Instead she just sat, looking perfectly content and especially hot with her hair in a high, curling ponytail, her black sleeveless dress showing off her curves to perfection without revealing too much skin.
“I have to say,” Nick said, “I didn’t think I’d ever see the day you’d be at my bar.”
She lifted slim shoulders. “Wanted to see what all the fuss was about.”
“Why tonight?” he asked.
Taylor looked down at her drink, ran a red nail around the rim. “Celebrating. Or mourning. Not sure.”
Nick tensed. “Calloway again?”
To his surprise, she snorted. “No. Not him. My aunt.” She looked up. “It’s her birthday today. I just…I don’t know. I didn’t want to be alone, and thought about calling Brit or Daisy. But then I realized I didn’t really want to be with anyone either.” She wrinkled her nose. “That probably doesn’t even make sense.”
Nick watched her for a moment. “What was Karen’s favorite drink?”
Taylor’s head snapped up. “You remember her name?”
He shrugged, and she gave him a smile.
“Karen didn’t drink. A glass of red wine with dinner, maybe, but never a cocktail. If you’d met her, you’d understand. Not really the type to tolerate the dulling of her senses.”
Nick nodded and pulled out an old-fashioned glass. He filled it with ice, then topped that with club soda and garnished it with a lime. He set it atop a cocktail napkin to the right of Taylor’s drink.
“The reason you don’t want to be alone, but not with anyone either, is because the person you really wish you could talk to is Karen,” he said quietly. “So for tonight, just…let yourself pretend.”
She stared at the glass, then back up at him. “I’m getting the really annoying suspicion that beneath the scruff and scowls you’re actually a little bit sweet.”
He ignored this and held her gaze. “What would you want to say to her?”
She glanced at the drink, then back at him. “I can’t talk to a glass of club soda.”
“All right, then,” he said, leaning on the bar once more. “Talk to me. As a bartender, I’ve had plenty of practice pretending to be dead people.”
“The rest of your customers—”
“Are fine,” he interrupted. “Now come on. Lay it all out there for Karen.”
She blew out a breath, then took a sip of her drink. “I hate you.”
He smiled, because they both knew she didn’t. Not right now, anyway.
“Okay, Karen,” she said, taking a deep breath. “First of all, I miss you. I know you don’t want to hear that, and would tell me it’s sentimental schmaltz, but you also raised me to be honest, so there it is.”
Nick said nothing, because she needed to talk, not to be talked to. But he felt a small pang of sympathy for the woman who’d apparently been raised not to feel—or at least not to express it.
“And since we’re being honest,” Taylor said, spinning the cocktail napkin around slowly, her eyes locked on the club soda, “I should probably tell you that you were right when you said that men can’t be trusted, and that love is an elusive fantasy.”
Nick’s teeth gritted. He didn’t want to think ill of the dead, but this Karen woman was really getting on his nerves, even from beyond the grave. No wonder Taylor was, well…Taylor.
“Anyway, I was stupid,” Taylor was saying. “I fell for a guy. The wrong guy. The totally wrong guy.” She let out a self-deprecating laugh. “And I realized a little too late that he wasn’t who I thought he was—that he wasn’t worth one second of my time.”
Her eyes flicked briefly to Nick as she said it, then she glanced back down. “Anyway, he’s with some other girl now, and, well, I don’t think he deserves her either, but I guess that’s for her to figure out.”
Taylor took a deep breath. “And I just…I miss you. I wish you could tell me what’s next, and remind me to just keep my eye on my career, and—”
Okay, that was enough.
Nick reached out, his fingers brushing against the back of her hand until she looked up. “I don’t doubt that you miss Karen a hell of a lot, but she wasn’t right about everything.”
Taylor blinked. “What do you mean?”
“You don’t need to focus on your career right now,” he said. “Or at least not just that.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. “And I suppose you’re going to tell me what I do need.”
“I am, and you’re going to listen,” he said, his fingers pressing her hand once more before retreating. “You need to do something—anything—without an agenda. Take a month to just let life happen to you.” She looked skeptical, and he laughed. “Trust me on this, Carr. Some of the best things in life are the unplanned ones.”
“Like new roommates?” she asked sarcastically.
“Don’t sound so skeptical. Ask yourself this: Whose bar did you walk into tonight?” he said, straightening and giving her a wink. “Then ask yourself why.”
Chapter 14
Taylor couldn’t quite remember the last time she’d been in such a good mood.
From the moment she’d opened her eyes that morning, she’d felt…refreshed.
Happy.
It didn’t hurt that her hair was on point, the hot pink dress one of her favorites, her shoes brand-new and a bit expensive.
The only slight imperfection on an otherwise stellar start to her day was that she and Nick hadn’t had their usual sparring match over coffee, yogurt (for her), and cereal (him).
His door had remained closed, but she couldn’t much blame the guy. She’d left the hotel bar sometime around nine last night and come home to a bubble bath and a good night’s sleep, whereas he’d told her he had to close the bar at 2 A.M.
So it was with no small amount of shock that when she walked (okay, maybe sashayed, a little bit…the shoes were really fantastic) into the Oxford office at nine-thirty, she saw…
Nick Ballantine.
He was sitting at his usual desk, in a white dress shirt and dark slacks, looking far more refreshed than he should considering his hours.
Not so long ago, his presence would have had her back up and her claws out, and that’s if she’d been in the mood to deal with him.
This morning she somehow found herself standing in front of his desk and, though she’d deny it to her dying day, a little happy to see him.
He didn’t glance up as she approached, but she knew he was aware of her. Just as she was of him.
Nick finally finished typing whatever he was working on, then lifted brown eyes to meet her gaze. “Yes, Taylor?”
“How the heck did you beat me here?” she asked.
He looked pointedly at her Starbucks coffee cup.
Her lips pursed defensively. “It was a long line. But regardless, do you ever sleep? What time did you get home last night?”
He leaned back in his chair and smirked. “Worried about me, roomie?”
Before Taylor could retort, Brit appeared by her side, slightly out of breath.
“Everything okay?” Taylor asked her friend.