Page 34 of Chasing Elliott
“Thank you so much, Elli,” he boasted as he pushed a quick, hard kiss to my lips beforepulling back and holding onto my shoulders. “I never would have improved without you.”
“You’re not embarrassed that a girl helped you?”
“Not at all,” Cooper replied as he picked up the bat and slung an arm around my shoulders as we made our way out of the building. “You helped me, that’s all that matters.”
Smiling up at him, I released a sigh of relief as wereached Benjamin’s car, which he let Cooper borrow since he couldn’t transport his baseball equipment on his bike. He quickly spun me around and pressed my back against the door before cupping my face with his free hand. Pushing his lips against mine, he ran his tongue along my bottom lip, but I decided to tease himand denied him access.
“Come on, baby,” he said huskily into my ear as he pulled back and started kissing down my neck. I laughed and pushed him away before it worked and opened the car door.
“You have to buy me dinner, first,” I said with a sly smile as I climbed into the car beforehe could argue. I heard Cooper laugh as he threw his bat in the trunk before climbing in behind the wheel.
“Haven’t I already bought you enough dinners?” Cooper implored with a cocked brow as he started up the car and pulled out of the parking lot. He reached over and rested a hand on my thigh, and I wasted no time in placing my hand over the top of his.
“Yes, but I mean now. I’m hungry now.”
Cooper laughed once more before he turned on the busy street and headed toward thehighway, claiming that he knew of the perfect place.
Forty minutes later we pulled up to one of the busiest parts of the city and struggled to find a place to park. Once we finally found a spot, I glanced down at my outfit and suddenly grew a little selfconscious. Normally I wouldn’t care about my outfit unless I was trying to hook up with someone, but it was a Saturday night in the city and we were still in our clothes from thebatting cages.
“Don’t worry so much,” Cooper said as he gave my thigh a slight squeeze. “Trust me, where we’re going, no one is going to care.”
Before I had the opportunity to question exactly where that was, he opened his driver's side door and quickly climbed out. Sighing, I reached for my handle but the door was pulled out of my hand as he opened it for me. Laughing softly as I rolled my eyes, I accepted Cooper’s outstretched hand and slid out of my seat.
I followed Cooper through the busy streets, weaving in and out of people as he held onto my hand so as not to lose me. Stopping outside of a restaurant with tall windows and dimly litlights illuminating from inside, he smiled down at me widely before pulling me in after him.
The inside was loud as we entered, and I almost rolled my eyes at the tacky neon light decor that covered the walls. It had a typical bar feel but as we walked deeper inside, I noticed astage resting in the back corner.
Cooper found an empty high-top table and we quickly took the seats. As soon as we sat down, a waitress walked over and handed us some menus and two glasses of water. I ordered my usual Tito Cranberry while he ordered a beer.
“I know what I’m ordering you,” he said with a smile as he set the menu down and folded his arms on the table. I raised a brow as I slowly lowered the menu and took a sip of my water.
“A girl is perfectly capable of ordering for herself,” I ventured as I picked up my menu once more and started scanning it again.
“I know a girl is,” Cooper teased as he wiggled his eyebrows at me. “But I want you to try this. You order me something.”
I rolled my eyes at his antics but nodded my head anyway, knowing that I could havesomeone worse ordering a meal for me; like the time I ordered a burger and the guy I was trying to hook up with at the time told the waitress to give me a salad instead. Once our waitress came over, we both placed our orders before I noticed a couple guys setting up equipment on thestage.
“Do live bands play here or something?” I asked as I turned my attention back to Cooper. He bit his lip to suppress his smile which caused me to narrow my eyes suspiciously.
“Not exactly,” he drawled out as I turned my attention back to the stage.
Suddenly, the two television screens behind it lit up and read Karaoke Night. I slowly turned my head back to Cooper to find him smiling widely at me.
“You expect me to sing?” I pondered incredulously as I laughed and folded my arms over my chest. Before he had the chance to answer me, I spotted a guy roughly grab a girls arm at thebar, and she struggled to get out of his grip.
As if on instinct, I found myself slipping out of my chair and approaching them. The guy had at least a foot on me and had quite a large build, but that wasn’t going to stop me. I grabbed his arm and tore it away from her before sliding between them.
“You know, I’ve never done Karaoke before,” I started to ramble, hoping to put this guy off.
“Who cares,” he snapped, trying to sidestep me but I pushed my shoulders back and followed suit. “Look, this doesn’t concern you.”
“Should I sing a song by the Backstreet Boys or something from Nirvana? I can’t really choose because you see, I think my voice could really atone for something like”
“Why are you protecting her? This is just,” he trailed off before narrowing his eyes on meand shaking his head. “Fuck this.”
As the man stormed away from us, I released a soft sigh and rolled my eyes before a hand on my shoulder caused me to turn around. My eyebrows shot up in surprise as I realized the girl who I had just protected from that man was none other than Laura.
“Thank you for that,” she said softly, clearly embarrassed over the fact that it was me who came to her rescue.
