Page 65 of Breaking Emily's Rules
I hadn’t been back there since the night Molly and I caused a bar fight, but at least Molly wouldn’t be there tonight. She’d gone to San Francisco for a night out on the town with a friend. Maybe it was time for the other Parker girl to make an appearance. Show everyone how much living I’d been doing these days. Flying the friendly skies. No more hiding in the shadows.
Greg was getting married, and it was amazing how much that didn’t bother me. It was all I could do to call up my righteous indignation. But the baby. That bothered me. I’d wanted kids. A lot. And now Greg and Nika, who’d done such a bad thing, were ahead of me on that end. It wasn’t fair.
But life wasn’t a race, as Grammy liked to say.
The parking lot was practically empty, a few straggler cars belonging to some other sad and lonely people who had found themselves with nowhere to go on a weeknight. I could go home to my loft, but I’d been in that cage too long. The world had kept revolving without me, traitor that it was.
Time to rejoin the merry-go-round.
Jimmy was behind the bar. “Hey, you. Haven’t seen you for a while. What’s up?”
I took pains to properly sit on the stool and not let everyone in the bar see half my ass. “I’ve been around.”
“Heard you’re taking flying lessons.” Jimmy winked.
“Yep, that’s right. Soon enough I’ll be a pilot and I can take all of you on a ride.”
“Not me.” Jimmy slid a Coke toward me. “I hate heights.”
I pushed the Coke back. “Let me have a tequila shot instead.”
“But it’s not Saturday night.” Jimmy deadpanned.
I was that predictable. “I’m trying something new on for size.” I fished in my purse and laid a twenty dollar bill on the bar. “Keep ’em coming.”
He poured a shot and slid it in my direction. “Weekday drinking? You are getting adventurous. You’re giving me your keys, I hope you know.”
“Yep. And you need to talk to Trish. She’s becoming one of those Bridezillas.”
“What now?”
“She wants doves released after the ceremony! Doves! That’s so sad. Do you know what’s going to happen to them after you release them and they fly away? Death, that’s what! I won’t kill animals at weddings! We could do a chicken because at least they won’t go far. And speaking of chickens, you shouldn’t be one, Jimmy. Go up in the plane with me. Maybe you can impress Trish the Bridezilla.” I took a gulp of the cold draft.
“By going up in one of those teeny tiny planes? What the hell for?”
“Because you might like it,” said a smooth and deep voice behind me.
That kind of voice made me shimmy and shine. I turned to see Stone. Of course. That voice should be bottled and sold as an aphrodisiac. For all I knew, he haunted this place every night since I’d met him here. Picked up a girl or two or three. Ones that didn’t have rules. I gave him the once-over, my gaze drifting over the hard body dressed in jeans and a white button-down.
Stone eased up on the stool next to me. “Hey.”
I scooted my body as far away from him as I could, without falling off my stool. “Look who it is. The guy who turned me down. You’re all this night needed.”
“Bad day?”
“Try bad year.”
“Want to tell me about it?”
“Heck no.” I slammed my shot.
“That bad?” His eyebrow quirked up.
I was making men’s eyebrows quirk up. Two in one night.Oh, hell yeah.
“I did something stupid.”
“Find someone else to take you up on The Rules already?” He grinned. “Becausethatwould be stupid.”
