Page 17 of Bountiful
She grabbed a pint glass and pulled my beer while her other hand was busy opening a bottle for someone else. Zara was always crazy busy back there, even on a slow night. She did so many laps around the bar that I swear she’d covered more miles than I did during a championship hockey game. I enjoyed watching her move. She had an economy of motion as she wiped down a table or rang up a check. It turned me on almost as much as the cleavage I could see every time she leaned down to clear a glass off a table. And she had a long, regal neck that begged to be traced with mytongue.
When she set the beer down in front of me, I didn’t get my a wink. Not even a quick one. But this was our dance, our tentative association. Maybe it wasn’t how normal people behaved. But I’d discovered these past couple of weeks that neither Zara nor I had any taste fornormal.
I took a sip of my excellent beer and settled in to watch her work the last hour of the night. Zara didn’t remind me of any other woman I knew. Or any other bartender, for that matter. She was like a storm front on the move—always two steps ahead of the customers. Those busy hands. Those long, elegant limbs. I admired all the parts of Zara I could see. But her cool demeanor always suggested the important stuff was still hiddenfromview.
I’d seen it, though. And I didn’t mean this in a crude way. I’d seen the expression on her face when she truly let go, and I’d heard the laugh she unfurled when she thought nobody waslistening.
But even in my arms she kept a tighter lid on herself than any other woman I’d met. Sometimes when I looked at her, she seemed to be focused somewhere else—as if her soul was tuned in to a back channel that none of us mere mortalscouldhear.
The Milky Way and Zara. My favorite two exotic things aboutVermont.
A Green Day song came over the sound system, and I saw her move her shoulders in time with the beat, not for anyone’s benefit but her own. “Last call,” she said to no one inparticular.
After that, Wednesday’s crowd died out in a hurry. I didn’t have long to wait. Soon enough she was walking around, stacking the chairs upside down on the tables. Ignoring me. Once I’d tried to help her with this task and gotten snapped at for mytrouble.
I finished my beerinstead.
Eventually I was the only man left in the bar. Without a glance in my direction, she counted the cash in the register, then disappeared into the back, presumably to lock it inthesafe.
I got up off the stool, anticipation humming in my veins. I walked to the door and then slipped outside, where the stars were waiting. Leaning against the clapboards, I tipped my head back until I saw Jupiter in the sky, where it had just risen. And then I heard an owl hoot. A real owl.Herr-herr-herrrrrr,itsaid.
Where I grew up, owls were only instorybooks.
The door opened beside me, and Zara stepped out. I held my breath while she locked up. The second the key was retrieved from the lock, I stepped out of the shadows and grabbed herwrist.
Dark eyes darted to mine. But she didn’t sayaword.
“Hi,” I said, my voice husky. “You didn’t have a lot to say to metonight.”
“When doIever?”
I laughed, and the sound seemed loud in the quiet night air. “Good point,gorgeous.”
She took her wrist back. “You want to stand here and converse now? Is thatyourplan?”
As if. I stepped into her personal space and stole my first kiss of the evening. Had to. Watching her move for an hour made me crazy. Andhell. Every time, I felt a jolt of energy when we came together. The heat of the stars and sun were inside me when she wasnearby.
Zara sighed in a way that sounded as if she didn’t approve, even as she softened under my mouth. I deepened the kiss, treating myself to a taste, but just a quick one. “Come out with me tonight,” I said, breaking it off. “Just this once.” Usually we went upstairs to herplace.
She stepped back and raised those dark eyes to mine. “Outwhere?”
“Outside. Not far. I only get one more night to look at the stars. Want you to comewithme.”
Zara considered this, her hands wandering up to land on my pecs. She had a thing for my chest. And I was smart enough never to point that out, because I was pretty sure she’d never touch me the same way again if she knew I’dnoticed.
My favorite girl was a prickly one. But that only made us more compatible, Isupposed.
“We don’t go places together,” sheremindedme.
“Only because there’s nothing open after you get off work,” I pointed out. “But the stars are open. And I want one last, good look at them. Youwon’tcome?”
She looked at my rental truck standing by itself in the lot. “You’re breaking therules.”
“Nah,” I said softly. Zara loved her rules. Sex only. No sleepovers—she’d kicked me out every single time. We talked more now, though. I was going to miss her irreverent sense of humor. “You’re not afraid of me, though, right? If I thought I was making you nervous, I wouldn’t be a dickaboutit.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “What if I’mnotscared of you, but I have otherobjections?”
“Then I will be a dickaboutit.”
