“I’m good, Michael. Promise.” She reached out and gripped his forearm with a firm hold, squeezing a little as evidence she was steady. “I’ll text you later, okay?”
“Let me know where you are, and I’ll come pick you up.” He led her to the door of the conference room, then paused with his hand on the door handle. “What is it about you and me and conference rooms?”
She laughed quickly, then went up on her toes to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth. Lightning fast, she was already pulling away again, as if not wanting to give him the chance to pull her back.
“We’ll talk about it,” he promised. That dimmed some of her joy, which he hated to see. But they had to talk, and he wasn’t going to put it off any longer.
Chapter 8
As she turned left out of the office building that housed Michael’s lawyer’s firm, she did a quick double take. She hadn’t been paying attention before when they’d driven here, or she would have realized it sooner. She knew where she was.
Sin’s Inn was two hundred yards away and probably closed at this early an hour. But she found her feet walking that direction before she could second-guess the choice. As she reached the closed glass doors leading to the bar, she sighed. What the hell was she expecting? A doorman to be there, ready to open the place up so she could go in and have a private moment in her own personal bar?
Something touched her shoulder. She shrieked and jumped a foot.
“Whoa, nice ups.”
Kat turned to find Stacy behind her. Her face was devoid of the dramatic makeup she’d worn the other night when they’d first met, but she wore the same style polo with the bar’s logo on it, same small shorts and sexy heels. Her dark hair was pulled into a sort of beehive hairdo that looked equal parts complex and effortless.
“You…” She gulped in air, fighting to calm the drumbeat in her ears. “You scared the shit out of me.”
“No kidding. Come inside, you look like you’re going to pass out.” Stacy led her around to an alley that sat between the bar and the business next door. They ducked in a side door, and Kat found herself in the back room she’d helped carry boxes into the last time she’d been there. “Sit, and I’ll bring you some water.”
She didn’t feel shaky anymore, but she wasn’t going to argue. It wasn’t as if she had anything else to do with her time. As she sat, Stacy walked back in and grimaced.
“What?” Kat asked as she took the cup of water Stacy handed over.
“You creaked. Did you know that? Did you hurt something when I scared you?” Stacy pulled up a box and sat, crossing her legs and dangling one high heel from the ball of her foot.
“My knees. They do that when they bend. It’s typical,” she added with a shrug when Stacy’s eyes widened. “Years of jumping and running and twisting will do that to the body. I’m getting old.”
“You can’t be more than twenty-five.”
“Twenty-six.”
“Oh, well, never mind then.” Stacy sniffed. “You’re ancient. Over the hill. We should put you on one of those barges and shoot flaming arrows at you.”
“There are some mornings I think that would be appropriate.” Kat laughed. “I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d stop to say hi.”
“We don’t open for another two hours, but you’re welcome to hang out, as long as Red doesn’t mind.”
“Red?” Kat asked.
“That’d be me.” The redhead Kat remembered from her last trip to the bar walked in, a box hefted in her hands. “Siss, you wanna take this and earn your keep?”
“Yeah, sorry.” Not looking at all concerned her boss had caught her sitting on the job, talking, Stacy walked over to take the box from Red.
“When you put that away, start making calls. Irish called off tonight. Again. That girl sneezes, and suddenly she’s convinced she’s got the plague and can’t work.”
Irish, Kat guessed, was the nickname of another bartender.
Stacy rolled her eyes at Kat but said, “Sure thing. Anyone you want me to start with?”
Red studied Kat for a solid half minute without speaking, to the point that Kat began to shift in her seat.
Stacy hefted the box into a better grip. “Red? Hello? Should I just go down the list?”
“Wait on that for a minute.” Red ignored her employee, who just rolled her eyes and walked out with the box. “You working anywhere, honey?”
“Uh, no. I mean, yes, just not here in town. I’m taking a short break. A sort of self-imposed off-season.”
“Off-season.” Red took Stacy’s seat and leaned back against the concrete wall. Her jeans and tank top molded to an unbelievably curvy body, making Kat think of pinups from the forties. Sex appeal in a Betty Boop sort of way. “Athlete?”
“Tennis.”
“Can’t say I recognize you.”
Kat bit back a sigh. “People rarely do.” Not for the right reasons anyway.
“I know about those two Williams sisters.”
“Venus and Serena.”
“Huh?”
“Those are their first names.”