One Last Shot (Cupid's Conquests) (4 page)

She grabbed a bottle of Crown Royal from the shelf and filled the bottom of her glass.

“To what
should have been,” the man said, lifting his tumbler.

She cocked her head then thought,
What the hell
. “To what should
’ve
been.”

They clinked glasses
and she threw back the shot
, slamming the
tumbler
on the bar. Fire burned down her throat and lit inside her gut, sparking a relaxing heat in her belly
that slowly
filtered
through her body. But her lip stung like she’d bitten it and she noticed a dark
smudge
on the glass.

She tucked her lip between her teeth, running her tongue across the surface and tasted blood. Grabbing a napkin she pressed it to her lip and stared at the glass. The etched arrow shone gold in the dim bar lights and she did a double take at the drop of blood resting on
it’s tip
, as though it had been the cause of her pierced lip.

“Thanks
for the drink
,” she said
,
looking up
. T
he
man was gone. She glanced across the room, but he was lost in the
thinning
crowd
,
n
othing left but his glass with a twenty tucked beneath it.

Chapter Two

Bar cleaned and registers balanced,
Shelby
hugged the girls good night and locked up the bar.
The bouncer leaned against the wall near the door, watching the
waitresses
make their way to their cars.

“Thanks, John,”
Shelby
said.

“
Hell of a night
. You okay?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

He gave her a pointed look and she knew he was talking about
Justin
. Her lip pulsed and she nodded. “I’m good, but thanks.”

“Drive safe.”

“Always.”

She
slid into the Mustang
and
waited for
John to climb into his pickup
before
head
ing
to the home she’d grown up in. Less than ten minutes and she was across town, pulling into
the
d
riveway.
Spotlighted on the s
teps
sat a familiar form
.
Her hand shook as she locked the
Mustang
and walked to the front door
, keys fisted in her palm
.
Justin
waited
on the step, a six
-
pack of beer at his feet.

“
I was hoping you’d let me buy you a
drink
,” he said
,
raising a bottle toward her.
The porch light
shimmered off the
golden streaks in his hair. It was longer than she’d last seen on T.V., but it made him look younger again, like when they were in school together.

She swallowed the memory and asked,
“Where are the Barbies?”

“
Sean
took them off my hands for the night.”
She was glad to see he didn’t look to
o
disappointed about that.

“How thoughtful.”
Her lip
throbbed
as a
desire pulsed between
her thighs.
Dammit! How could his sitting on the porch do that to
me
!
“One drink.” She grabbed the bottle, twisted the cap off, and downed a third of
it
.

“You always
did hold
your liquor better than me
.
”

“Well I am a bar owner. It kinda comes with the territory.”

“I guess so. Look, I was real sorry to hear about your dad. I would have been here for the services, but we were playing a double-header in
L.A.
”

“I go
t
the flowers, though. They were beautiful.”
Most of that week had been a blur to her
,
and she’d had warring emotions about him coming home anyway. Part of her was glad his celebrity status hadn’t distracted from her father’s memory
,
but
,
more than anything, she’d wished he’d been there to hold her.

“I wanted to do more, but…I didn’t know if it would be welcome.”

She
didn’t know what to say
to that
so she
took another pull on her beer, swallowing her rising guilt. Walking away back then was the right thing to do, for both of them. That’s what she kept telling herself anyway,
even if her
heart never
did
agree.

“
Did I screw up? Did you realize you weren’t in love?”

Suddenly the label on her beer bottle became intensely interesting.

“
Where’d you run off to, Shel? I came back from the All-Star Tournament and you were gone.”

He deserved the truth or some version of it, but the words got stuck in her throat. How do you tell someone you let their parents pay you to leave? He was going to give up a scholarship and a possible career because she was staying home for school. By walking away, he’d gotten his shot at the Majors and she’d gotten the education her dad couldn’t afford.

“I asked around,” he continued. “But even your dad wouldn’t tell me. I thought it’d be impossible to keep a secret from this town, but somehow you did it.”

“Bullshit.”
She may have walked away, but he damn sure
could have tried harder to find her
.

“What?”

“My dad talked about me all the time. Every time I came back to visit people were asking me about all the stories my dad told them. If you’d really wanted to know, you could have found out. You just didn’t ask the right people.”
Her guilt only went so far. She turned her back, but he sure as hell hadn’t searched too far and that stung more than anything.

He looked like he wanted to argue, but his shoulders slumped and he said, “Maybe you’re right,” and took another swig from his bottle. “So what have you been doing all this time?”

She was glad for the change in topic; she didn’t have the energy to hang onto her anger tonight anyway.
“I went to school, got a business degree
,
and worked in a high rise making money for someone else. And when things got really bad here, I came home.”

“That’s it?”

“Pretty much.”
There wasn’t a lot more to tell without confessions being made and there was no way she was up for that tonight.

“No friends? No travels? No lovers?”

“You wanna tell me about your lovers over the last decade?”

He chuckled. “Hell no.”

“Good, cause I don’t want to hear it.”

“Jealous?”
That cocky grin of his twisted her insides and she was torn between climbing onto his lap or outright smacking him.

“You wish
.
An endless stream of plastic girls is not that exciting. I’d probably die of boredom right here on the steps.” She winked, but the laughter had drained from his face.

“It wasn’t like that
, Shel
. There were a lot of girls around, but you know me better than that.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” And she
was
.
She’d always feared his memories of her had been washed away in a sea of peroxide and silicone. Those kind of girls had never been his type, but fame has a way of corrupting even the best people. She was damn glad to hear he hadn’t changed that much.

He took a swig of his own be
er then stared at the bottle dangling from her left hand.
“I guess I should go now.”

“I haven’t finished my drink yet.”
She’d
been
scared and pissed when he’d
waltzed
into the bar earlier, but
an ache deep inside did
n’t want him to
walk away
just yet. Not now that the
y
were alone.

“I don’t want to wake your husband,” he said
,
standing up. “I just wanted to see you
without the audience
.”

“Husband?
”

He
pointed
at the ring
on her finger
.

“
Oh
.
” She smoothed her thumb across the gold band, twirling it around her finger. “It’s my mom’s,” she
said
softly.

“
Oh.
I’m sorry, Shel. I just thought
—
”

“It’s okay.”

He grabbed her left hand
and
r
an
the band between his finger and thumb.
Her mind screamed at her to pull away, but her body wanted to pull him closer.
His touch
sent shock waves across her nerves
and her lip tingled
like she’d just had half
of
a bottle of tequila, not half
of
a bottle of beer
. It was all she could do not to close the space between them, but she didn’t have to.
One small tug
and she wa
s in his arms, h
is hand clutch
ing
her belt
as his lips crashed into hers.

“Get a room!”
s
omeone yelled from a truck that flew down the road. They both chuckled and
Shelby
dropped her forehead to his chest.

“You should probably
—
”

“Keys,” he said.
Her head snapped up.
The look in his eye sent
shivers across her skin
. She hesitated only a second before
hand
ing
them
over. He unlocked the door and jerked her inside before she had time to protest. His mouth was on hers
again
as he kicked the door shut behind them. Their tongues
entwined
and she
went
weak with need, clutching his shirt as he
slammed
her against the wall, his cock grinding into her.
God it had been awhile since a man had taken control
like this.

Suppressed
frustrations churned
in
to a desperate heat
. It was like reliving their first time. T
hey were young and so eager for th
e
first taste of each other.
She’d replayed that moment in her mind countless times and now he was finally here, in her arms again.
His hands slid to her butt,
lifting her up
.
She w
rapp
ed
her legs around him
as
she found the spot she’d been searching for
and thrust her hips up and down
. He moved against her,
heat blazed
through her, but it still wasn’t enough.
H
is tongue slid up her neck and his teeth grazed her ear
lobe
and suddenly it was too much
.
Lacing
her fingers in his hair
,
she
pulled his head back. One more
flick of his tongue across
her ear and she
just might
come before they even got their clothes off.

His eyes burned
with
so much more than lust. Her
breath caught in her throat at the emotion displayed there. She’d told herself she’d never do this again. She knew it would break her heart to touch him and not get to keep him, but the need inside her stopped the words cold. He was here and he still wanted her after all this time. Tomorrow be damned, she wasn’t letting go of tonight.

She couldn’t tell what he read in her own eyes, but
h
e turned
and
head
ed
to the living room.
He stumbled his way th
r
ough the entry, nearly losing his balance as he trailed kisses down her neck to that
sensitive
spot on her collarbone. She gasped, clutching him tighter as h
e set her on the arm of the couch and pulled back.