He’d fallen hard for the stubborn woman from the first. But smart chick that she was, she wanted nothing to do with him. He thought they’d become kind of friends. After all, he considered hernicecousin a friend. And her other one, the she-wolf with attitude, well, if not a friend, then a colleague of sorts. They shared the same paint specialist, though the she-wolf did tend to hog him at her repair shop more than she should.
Something he’d once again take up with her as soon as he got a minute to more than breathe.
Hell. He needed a break. One beer couldn’t hurt. And it had been a while since he’d been at Ray’s. He ignored the secret hope that lingered—that he might see Rena there.
* * *
Three fallen dickheads later, Axel had worked off a decent head of steam in the bar’s parking lot, much to the entertainment of the crowd who’d gathered to watch. He’d also won fifty bucks and beers on the house. Ray, the owner of Ray’s Bar, shook his head as he stared down at a bunch of racist pricks who’d already been kicked out once…for being racist pricks.
“I catch you here again,” Ray said to Fletcher and his asshole buddies moaning on the ground, “there won’t be enough of you left for anyone to identify. Now fuck off before I let Earl and Big J do what they’ve been wanting to all night. Axel was just a warm-up.” It wasn’t as if Ray didn’t still have some fight left in him. A retired boxer, he had the fists, and face, of someone who’d fought too many rounds. The fists looked like he’d won most of them, but his face suggested he’d lost more than a time or two.
Behind Axel, the bar’s bouncers waited with shit-eating grins. Trouble, those two, but they liked Axel taking care of their business. They had enough to handle with all the—what had Rena lovingly called the clientele?—riffraffin the place.
Fletcher stood with help from his seedy friends and shot Axel the finger. “Your ass is mine. I won’t forget this, dickhead.”
Axel just stared, not saying a word, and waited for the idiots to limp away. Funny that Fletcher couldn’t seem to recallhe’dbeen the one to start the fight. Axel hadn’t even stepped a foot out of his truck before Fletcher had been in his face. The dumbass was apparently trying to make up for getting walloped a few months ago.
Axel turned, praying his favorite person in the world really had stayed home tonight. God forbid she see him do yet another thing involving brutality.
To his chagrin, she stood by the entrance behind the enthusiastic crowd cheering him on and collecting bets.
Rena shook her head at him before turning to go back inside.
Fuck.
He sighed, feeling down, and forced his feet to take him into the bar to apologize. He didn’t want to tell her Fletcher and his cronies had had it coming. The crap they’d said about her and J.T., her nice cousin, just because they had darker skin… Rage threatened to consume Axel. He hated bigotry of any kind, and that kind of intolerance aimed at Rena?
He forced himself to calm down, needing for once to make a good impression. He wanted Rena to see him as more than a giant mauler. She claimed he fought too much, and maybe he did. But the things they’d been saying about her had bothered him. A lot.
Everything about her captivated him. Her laugh was real. Contagious. She had full lips, the cutest dimple, and a lovely face he’d more than once fantasized caressing. Her skin was a warm chestnut brown, and the golden-brown curls framing her angel’s face made her amber eyes almost glow.
God, he would give anything to hold her close.
When around her, his troubles faded, and joy took their place. He couldn’t explain it except to tell himself love at first sight must exist. At least for him.
He’d told his mother about Rena a month before she’d passed, and she’d agreed. He had it bad for the bartender-slash-waitress-slash-hairstylist. His mother had also agreed that he needed to make a move.
But fear kept him back, that he might do the wrong thing and scare Rena away. The idea that Rena would someday be his felt more unattainable every time he screwed up in front of her. And then the drama with his mother and father, his mother’s death, it all conspired to keep him distant, apart. Cold. Because numbness made the hurt bearable.
Pushing through the crowd, he tried to fight his fragile hope she might smile his way. He would have felt better about beating the losers outside if she hadn’t seen him. Now his therapeutic workout in the parking lot was all for nothing, and the balled-up tension inside him threatened to freeze solid under an icy wall of self-preservation.
But Rena could melt him with a smile. If only she’d give him one.
He found an open spot at the bar and looked around, but she didn’t appear. Instead, crowds of his kind of people, hardworking men and women who liked keeping a low profile—especially around law-enforcement types—milled around tables and danced by a new jukebox playing some funky metal-dance mix. Piercings and tattoos decorated visible skin, and denim and work boots seemed the dress of choice.
The booths and tables in Ray’s were mostly clean. Axel’s feet didn’t stick to the floor too badly, and the smell of stale beer didn’t offend as much as the few smokers puffing away in Ray’s nonsmoking bar. Most of the occupants adhered to Ray’s rules: no fightsinside, no cops, no drugs, and, most importantly, no fucking with the staff.
For all that Axel didn’t like Rena working in the place, he knew she had so many friends and family around that no one messed with her without major consequences.
He cracked his knuckles, once again gratified they’d met Fletcher’s big mouth and drawn blood.
“Yo, Heller. What can I get ya?” Sue asked, smacking gum as she waited for him. She wore a black T-shirt that saidBartenderin big white letters. Her many tattoos, piercings, and braids made her an obvious fit for the place.
“Adunkel—a dark ale—for me tonight.”
She nodded.
“Is Rena here?”
