Page 92 of Wilde's End
“Shouldn’t I be the one making that offer?”
“Not this time.” His leg is getting stiffer, so I let the argument go and frustratingly let him drive. I’d argue if I thought it would get me anywhere, but Wilde has made it clear that he won’t get into the car with anyone driving but him.
It’s a peaceful sort of silence as we trundle along, pulling up out the front of a decent-sized building a few minutes later. It has a wide front porch overlooking the river and tall front windows, and through them, I can make out large ceiling fans circling sluggishly.
“What is this place?”
“A Wilde’s End secret.” His lips pinch like he’s unsure whether to keep talking. “We call it the Cutty. It’s our bar. No one but Wenders knows about this place.”
Again, that odd feeling tries to take over. “Why do you call it the Cutty?”
“Because the drinks have a way of cutting you down.” He strides toward the building, doing his best to hide the pain he’s in. “Come on. One drink. Then I’ll drop you home.”
The reminder that I have to go back there dulls my good mood, but I push it away for now. Any extra time I get to spend with Wilde is extra time I’ll take. I’m determined to piece him together, to figure out his mystery, even as he does everything he can to stop that from happening.
We get inside, and it’s nothing like I expected. Most of the homes I’ve seen today were small and modest, whereas the Cutty is the complete opposite.
It has high rafters and a long gleaming bar down the right, and there’s a seating area down the left with a pool table and jukebox at the back. I turn to Wilde with wide eyes. “This is fancy.”
“It works. We built it.”
“From a professional standpoint, it’s really good.”
He grunts because he always grunts and then rounds the bar to pour two beers.
“You help yourself?”
“Yep.”
“Like,anyone? But … what if someone steals it? Or drinks too much? Or …”
So help my fucking heart, he chuckles. I didn’t know he could do that. “Can’t steal what’s free, and we’re all adults smart enough to run our own lives.” He hands me a glass and joins me back on the customer side. “The rule is once you’re done, you leave whatever money you can spare, if you can spare some.”
“But if people aren’t paying for it, how do you afford to keep it stocked?”
“Who said they aren’t paying for it?” Wilde shrugs and takes a sip. “This shit isn’t expensive, and the money left is usually more than enough to replace what we drink. What you’re thinking of is profit. We don’t do that here.”
It’s embarrassing how hard it is for me to wrap my head around that. Ever since starting our business, I’ve been driven by money. Money to cover costs, then money to get ahead, now money to make my brothers’ and my lives easy.
I follow Wilde to a table toward the back. There’s no one else in here, and I don’t know if it’s because it’s still early in the day or because there are so few people in the town to begin with.
Our chairs are side by side, and I have a long drink of the sweet-tasting beer before leaning back and looking at him.
“You have a pretty cool town,” I admit.
His lips twitch. “Yours now.”
“Ask anyone around here and I’m sure they’d disagree with that.”
“True.” His jaw twitches to the side. “Not my town either though. People look at me like a leader because I do so much, and truthfully, I don’t think anyone else wants the responsibility.”
“People always want power.”
Then Wilde shocks the hell out of me when a smile catches his lips. It stretches his jaw wide, and these little creases spread from the corners of his eyes. “You aresucha city boy.”
I smile back, but mostly because I’ve run out of things to say. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile before, and that’s probably a good thing because Wilde with a sexy trimmed beard and a smile that warms his eyes is enough to make everything inside of me short-circuit.
It slowly slips off his face again. “What?”
