One Last Shot (Cupid's Conquests) (2 page)

“Take a shot with us!”
o
ne of the girls squealed.

“I’m working tonight, ladies. Next time,”
Shelby
said with a wink.
It took a sober bar owner to keep an eye on all the drunks, but these girls certainly weren’t her type of drinking partners anyway. She turned back to the dirty glasses, s
loshing more through the hot water
as
she watched
Justin
and his party from the corner of her eye. She’d heard he was back in town, but she never figured he
’d
set foot
in
her daddy’s bar. Not that there were too many choices in a town of thirty-thousand
and
Shooters was
the cleanest by far
. S
he
’d
just assumed he’d make the drive into
Dallas
to celebrate, or whatever it was he was doing. It was hard to tell with
the
swarm of people
buzz
ing around him, asking for autographs and pictures.
He’d be on a hundred Facebook pages before the end of the night.

And t
here he was in the
center,
soaking up all the attention, flashing
the
million-dollar smile that
still
sparked a flame inside her
that
lick
ed
across her skin
, igniting every nerve
. She cursed her body’s reaction. It had been ten years since those hands caressed every curve and crevice of her body. No, not those hands—the nervous, but determined hands of a boy, exploring a
girl
for the first time. Heat gathered between her thighs
.
Fuck!
How could he still affect her after all this time?

“
Leah
,
can you bring some more Buds from the back?”
Crystal
called.

“I’ll get them,”
Shelby
offered.
She hoped the girls couldn’t see the desperation she felt, but if she didn’t get a minute to calm herself down
,
she was going to do something she’d regret.

“It’s okay, Shel,”
Leah
said.

“Go clean table seven. I’ll get the beers.”
Shelby
ducked into the back room
,
l
eaned her forehead against the cool metal of the liquor shelves
and tried
to catch her breath.
Damn him all to hell and back! I can handle hundreds of liquored up patrons a night, but one smile and I’m hiding in the freaking store room.

#

Justin
smiled to cover the wince as one more ex-classmate clapped him on the back, sending a stab of
pain through his torn shoulder. He blinked away the flash from another camera and caught a familiar face out of the corner of his eye
—a
nd his heart nearly stopped.
Shelby Stephens.
Forcing himself to breath
e
, he glanced
through the crowd
as often as
he dared. She’d lost
the softness of youth, but there was a tightness to her
features
that
only made her more striking. He got an eyeful as she leaned across the bar, handing two beers to a cowboy. Her black Shooters t-shirt
curved over her breasts and hugged her flat stomach. His fingers
flexed
at the thought of running across her bare skin
like
he’d done so many years ago.

“You okay,
Justin
?”
Sean
asked.

“
Sure,
I just wasn’t expecting all th
is
.
”

“You’re the hometown hero.”

“Yeah.”
Justin
tipped back his beer, swallowing until the bottle was empty. He’d come home to get away from the attention,
and
,
he had to admit, this was better than the blur of paparazzi, fake tans, and even faker friends that littered the landscape in L.A.
He just hoped the novelty
of his presence
would wear off sooner than later.

“Dance with me,
Justin
.”
Cynthia pouted and wiggled her manicured
nails
in his direction.

Sean
must have read the distaste in
Justin
’s
face because he leaned in and said, “She’s yours for the night
.
Y
ou might as well take advantage.”

The last thing Justin wanted was to have this girl climbing him on the dance floor in front of the entire bar, but he
bit his tongue and
accepted her hand, leading her to the edge of the dance floor.
Sean couldn’t wrap his head around the fact that
Justin
wanted to be challenged by a woman, not offered a free ride.

Cynthia
pressed in close and teased his ear with her tongue
. A
shiver traile
d down the back of his neck
despite himself
. Sliding one arm
around her tiny waist
,
he
led off, maneuvering her through the circle of dancers
. He
s
hift
ed
his eyes
to the bar as often as possible
,
trying to catch a glimpse of
Shelby
. He started to worry
Shelby
had
left when she
stepped through a door leading to
the back, her arms weighed down with a case of beer.
Even after what she’d done to him, h
e couldn’t
keep a grin from
spread
ing across his face as memories rose in his mind of
th
ose
summers spent stocking her dad’s back room, hauling cases back and forth
, muscles taut, sweat sparkling on her neck
.
Besides
,
a body rival
ing
anything manufactured in
L.A.
, a
ll the lifting
had given
her a right hook nearly as deadly as any of the guys he
’d
played ball with
over the years
.

The crowd applauded the end of the song and
Justin
thanked God for short country songs as he led Cynthia back to the table. She didn’t complain
,
which told him the dance was more about staking her claim in front of the other women in the bar than enjoying the song. Just like
L.A.
, it was more about
appearances than substance.

“Why don’t we take this little party back to your place?” Cynthia
asked
, leaning her hip ag
ainst the table, posing like she expected a flash to go off at any second
.

Justin
resisted the urge to look around for a camera.
“Get me
another beer,” he said to Sean
. “I’ll be right back.” He turned and stalked to
the
restroom. It was empty except for a chubby attendant sitting on a barstool next to the sinks. He wasn’t sure Shooters rated bathroom attendants, but he shrugged it off and gave the man a polite smile before leaning over the sink to splash water on his face.

He was as tan as he’d been all those summers ago. Then it was days working construction and weekends at the lake
.
N
ow it was from
L.A.
traffic jams in convertibles.
But when he stared hard enough, he could still see the shimmer of the boy he’d once been, eager to leave this town behind and take on the world.
All that felt like a century ago.

Justin
thanked the man as he handed him a paper towel.

“You look like you’re having
a rough night,” the man said.

“Could be worse.”
Justin
wiped the last drops from his chin and neck. The
air cooled
his skin, but there was still a
tired, pinched look to his eyes—too many years of being on the road and too many nights spent nursing an aching shoulder.

“Only if it involves a woman.” There was
a playful glint in
the attendant’s
eye.

“It always involves a woman, doesn’t it?”
Or at least one woman.
Every time Justin thought
Shelby
was out of his mind, another memory would surface, bringing a rush of bittersweet longing.

“You know what they say, if y
o
u love someone, set them free.”

Justin
tossed the paper
towel in the trash and dug in his pocket for a dollar. “No, I’m not in love. There
’s
no one to set free,” he said, handing the man his tip.

“No?” The
attendant
cocked his head and
Justin
found himself
captivated by
the
man’s
searching gaze. “Maybe
yo
u were the one who was set free, but even freedom has its price.
” The man pressed something into his hand and
Justin
looked down to see a quarter resting in his palm.

“I don’t need change
.
”

“We all need change
.” He
walked out the door, leaving
Justin
to wonder if he was really an attendant or just some drunk who’
d wandered into the bathroom. He shoved the quarter in his pocket and winced. Jerking his hand back out
,
he found a single drop of blood welling up in the center of his hand. He tapped his pocket, but only felt the quarter and pulled it out, rubbing it between his finger and thumb. It felt like any other quarter he’d ever held, but something caught his eye and he brought it closer to his face. One of the arrows clutched in the eagle’s claw gleamed gold. He tilted the coin back and forth and when the light caught it again, it was silver, like it probably always had been.
Justin
rinsed the blood from his hand and shook his head
,
trying to decide if he’d had too much to drink tonight or not enough. He tossed the paper towel and walked back to the table where three expectant faces waited for him.

“Have you had enough nostal
gia for the night?”
Sean
asked.

“I’m in no hurry to go,”
Justin
said.

Sean
gave a pointed look to the two women then to
Justin
who
ignored the look and
snagged the fresh beer off the table
.
“I’ll tell you what,
Sean
. We can leave now, but you gotta arm wrestle for it.”

“What?”
Sean
chuckled. “You’re in no shape for that.
I can’t have you losing face in front of the hometown crowd.
”

“Not me. Her.”
Justin
tipped
his bottle toward the bar and winked at Shelby
,
who spun and started rearranging bottles on the shelf behind the bar.
She’s nervous.
Nervous was a hell of a lot better than pissed.
He chuckled and looked back to
Sean
. “You up for it?”

“You want me to arm wrestle a girl?”

“Yep.”

“If I win, we go?”

“Yep.”

“I think all this clean air is messing with your head.”

“Maybe, but I’ve got a hundred bucks on the
girl
.”
He pulled a bill from his money clip and
slapped
it on the table.

Sean
looked to the bar then back to the restless
women s
itting at their table.
Justin
could tell he’d do just about anything to get out of
here
and into one of them.

“Fine.”

Justin
waived
Leah
over and asked her to get
Shelby
.

“It’s your funeral,”
Leah
said and
headed
to the bar.
Shelby
shook her head and
Leah
continued to talk. He read her lips say, “Son of a bitch,” and he knew she’d come. Sure enough, she tossed a bar rag o
ver
her shoulder and marched
to the table. His pulse spiked as he watched her move toward him, his cock hardening at the thought of them alone in the bar like all those summers ago.
She was sexier than ever with her chestnut hair swept into a loose ponytail and her dark jeans hugging her thighs.
Half of him wanted to grab
her
and scream at her for disappearing ten years ago and the other half, the half below
his
belt, wanted a very different kind of grabbing and screaming.
His palm began to sting again
.
H
e clenched his fist and focused on the beautifully angry wom
a
n striding up to the table.