Page 67 of Unbreakable
Popping up on the step stool behind the bar, I jumped up to get the sword from its decorative hanging spot. Except the sword was higher than it used to be. Or else I’d shrunk about a foot. While I tried to problem-solve whether I could climb all the way up on the bar, I distracted the couple with conversation.
“See that basketball hoop over there?” I asked, gesturing to the hoop adjacent to the bar. A bucket hung under it to catch corks. This was a game my brother and I came up with in high school. We opened sparkling bottles with a sword and aimed the corks through the hoop and into the bucket. It ended up becoming a phenomenon, with Food and Wine coming out to interview us.
“No way,” the man said.
“We’ll see if I still can. I’m way out of practice,” I said.
I hiked my knee up on the bar, not wanting to put my dirty shoe up there. I wobbled and almost fell, until large, warm hands captured my hips.
“Got you,” Andy said, low.
I was startled by his closeness, his grip. “Oh, thanks.” His steadying me actually did help and I was able to snag the sword. As I descended, Andy’s hands slid to my waist, facing our fronts together.
Sunshine burst into the room as the tall oak doors opened. A lone figure was silhouetted in the blinding light, a voice booming from it. “Get your hands off my wife.”
Andy didn’t let me go as my eyes widened and I turned toward the voice, a voice I knew like my own. My heart thudded, my stomach tightening.
“Dylan?” I still held the sheathed sword as I tore out of Andy’s grasp.
“You okay?” Andy asked under his breath. I ignored him, walking toward the bar and getting hemmed in by it.
Dylan rushed toward me, concern knitting his brow. “Jeannie.”
“I, uh, Andy, can you do the honors?” I asked, handing him the sword with shaking hands. The couple sat with gaping mouths and raised eyebrows. Dylan kept his eyes on me as he came around the counter, slamming his hip into it because he wasn’t watching where he was going.
“You’re here,” I whispered when he got to me.
Dylan held both my hands, panting as he looked down at me. “I’m here.”
“Um, J, I’m technically not working right now,” Andy interrupted with a tap to my waist.
Dylan shot him a glare that, were his eyes laser beams, could have withered Andy down to dust. Sweat broke out on his palms where he still held my hands. “I’m sure you could clock in, big guy,” Dylan grumbled. “And if you’re her boss, I’m certain you shouldn’t be touching my wife the way you were.”
While some patriarchally brainwashed part of me was folding at Dylan’s ‘my wife’ routine, I could fight my own battles.
“Well, Dylan, maybe Jeanine wouldn’t be here in the first place if you treated her with the respect a wife deserves?—”
“If you two are done with your dick-measuring contest,” I shouted, silencing them, “I’ll open this bottle.”
The couple at the bar looked like they were about to explode at this soap opera scene going down, and frankly, I would have been too. What had my life become? My husband, the father of my children, was fighting with my brother’s best friend and my ex-boyfriend to defend my honor or prove their ownership of me, or something equally ridiculous.
Still, it’s not like there wasn’t anything to it. Dylan was well aware of my history with Andy, and one wrong move could land my husband with an assault charge.
Neither Andy nor Dylan moved, their stares locked. I was sandwiched between the two of them, heat pulsing off their bodies. I shimmied out from between them, reaching back in to get the sword from Andy. I put on a bright smile, plucked the bottle off the bar, peeled off the foil, and untied the cage.
I unsheathed the sword and positioned it at the bottle’s neck. “Ready?”
“Wait, wait, let me get my phone,” the woman said, snapping out of her amazed daze and reaching for her back pocket. She got her phone out and gave me a thumbs-up.
Dylan stood behind me and leaned a hip on the bar, boxing Andy out. Neither of them had left, hovering over me. They both had their arms crossed like they’d assumed their roles as my bodyguard from the other.
With a clean slice, I sent the blade up the bottle. The cork flew off with a satisfying pop, followed by two thuds as it hit the backboard and went into the bucket.
“Still got it!” I laughed.
The couple cheered and Dylan bent over my shoulder to kiss my cheek before I filled the two champagne flutes.
“You did good, baby,” he cooed in my ear. Dylan couldn’t have been claiming me more if he took his dick out and peed on me. I blushed as I poured, then dropped the couple’s bottle into an ice bucket. I didn’t realize how much I missed Dyl, his scent, the way his warmth radiated into my back, his lips on me.
