Offensive Behavior (Sidelined #1)

by Ainslie Paton

  She hoped she’d seen the last of his god-awful handsome face, his judgmental scowl that was kind of hot, and his surprisingly muscular body. And if she ever heard his imperious I know better tone again it would also be too soon.

  She let herself out and wondered if he’d remember she was ever there.

  FIVE

  Reid woke with a sour taste in his mouth, a churning gut and a vague suspicion there was someone in the apartment with him. He was burning up, thirsty; either the whole room had entered another dimension, one that pulsed, or it was his head. He pushed upright and then he remembered. Lux put him in a cab. She’d gotten him home. Holy shit, he’d just about hurled all over her. He closed his eyes as the world tilted.

  “Lux. Hey, anyone there?” What day was it? It was day, that much he could tell, through eyes that didn’t want to open. “Anyone.” He listened. Silence.

  He pushed the bed coverings away and got himself upright. Made it to the bathroom, where a glance in the mirror confirmed that notion about the other dimension. He looked like he’d been slammed by a time machine, and pulled backward kicking and screaming through a black hole.

  He was pale, sweating, smudges under his eyes that didn’t rub off, hair doing its best electric shock. He smelled foul too, body odor and alcohol and what the heck happened to his hand? A vague recollection of tripping, going down on his hands and knees. Yup, knees felt bruised.

  A shower improved things. Toothpaste. Water guzzled. But that was the extent of it. He made it back to bed and next thing he knew there was definitely someone in the apartment. In the kitchen to be precise.

  Was Lux still here? He’d told her to go, but she’d flipped him off, was that a memory or a dream? It was dark again. Had she been asleep all day? He hauled himself upright and rubbed his hands through his hair, then made the long, knee trembling, stumbling trek to the kitchen. It wasn’t Lux’s pert, squeezable backside poked out of his refrigerator.

  “Dev.”

  Dev straightened, knocking his head on a shelf and making the condiments in the door rattle. “Month of Sundays. What are you doing here? You’re not meant to be here.”

  Because Dev was more comfortable sneaking food into the kitchen when Reid wasn’t home than he was being acknowledged for doing it. Reid fumbled for the kitchen stool and sat.

  “Cripes, what happened to your hand? What happened to you?”

  “Food poisoning.”

  Dev’s head tilted hard right. “No way. Unless you messed up with the rice. Did you cook it like I showed you?”

  “Not from your food.” A good portion of which Reid threw out, because he wasn’t hungry when he was drunk.

  Dev flashed his perfect teeth. “Well, then, that’s okay.”

  “I could be dying and you’re happy it’s not from your food.”

  Dev made a circular motion around his face, then his smile was replaced by a grimace. “Stop eating bad food, Reid. Why do you think I cook for you? “

  Doing nice things for people was how Dev lived. It was his thing, alongside being the kind of software engineer who could smell a bug before it was programmed.

  “Because I’m a philistine who wouldn’t know a well-cooked meal if it tried to eat me, and you’re trying to hold on to a friendship that only existed through work.” Reid coughed.

  Dev put a glass of water in front of him. “Look who’s sorry for himself. What did you eat?”

  “Shrimp.”

  “Oh, bad seafood, that could actually kill you.”

  “Thanks for the reassurance, doc.”

  “And you know, binge drinking and fighting. That could kill you too.”

  So Owen had been talking. Reid held his hands up. “I tripped. This is gravel rash. Owen should’ve said it’s not binge drinking. It’s full-time alcoholism.”

  Dev clucked his tongue. “What would your mother think? Mine would whack into you.”

  “Owen tried the sympathy route. I see you’re going with shame.”

  Dev took Reid’s empty glass, washed it, dried it and put it away. Reid didn’t have the energy to point out Dev should’ve thrown it at his head instead. “Thank you for the food.”

  Dev stopped wiping the sink, then made a show of sticking his finger in his ear as if he was having trouble hearing. Reid tried to remember the last time he’d said thank you for one of Dev’s kindnesses and couldn’t. He got up from the stool and dragged his feet back along the hall. Dev would let himself out and Reid intended to sleep until he felt like it made sense to be awake and if it didn’t, it’s not like anyone other than Mom would miss him and she’d wait till Christmas to do it.

  It was light again when Reid woke and his head felt like it was normal size and the walls weren’t closing in on him. He listened to the apartment and was satisfied he was alone. Dev was the only person with an access override code, so even if Lux wanted to check up on him she couldn’t.

  He flexed his hand. It’d scabbed up, the skin felt tight and dry enough to crack open and bleed again. Had she seen him fall? He felt his face heat and it was either the fever still or embarrassment. He’d watched Lux take down a guy five times her size in the alley and step around him like he was a mere curiosity and he’d said obnoxious things to her that implied she’d deserved that trouble. But that’s not what he’d meant.

  She should be safe leaving her work, same as he was leaving anywhere. He’d meant it wasn’t safe for her to have to exit Lucky’s by their back entrance, it was dark, and the perfect place to be ambushed. But he hadn’t explained himself and he’d been amused enough at her umbrage that he’d laughed when she called him a dickhead.

  He was a dickhead.

  And that next night, the night he felt sick, she’d blown him a kiss from the stage—a kiss off more like, and then used her body to show him what he was missing out on. He’d sat there transfixed while she tossed her hair and spread her legs and danced in that little ripped to ribbons black dress like she was deliberately trying to make his lungs seize and his heart expand till it punched out his chest.

  He’d flushed hot and cold and his head spun and eventually he’d realized it wasn’t lust writhing in his gut and he had more than a headache going on.

  He was an asshole who’d mouthed off at Lux and barfed all over himself, and yet she’d stopped to help him, gone out of her way to bring him home and stand over him till he was safely comatose.

  His stomach churned and it wasn’t from hunger. He’d been acting like a spoilt brat and it was time to get real. This was rock bottom of the pity fest he’d been on.

  There was nothing he could do about Owen or Dev right away. Too much history between them and no clue how to set it right, but he could do something about Lux.

  Of course, Lux, couldn’t be her real name, but that’s all he had for her. He sent flowers care of Lucky’s. It was a start, but since bastards who assumed she was theirs to take by force probably did slick things like send flowers too, it wasn’t enough. He wanted Lux to know he was astonishingly grateful for what she’d done, that he appreciated it, and was sorry for being . . . just being an asshole who was hopeless with people.

  He needed to apologize face to face. It was the kind of thing he’d had a lot of practice at. The kind of thing those he was apologizing to usually enjoyed immensely.

  And once he’d done that, he’d quit obsessing about her, move on, maybe learn to cook, or travel, or go build houses in Cambodia, ask a woman on a date, anything that had potential to make him a better person.

  It was another two days before he stopped feeling dizzy and weak and left the apartment. It was the first time he’d felt motivated by anything other than getting plastered since his exit from Plus. He went to Lucky’s and when the regular hostess who served him came over with his usual rotgut he asked her name.

  She laughed and put the glass down. “Absence made the heart grow fonder, did it?”

  “What?” Cinnamon was on stage, which meant he’d missed Lux’s first set.

 
“We haven’t seen you in a while.”

  He looked at the woman. “That’s because your chef poisoned me.”

  “Holy shit, you had the surf and turf. I’ll go get Lou.”

  “No. I don’t want to complain.”

  She balanced her tray on one hip and tipped her head in the other direction. “You don’t?”

  “Nope. I don’t want that bourbon either. Just a Coke.”

  “As in pop?”

  “Yep.”

  She shook her head. “Honey, you can’t sit here and not drink alcohol?”

  He looked directly into her heavily made-up eyes and didn’t blink. “Why not?”

  She blinked, but held his stare. Impressive. “Because that’s how we make money. No cover charge.”

  “Do I look like I want a lesson in dive bar economics?” That didn’t come out the way he’d thought it would, she wasn’t smiling.

  “You look like a bear crawled up your rear.”

  He almost laughed. Why hadn’t he flirted with her, she was fun. Because he didn’t have the first idea how to flirt, that’s why. “What’s your name?”

  “Violet.”

  “Your real name.”

  She leaned forward, still holding eye contact. “That is my stupid, useless mother-given, goddamn real name.” She gestured to the glass. That’s on the house since we mighta killed you. I’ll get your Coke.”

  Hmm. That hadn’t gone as he’d hoped. He’d hoped he might get to Lux through Violet. He didn’t want to ambush Lux outside the bar, that was a terrible option, but he didn’t want to sit at the edge of the stage and throw money at her either. He watched Violet on her way back to him. When she drew level with the table he held up a fifty. She looked at him like he’d slapped her.

  “What’s wrong now?”

  “A fifty. I bring you a kid’s drink and you tip me a fifty. That’s not how this works.”

  “How does it work then?”

  “With you, I don’t know. With most normal men, they stare at my tits, call me Vi, tell me I’m gorgeous even though we all know I passed gorgeous two decades ago. I bring them overpriced drinks, we flirt, they tip, we all have a good time. But you.” She shook her head, her red lips pursed. “You sit there with storm clouds rumbling above your head, and you don’t speak, and no one wants to serve you even though you tip well, and you barely acknowledge my existence.”

  It wasn’t news to be told he could inspire bad weather. “I noticed you.”

  “Like you’d notice if your dick fell off. Look, I get it, you’ve got a thing for Lux, but she’s never going to talk to you.”

  “Did she say something?” Fricking hell, did he sound like a wet behind the ears schoolboy? Hell yes, he did.

  “She’s not like that and she has a boyfriend. Sent a whole florist shop this week, so she doesn’t need no loser barfly.”

  What’s the bet there was no flower sending boyfriend. “If I wanted to get a message to her?”

  “You know there are plenty of bars where you can get up close and personal with the girls. This ain’t one of them. This the cleanest damn strip club in the US of A, unless you count the kitchen, and you don’t want to have anything more to do with what goes on in there.”

  “How do I get a message to Lux?”

  Violet shifted her weight hip to hip. “I just told you, you don’t.”

  He pulled a hundred from his wallet and held it in front of her. “How do I get a message to Lux?”

  She shook her head. “I’ll bring you kid’s drinks, but I won’t sell out one of our girls.”

  “So if I held up another two hundred bucks and all I wanted was for you to deliver a message to Lux, you wouldn’t take it?”

  “Make that three hundred and you’ve got a deal.”

  He whistled. “You drive a hard bargain, Vi.” He’d have paid twice that. Just for the game of it. “Tell Lux, Reid would like to speak to her in person.”

  “I’ll tell her, but I’m not guaranteeing she’ll agree and I get to keep the money whatever happens.”

  He nodded and handed her the cash and an envelope. “And give her that.”

  Violet took the cash and tucked it into her waistband. She tapped the envelope against her lip. “This better not be drugs. She does drugs, Lou will can her.”

  “It’s not drugs.”

  “What is it then?”

  “Private.”

  She sighed. “You ever stop hanging around here you’ve got a career as a lawman, I reckon. Bossy enough.”

  “That cash self-destructs in fifteen minutes.”

  “All right, all right. I’m going.”

  Vi backed away, using his envelope to fan her face. He watched her go to the bar, take out another tray of drinks and then disappear off the floor. A dancer Reid had never seen before was on stage, so nervous she’d stumbled twice and looked like she was ready to burst into tears.

  He watched for Vi to come back, figured she’d bring a message, because Lux never came down from the stage. None of the girls did. He pulled his cell out and sat it on the table, because once Lux read his note she might call instead. He wanted this to be painless, for her to choose how they interacted again instead of having the hassle of him foisted on her.

  What he got was Vi with another Coke. “I told her. I gave her the note.”

  “And.”

  Vi shrugged. “And nothing.”

  “She did not say nothing.”

  “Nothing for your ears.”

  There was a burst of raucous laughter from the stage area, the new girl had taken a tumble.

  He went for his wallet. Vi put her hand out and grinned. “You know I’m splitting this with her.”

  He grunted. “I don’t care what you do with it, take another message. Ask her, yes or no?”

  Vi sauntered off before he could suggest his money might burn a hole in her bra if she held onto it too long before finding Lux.

  He watched the new girl humiliate herself. She was pretty in a blonde, fake tan, big teeth kind of way. Lux was a brunette. He much preferred her less brash style and when Vi came back, he raised his brows at her expectantly.

  “Told her.”

  “Is this how flirting works? I pay you to do something and you do it so incompetently I’m forced into paying up again?”

  “I liked you better when you sat there and oozed a miasma of gloom.”

  “Miasma of gloom?” That was a new one.

  She shrugged. “I read a lot.”

  He locked onto Vi’s eyes with the kind of contact that made people squirm, got him called too intense. “What did she say?”

  Violet blinked twice and curled her cherry red lip. “I could tell you but then I’d have to kill you.”

  Good God, this woman had armor-plating under her tiny skirt. He’d obviously underestimated her, showed his hand too soon. He went for his wallet again. He could do this all night if it’s what it took.

  He wasn’t ready for a warm hand to fold over his and lower it to the tabletop. There was no way to be ready for the vision of Lux in silver snakeskin. Hell, what was that she was wearing? Bare legs, most of her torso naked. What there was of the outfit wrapped around her tight little body, cupping her breasts, skimming her ribs and hips, leaving everything to his imagination.

  All he got out was a strangled. “Wow,” and she let go his hand.

  Vi laughed. “I see you’ve got this covered, Lux, girl. Don’t let Lou catch you out here.”

  He pulled it together to say, “Please don’t break the rules on my account. I don’t want to cause you trouble.”

  “Don’t you think that horse bolted?” Lux said. She had his envelope. She had a husky voice, like she’d been shouting all night. It curled around his face and made him want to breathe deep. “What’s this about?”

  All that creamy skin up close, the big bright eyes he couldn’t see from the stage, the perfect bow of her pink lips. She was like adrenaline injected into his brain stem. She crackled through his spine
, fizzed in his lungs and drilled holes in his senses.

  “I, ah.”

  She lifted a hand in an answer me gesture like he was wasting her time.

  He shook his head, closed his eyes momentarily to collect himself before he looked at her again. “Yes or no?”

  “Thank you for the flowers. They’re lovely. But by sending them here, you caused me a problem.”

  “What kind of problem?”

  She took a breath that swelled her sweet breasts and made a sound of exasperation when she let it go. “Are you going to ask me my shoe size as well?”

  He shook his head.

  “How about you take it on face value that your flowers caused me issues backstage.”

  “You had to say I was your boyfriend.” That word boyfriend was somehow as erotically charged in his mouth as the swish of Lux’s glossy ponytailed hair against her shoulder. “You don’t want people in your business.”

  She gave a sharp nod that felt like approval, like she’d thought about patting his stray puppy self on his goofy head.

  “And I got the message.” She put the envelope on the table, it was unopened. She slid it toward him. “You’re welcome. Put please don’t try to make something out of this. I did what anyone would do.”

  “No, that’s not true. You’re the only one who checked to see if I was breathing.”

  “I kicked you. I didn’t go Nurse Jackie on you.”

  “You got me home and you cleaned me up and you had no reason to do any of that after I was so insufferable.”

  “You’re not drunk tonight.” Her eyes went to the untouched bourbon and the half-filled Coke glass.

  “No, I’m done with that.” She smiled but angled her face away. She didn’t believe it and he had nothing to support proof of concept. “And I do need to make something out of this.” He tapped the envelope. Inside was an invitation for a meal out and his cell number. “I want to thank you face to face. I want to invite you to dinner to show you my appreciation.”