“Uh, Brennan? A TV crew just pulled into the parking lot, and the upstairs phone has been ringing off the wall with people looking for you. Something about wanting the big story straight from the source?”
Brennan’s gut dropped low enough to turf his kneecaps, and Adrian lifted a shadowy brow, finally throwing his two cents into the conversation.
“Better go somewhere else if you want normal, dude. Looks like we’re gonna be fresh out for a while.”
Three hours and a whole lot of avoiding the front of the house later, Brennan was out of options. Adrian and Teagan might’ve been able to get rid of all the nosy-ass reporters, but the Double Shot’s dining room was still brimming with locals wanting to get a glimpse of their “hometown hero.” The waitstaff had been steadily turning tables since they’d popped the front doors open at four o’clock, and if the volume and intensity of Adrian’s gruff kitchen directives were any indication, they were headed for the weeds in both the back of the house and behind the bar, all before the dinner shift even got into full swing. Brennan’s servers needed all the help they could get, and that meant he was going to have to take one for the team.
A big one.
Brennan shifted his weight in a move he’d given far too much play tonight, his cross-trainers squeaking against the well-traveled kitchen floor by the door to the bar. His back felt like a team full of ringers had used it for batting practice, and he pressed a palm into the throbbing muscles under his gray T-shirt with a grimace.
“Teagan catches you making that face, and pissed won’t even begin to cover it.”
God damn. For a big guy, Adrian’s stealth was just not right. The fact that he didn’t miss even the slightest trick wasn’t lost on Brennan, either.
“I’m cool,” he said, dialing his expression to a nice, controlled easy-does-it. Brennan nodded down to the three plates in Adrian’s grip, snapping the corresponding ticket from the queue. “These going out the door?”
“Table nine.” Adrian didn’t let go of the plates, and although his words were clipped to the quick like always, Brennan caught the concern hiding beneath them. “You had a helluva morning. You sure you’re straight?”
“Yup.” At least, he would be when all this hype died down and he could slide back into the woodwork. Preferably with a heating pad and an extra PT session. “Absolutely.”
“Good.” The gravel in Adrian’s voice returned with a don’t-fuck-with-my-kitchen vengeance, and the thick, black tattoo on his forearm flexed as he passed over all three dishes in half as many seconds. “Because I’ve got six more just like ’em that need to go out the door on the fly. Let’s turn and burn a little, yeah?”
“I’m on it.” Balancing the plates over both hands and a forearm, Brennan shouldered his way past the swinging door to the dining room. The place was as packed as he’d ever seen it, with every available table occupied and standing room only two-deep at the bar. Teagan was a blur behind the stretch of mahogany and brass at the back of the restaurant, and whoa, even her father, Patrick, who owned the place, had slipped in beside her to help out. The air hung thick with noisy chatter and the clink of glassware and cutlery, the warm overhead light spilling down from the exposed wood beams of the ceiling just low enough to make the place cozy, even with the brimming crowd.
Brennan covered the hardwood beneath his feet in quick strides, sneaking in a breath of relief. If they were this busy all night, he should be able to avoid too much attention over what had happened this morning.
“Brennan? Oh my gracious me! It’s you!”
Or not.
“Hi, Mrs. Teasdale. How are you tonight?” Brennan shifted to a stop in front of table nine, lifting up the plate in his left hand. “Tuna melt, as usual, right?”
The elderly woman’s hand fluttered up to her throat as Brennan distributed everyone’s dinner with polite efficiency. “Look at you, so modest! As if you didn’t pull Matty Wilson out of a blazing inferno today.”
“It wasn’t nearly as dramatic as that. I’m glad Matthew’s okay, but really, I just got lucky,” Brennan said, hoping his smile didn’t look as ill-fitting as it felt. Mrs. Teasdale might mean well, but Pine Mountain’s small-town grapevine could withstand a nuclear apocalypse with a zombie invasion on top. The last thing he needed was to fuel the rumor mill.
“That’s not what Kitty Wilson said,” replied the woman next to Mrs. Teasdale. “She said you saved Matthew’s life. Everyone down at the Main Street Diner has been talking about it. Why, you’re a regular hometown hero!”
Brennan barely resisted wincing. “That’s nice of you to say, but really, I’m just a regular guy.”
“Nonsense,” Mrs. Teasdale clucked, picking up a red and green paper shopping bag from the chair next to her. “We’ve made you a little something. It’s just some Christmas cookies and a bit of my fruitcake to get you in the holiday spirit, but . . . well, the three of us old biddies have lived in Pine Mountain for a lot of years, and Kitty Wilson was born and raised here. We’re just so grateful for what you did for her, and for Matthew.”
“I’m just doing my job.”
The words were out before he could trap them, and damn his deeply rooted instincts. Brennan ratcheted up his smile and gestured to the back of the restaurant. “I mean, I need to get back to the kitchen, ladies. Thank you for the cookies. It’s, uh, really nice of you.”
Before the hot seat he’d parked himself right smack in the middle of could spontaneously combust, Brennan beelined back toward the kitchen. He tried to make steady work of running plates and helping behind the bar, but after the four-thousandth mention of the fire at Joe’s, he came perilously close to throwing in the towel.
“Another phone number for you, Brennan,” Teagan said, holding up a bar ticket smudged with red ink. “But I’ve gotta tell you, if these girls start flinging their unmentionables around, I’m going to have to draw the line.” Her sarcasm fell prey to the ear-to-ear smirk taking over her face, and Adrian met it with a gravelly chuckle as he hauled a tray of clean pint glasses to the slim stretch of countertop by the service alcove.
“Come on, Red. He pulled a kid from a burning building this morning. Give the guy a little credit.”
“I don’t want any credit. And I definitely don’t want anyone’s number,” Brennan argued, snapping the caps off a couple of Budweisers and sending them down the bar. Damn it, he never put stuff like this to words when he’d been a firefighter. He sure as shit wasn’t going to get gabby now that he wasn’t. “In fact, don’t you need help breaking down the kitchen?”
“Nice try.” Adrian edged past him, refilling the glassware shelves behind the bar only a hair faster than Teagan could empty them. “But we’re slammed out here. Jesse can handle breakdown on his own. Right now, we need all able bodies behind the wood. If I’m in the front of the house, you’re in the front of the house. You feel me?”
Well, hell. The guy had a point, and it wasn’t as if Brennan was a stranger to slinging drinks. Plus, as antsy as the crowd made him, a steady stream of customers at the bar would keep him focused and busy and in control.
Provided that none of them mentioned the words rescue, fire, or grocery store, he’d be money for the rest of the night.
“What can I get you?” Brennan placed a palm against the smooth wood of the bar, leaning in toward a middle-aged guy wearing a crisp button-down shirt and horn-rimmed glasses.
“Perrier with lime would be great.” The guy paused, throwing a quick but thorough perusal Brennan’s way. “Are you Brennan?”
His gut took a swan dive into a giant pool of suspicion. “Who’s asking?”
“Mike Trotter, Bealetown Bugle. Got some questions for you, if you don’t mind.” The reporter whipped a recording device from his pocket, aiming it under Brennan’s chin in a presumptuous thrust. “Tell me, what was going through your head when you ran inside that burning building today? Did you think you were going to make it out alive?”
Brennan dug deep for his calm, but da
mn, it took effort. “No comment.”
“Come on,” the guy tried again, closing in on Brennan’s personal space a little further with the recording device. “This is the biggest thing to happen in Pine Mountain in years, and the public deserves to know the real story. Fire and Rescue hasn’t released the boy’s name to the public yet. Can you tell us if you know him?”
Brennan resisted the urge to pop off with a two-word directive a little harsher than no comment, but he lowered the man’s drink to the bar with a heavy plunk instead. “Will this be it for you?”
“The stunt you pulled today drew some pretty serious speculation from one of my firefighter sources. Says that rescue you made is one in a million for a civilian. Do you have any training as a firefighter, Brennan?”
Adrian swooped in just as Brennan swallowed the bitter-edged yes burning a hole through his mouth.
“Do we have a problem here?” He unfolded to his entire six feet, five inches, crossing his arms over the cement wall of his chest with clear disdain as he stared at the reporter.
“I was just trying to get a story,” the man sputtered, pulling the recorder back in a nervous jerk. Adrian’s gaze narrowed to a thin-bladed stare, and he leaned halfway across the bar as the man’s Adam’s apple lifted over his shirt collar in a hard swallow.
“Get it somewhere else.”
Brennan waited until the reporter had slunk off his bar stool before turning to cock his head at Adrian. “You enjoying yourself over there, Gigantor?”
“Maybe.” But his satisfied smile marked the word as a massive understatement. “Look, I need reporters harassing my staff like I need a frigging prostate exam. Anyway, you’re part of the crew. I’ve got your back.”
The phrase sent a familiar ache through Brennan’s gut, but he tamped it down. He might be strung tighter than a fistful of butterfly knots right now, but man, this was too good to pass up. “Aw, you’re all hearts and unicorns, Holt.”
“Uh-huh. And I can still turn you into paste if the spirit moves me,” Adrian flipped back, his smile tripling in size. “Now can we tend some bar here, hero? Or are you gonna just stand there looking pretty?”
“Speaking of pretty,” Teagan interrupted, reaching between him and Adrian to pluck a bottle of tequila from the back shelf, “there’s a woman at the end of the bar who’s asking for you, Brennan.”
He bit back the urge to frown. “I told you, I really don’t want anyone’s phone number.”
Okay, so he hadn’t exactly dated anybody since moving to Pine Mountain, and yeah, it probably wouldn’t hurt him to try, but Brennan wasn’t interested in the kind of girl who’d go all starry eyed with rescue syndrome.
“Well, good, because she didn’t offer it,” Teagan said over her shoulder, filling two drink orders at once. “All she did was ask for you. For what it’s worth, I didn’t get an idiot vibe from her. She’s down at the end of the bar, last seat.”
Unable to curb his curiosity, Brennan aimed a covert glance across the room, but with the milling crowd, it came up about six people too short. A shot of unease rippled through his chest, but he locked it down before it could seep into his expression. This night had already lasted two weeks, the bar was still full to the rafters with people asking questions he didn’t want to answer, and the ibuprofen he’d thrown back three hours ago had gone on a complete walkabout.
The last thing he needed was one more person with his name on her lips.
“Fine. But after this, if anyone else asks, I’m not here.” Brennan stuffed his bottle opener into the back pocket of his jeans, covering the rubber floor mats behind the bar with a purposeful stride. One quick meet and greet, and he was going work-only for the rest of the night. He didn’t care who walked in the door asking for him.
But then he looked up into a set of startlingly familiar green eyes, and everyone in the entire bar disappeared.
Chapter Three
Even though Ava had watched him covertly for twenty minutes before snagging a seat at the packed-to-the-seams bar, the sight of Nick Brennan standing right there in front of her made her heart go for broke in her rib cage.
“Ava?” Her name was nothing more than a shocked breath as it moved past his lips, but the word landed in her ears as if he’d shouted it at her.
“Hi,” she managed, and great. Sign her up for the lamest opening ever. Ava straightened on her bar stool, forcing herself to look past Nick’s decadently long eyelashes and the holy-shit expression plastered to his otherwise gorgeous face. “It’s been a long time.”
“It’s been seven years,” he corrected, blinking twice before taking a step back.
Oh God, maybe she’d made a mistake coming here like this with no warning. But trying to talk to him at the hospital had seemed downright rude, and if she waited until tomorrow, she’d lose her chance. She’d never expected the place to be so jammed, though. Ninety percent of the town had to be in the warmly lit confines of the bar, most of them clamoring for Nick’s attention.
Ava made an attempt at a smile. “You look good.”
Okay, so it was a massive freaking understatement, but come on. Nick’s stare was still melted-chocolate sexy, although his dark hair was longer than the near crew cut she remembered, just enough to be casually tousled without going the full-on bed-head route. A closely trimmed goatee had replaced the boyish clean-shaven face in her memory, but if anything, it made him even better looking. Long, sturdy muscles pulled tight over his forearms as he braced his palms on the bar, triggering a long-buried spark in Ava’s belly as he leaned in close enough for her to catch the brisk ocean scent of his skin.
“Thanks. You look—” Nick’s words yanked to a stop, and Ava realized just a half second too late that the mother of all serious frowns bracketed his mouth. “Far from home.”
“Oh!” The sudden change in both his expression and his body language peppered holes in her composure, torching the smooth, professional opening she’d practiced ad nauseam on the drive over. “Well, I, ah . . . I live in Riverside now.”
That jarred a frown. “You do?”
“For the last five years,” she said, pausing so he could respond with what he was doing so far away from his own hometown of Fairview, which sat just outside Richmond, Virginia.
But he didn’t. Instead, he moved his hands from the bar and took a step back, reestablishing the distance between them. “So what brings you out to the Double Shot tonight?”
Ava scooped in a breath and went right for full disclosure. “I came to see you.”
“Interesting change of heart,” he said, his tone utterly unreadable as he flipped a couple of shot glasses to the three-inch strip of black matting on the inside rim of the bar. “Last I remember, you never wanted to see me again.”
“That’s not true.” The pungent scent of bourbon sent a razor-wire punch to Ava’s chest, and she held her breath to avoid another inhale as Nick filled the shot glasses with an expert flip. Damn it, she should’ve known putting herself within fifty feet of a bar would give her the sweats.
Just like she should’ve figured Nick might be less than thrilled to see her.
Ava swallowed. “Listen, Nick, I—”
“Brennan.”
Now it was her turn to be surprised. “What?”
“I don’t really go by Nick anymore.” He slid the shot glasses a few spots down the bar to the guys who had motioned for them. His expression made the Great Wall of China look like a teeny little roadblock, but Ava refused to let it deter her. Story or no story, she’d left him without a good-bye seven years ago. She might’ve had damn compelling reasons for her actions—even if she’d rather stick an ice pick in her eye than admit them—but she still owed Nick an apology.
“Brennan,” she said, trying the name on for size. “I know it might seem like I left because I didn’t want to see you again, but that’s not true. There were . . . complicated circumstances. But just because I didn’t intend to hurt you doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. I’m really sorry.�
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“No sweat.”
“No sweat?” Ava’s brows took a one-way trip upward, and her shoulders met the back of her bar stool with a bump.
But Nick . . . Brennan . . . whoever he was just gave a shrug as he slid the frost-covered lid on the beer cooler in front of him to the open position, barely looking as he took out a bottle and uncapped it for the woman standing behind her. “Sure. Like you said, it was a long time ago.”
Ava hesitated, uncertainty welling in her throat. Nick’s face was perfectly neutral, and even though his shoulders had gone momentarily tight beneath his dark gray T-shirt as he’d delivered the all-is-well, right now he was nothing but smooth movements behind the bar.
Stupid. Seven years had passed since she’d hastily stuffed everything she’d owned into a pair of beat-up suitcases and taken the sunrise ferry off Sapphire Island. Of course Nick had moved on and forgotten all about her. And anyway, that’s what she’d wanted.
Even if, despite all her efforts, Ava hadn’t been able to forget him.
“Right. It was a long time ago,” she said, shaking off the thought as she buckled down. She’d come to the Double Shot for a story, and she needed to get to business. “You’re obviously busy, so I don’t want to keep you. I was hoping maybe we could talk after your shift, or whenever is convenient for you.” Ava’s instincts sprang back to life at the reminder of why she’d come, and she pulled a business card from her back pocket and handed it over.
Nick’s gaze flashed, wide with undiluted shock before his grip went tight enough to bend the card stock between his fingers. “You’re a reporter?”
She nodded. “I write for the Riverside Daily. What you did today out at Joe’s Grocery was extremely brave. I’d like to write a piece about what happened. We could—”
“Let me ask you something.”
He cut her off with such quiet intensity and precision that Ava’s only choice was to reply, “What?”
“Do you still drink Arnold Palmers?”
All Wrapped Up (A Pine Mountain Novel) Page 3