fingers, gets there first and pulls it out of my reach.

In the mirror, Lisa Mayfield-Hatcher’s blurry reflection pulls up a stool next to my own.

“I think you’ve had enough of that for tonight,” she says, sniffing at the expensive scotch and wrinkling up her nose.

“You know what the difference is between my glass of whisky and your opinion?” I stare morosely down at the empty coaster.

“No,” she says sadly.

“I paid a lot of money for the one, and I have no interest in the other.”

“I see.” Lisa’s reflection frowns at me, then pulls over a bowl of peanuts and mini-pretzels.

The silence between us grows longer and longer, broken only by crunching noises as Lisa nibbles at the salty snack mix.

“I’m sorry,” I finally say, when the quiet becomes too unbearable. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“You’re right,” she agrees. “You shouldn’t have. What the hell’s wrong with you?”

“I don’t know. Why are you here?” I peer over at her. Huh. It’s not the mirror that’s blurry, after all. “It’s almost two in the morning.”

“I’m here because Sam called me.”

That son of a bitch. I’m paying him to pour drinks, not stage an intervention. But the flash of anger passes quickly, and I’m ashamed of myself for having felt it in the first place. Sam didn’t do it to be an asshole. He did it because he actually gives a damn.

“He says you’ve been coming here just about every night, and that you’ve had to walk home every single time.”

“Yeah. He’s confiscated my car keys.” I can see them from here. They’re on a hook by the cash register. I wonder if I can reach them?

“He’s taken them away from you every single night?” Lisa’s eyebrows climb sharply.

---