Page 3 of Should've Been Us
Connor Shaw was an arrogant, know-it-all bastard. He always had some smartass remark for her. Always. He’d been Derek’s sidekick since the sandbox days but Lulu did not consider him a friend. He was more of a nuisance, an ache in her head that never quite went away. Case in point, he was here now, standing far too close to her, wearing some sort of cologne that invaded her personal space and made her stomach twist; looking smug as hell because he knew,knew,that every woman in the room was looking at him now that he had herattention.
She hated him. Despised him even. But she couldn’t blame the women in the room forstaring.
He looked like an angel, all golden and gorgeous and he had an obnoxious habit of always managing to stand directly in the path of the sun. Even now, in the low light of evening, a spotlight of glowing orange beamed through the windows above, highlighting his dark blond hair and making it look as if he were wearing a halo. Sometimes it seemed like the sun literally revolved aroundhim.
It was annoying ashell.
So was that knowing twinkle in his dazzling blue eyes. Because he wasn’t just ridiculously good looking, he alsoknewhe was ridiculously good looking which made him just about the biggest kind of asshole on the planet in her estimation. He knew the effect he had on 99% of women and the fact that she fell into the 1% that didn’t go ga-ga over him seemed to give him some weird sort of enjoyment, which only made him moreinfuriating.
“I mean, unless that’s your plan.” He leaned an elbow against the bar beside her, edging even closer so that she had to force herself not to pull away, to put more space between them, because she knew he’d take her retreat as a win in their never-ending game of dare. “Liquidcourage?”
“Go away,Shaw.”
His head tilted slightly as if he’d expected a different response, “Drowning your sorrows then? Have you finally admitted to yourself that you and Dare were never meant tobe?”
Her jaw clenched because, as per usual, his assumption hit far too close to home. She attributed Connor knowing so much about her to the fact that they’d grown up together. He’d always been there, on the edges of her friendship with Derek, watching. Judging. He saw parts of her that she’d thought were well hidden from everyone, even Derek, especially Derek, but somehow Connor had seen her infatuation with their friend and he seemed to take absolute joy in calling her out on the stupidity ofit.
“I said, go away.” She slipped her hand around the glass in front of her without looking at him but a big, warm, roughly masculine hand closed over hers, stopping hershort.
Her breath caught at the contact and she silently cursed herself for the physical reaction. It had been too long since anyone touched her. Anyone. It didn’t have anything to do with this man no matter how gorgeous he was. It was the alcohol and the moroseness that had overtaken her at the thought of Derek gettingmarried.
Derek. Married. To someoneelse.
Her blood chilled and she pulled her hand away from Connor, carefully, so as not to spill the liquid in her glass. She glared at him when he frowned and his eyebrows drew together. He was looking at her strangely, in a way she couldn’t place and she glanced away before he saw something else she didn’t want him tosee.
“Just… slow down on the drinks, okaydoll?”
“Don’t call me that.” She instantlyflinched.
“Tell me you’ll slow down, at least until dinner is served and you put some food in your system and I won’t call you that again.” His blue eyes were serious and she felt something inside of her begin tosplinter.
Was he actually trying to take care of her? This man that taunted her constantly? That set her every nerve ending on edge? Was he trying to make nice for once? Because he knew this must be hard onher?
She nodded, “Okay.”
He gave her a small, cautious smile, “Okay.”
“Okay.” She tipped her drink athim.
“Okay.” He said again and she rolled her eyes because she knew he’d do this all night if she let him get away withit.
“You can go now.” She shooed him away, “Go find someone else to play your mind games with,Shaw.”
“But playing with you is so muchfun.”
She groaned, “If you stick around, I’m definitely going to need anotherdrink.”
That made him chuckle slightly, “Do one more thing for me and I’ll go find someone else to play my mind games with, as you so eloquently putit.”
“What?”
“Call me by my firstname.”
She raised an eyebrow at that, “What?”
A big shoulder rose slightly, “Your brother calls me Shaw. Down at the station, all the guys call me Shaw. It’s weird hearing it from you too. I don’t like it. We’ve known each other a long time. Long before I became Deputy Shaw. Call meConnor.”
Lulu squinted up at him, trying to figure out what game he was playing now. Everything he did had a purpose. He was always screwing with her and trying to throw her off balance. But for the life of her, she couldn’t figure out why he suddenly cared that she use his first name instead of hislast.
