“First, I think you are taking this too personally. Fitting in here isn’t a good thing—”
“Fucking right it isn’t,” Mick muttered. “Shit hole.”
“Second…practice,” I said as Liam reached us. “Lots and lots of practice.” I half smiled at the bartender. “Guinness, please.”
He stopped, turning his gaze to Bria, and waited.
“Jack and Coke,” she supplied.
He started to turn, and guilt ate through me. I put up my finger. “I’ll… I got… I’ll pay,” I muttered. “I’ll pay for this, not Miles.”
“Eh?” Liam squinted one eye at me. “You don’t want to put this on Miles’s tab?”
Bria touched my arm and leaned farther over the bar. “Who is Miles?”
“No, I’ll…” I circled my finger in front of us before pointing at the Guinness tap down the bar. “I got it.”
“We want to put it on Miles’s tab,” Bria rushed to say. “Put it on the tab, just like…normal?” She shot me a questioning glance.
Liam moved his finger back and forth in front of us. “Both?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “No, I should—”
“Yes, both,” Bria chirped. “Both of us. Miles and I go way back. Just like”—I got another questioning glance— “you guys?”
Liam nodded and continued to turn, making his slow way back down the bar.
“We shouldn’t charge it,” I said quietly. “We should pay.”
Bria turned and rested her elbow on the bar, lowering her chin to her fist. Her eyes glittered with mirth. “Well now…that depends. Who is Miles?”
“She rode the boss,” Mick said in a series of grunts. “Liam, I’ll have a shot of Jameson.”
Bria’s eyebrows lifted. “Rode…as in…”
“Shifted. Fucked. Buggered,” Mick said. “Made a bad fuckin’ mistake, at any rate.”
“We dated,” I said, my face flaming. “He had just bought this place when we started dating.”
A slow smile curled Bria’s lips. “You get free drinks…whenever you want…because you screwed the owner? And you didn’t invite me here first thing?”
“He’s a fuckin’ coont,” Mick said in his thick brogue. “Not worth the free drinks.”
“Don’t mind him,” Liam said, reaching us with the Jack and Coke. The Guinness sat under the tap, resting. Liam hooked a thumb Mick’s way. “He’s a fan of the ol’ gargles.” He shook his thumb at his mouth and leaned back like he was drinking.
“I’m a fan of the ol’ fecking whiskey.” Mick spread his hands wide, growing surlier by the moment. “I’m dyin’ of thirst. Any day, man.”
Liam thinned his lips, the effect giving him a dimple on his right cheek, before turning back.
“Young man, young man, young man,” Mick muttered, and though he’d randomly said it as long as I’d known him, I’d never figured out the context.
“Does Kieran know about this?” Bria asked, indicating the bar at large.
“Yes,” I said, remembering when I’d first seen him in this bar. He’d done his homework.
“You don’t…” Bria moved her finger back and forth above the bar. “You don’t still bump uglies with the owner, right?”
“No.” I huffed and smoothed my hair. “He’s just an ex-boyfriend who wants to lord his good fortune over the harlot who broke up with him. These are pity drinks, as far as he’s concerned.”
“Oooooh.” Bria grinned while nodding. “I get it. Because”—she leaned closer with a smirk—“Miles would be dead now if you were screwing both him and Kieran at the same time. Demigods don’t like to share their prized possessions.”
There was that word again. I scowled at her. “I’m no one’s possession.”
“Fuckin’ right,” Mick said.
Bria clucked her tongue. “I’ll admit it. I can’t believe Kieran knows you get free drinks from your ex and hasn’t pitched a fit. What dimension am I living in? Is this an alternate reality? I even mentioned this bar to him! He must’ve known I’d drag you here, and he said nary a word.” She huffed out a laugh. “I am tickled.”
I opened my mouth for a rebuttal I hadn’t quite thought of yet, but she held up her hand.
“No, no. Don’t say anything. Just let me soak in the shock for a moment. Somewhere, a pig is flapping its wings, taking to the sky. This is history, and I am witnessing it. Hark.”
“What is she on about?” Mick asked, looking over.
“I haven’t a clue.” I took a sip of my Guinness, barely sparing a glance for the woman who’d just walked in and looked around. This was clearly her first time in the bar, and Narnia had turned out a bit different than she’d expected. I’d seen the same expression—unsure and a little disgusted—a million times.
Bria studied the new arrival. “What’s her game? She’s in the wrong place.”
The new woman sat down at the other end of the bar and waited patiently for Liam to approach her. Her posture screamed confidence, from her slightly upturned chin to her glimmering eyes. Bria was right—this woman wasn’t at home in dive bars. This woman expected people to do things for her, and do them quickly. I could see it in her soft scowl as she waited. In her tapping fingers as Liam took his sweet time. She was used to being kowtowed to by underlings.
So what was she doing wearing an outfit that wouldn’t have looked out of place in my pre-Kieran wardrobe?
“Maybe she came here on business and is trying to dress like the clientele so as not to get mugged,” I muttered, answering myself.
“Those clothes fit her too well,” Bria said quietly, lowering her gaze to her drink. Something in her tone, plus the set of her suddenly stiff shoulders, set me on edge.
“How do clothes fit someone too well?” I asked, following her lead and lowering my gaze. “Some people are great shoppers.”
“Cheap clothes are made to fit a wide range of body types. They’re generic. That’s why, before Kieran fixed you up, you always wore high-water pants and your tops looked like second-hand acquisitions from a circus. You have a pretty standard body for someone who’s in moderately good shape, but you’re an Amazon. Nothing on the racks fit you well, let alone perfectly.
“This woman’s cheap-ass clothes mold to her body perfectly. Nothing is too loose, or too tight. Based on the size of those—very expensive—fake boobs, that is a damn miracle. No.” Bria shook her head and upended her glass, draining it dry. “She had those cheap-ass clothes tailored to fit her body. Odd, right? She probably spent more on the seamstress than she did the clothes. Hello, sore thumb.”
Surprised Bria had caught so much from a crappy outfit, I flicked my gaze back up, careful not to make eye contact or stare for too long. I didn’t want the woman to know I was checking her out.
Her durable yellow cotton shirt cinched in at the waist like on the mannequins in the stores. Except, as I’d learned the hard way many times, mannequins always have the excess material clipped in the back. The V-neck showed just enough cleavage of the woman’s large, perky breasts to be sexy while still practical. And the color, one that should fade quickly in the wash, was still a vibrant yellow. Bria was absolutely right. There was no way a top like that would fit this well. I’d always looked like a square.