“Thanks, but I don’t need another drink,” I denied, managing to squirm away from his unwanted touch on the second attempt.
“Come on. This was the first chance I had to get you alone all night and now you won’t let me buy you one measly drink,” he whined annoyingly.
Not wanting to argue the point, I simply lied. “Thanks, but I’m done drinking for the night. I’m the designated driver. Iappreciate the offer, but I’ve got to get back to my friends before they start looking for me.”
I tried to turn and walk away, but the man snagged my wrist and reeled me in closer. “You don’t need to hurry back, babe. Your friends look like they’re having a good time dancing together. Stay a while. I want to get to know you. I’m a good guy, I promise. You’ll find that out if you give me half a chance.”
Glancing in my friends’ direction, I saw that Charlotte was laughing and twirling her older cousin around in circles to the beat of the fast-paced song bleeding out of the speakers. From where they were, they couldn’t easily see me. This guy had waited until I was away from the herd and cornered me here, out of sight of my friends, on purpose. He was clearly a wolf in sheep’s clothing, insisting he was a “good guy”, and now I was on my own with him.
Countering his weight, I angled slightly away from the man and tried to pull back my arm. This close, I could smell the beer he was drinking on his breath, and the scent was far too sour for my liking.
“I’m Will, by the way,” he belatedly introduced, his alcohol-soaked brain just now processing he’d never introduced himself.
Pulling against his grip like a wild animal caught in a steel trap, I ignored his introduction and my eyes wildly darted around for an exit strategy. “I’ve really got to go.”
The man immediately switched up on me then. Gone was the “nice guy”. In his place was an angry, frustrated, incel version of the former man. Or more like it, his mask had just slipped and I could see the real him beneath the facade.
At my implied rejection, Will’s brow furrowed, his eyes squinted hard at me, and his upper lip curled. “I just want to buy you a drink, lady. For fuck’s sake, why are you being such a bitch about it?”
Garrett, Alice’s friend, must have seen what was happening. Leaving the bar, he started plowing through the crowd toward us with a furious look on his handsome face.
Will clocked where my attention was and swore under his breath. “Fuck it! You aren’t worth the fight,” he growled, before releasing his death-grip on my arm.
Because we’d been playing a sort of tug of war with each other, I stumbled back into a group of unsuspecting people when he’d suddenly let me go. I felt cold liquid spill all over me seconds after I tipped backward, and heard a woman curse a blue streak over her spilled drink.
Garrett raced to my side and steadied me on my feet. He was a tall, muscular guy, so he made it look absolutely easy, though I know it must have cost him considerable effort.
“What the heck was that about?” He asked, his eyes searching mine as he checked me over for any potential injuries.
Embarrassed by the scene, and the fact that my chest was now covered in something dark, syrupy, and sticky, I shrugged. “Just some guy who couldn’t take no for an answer. Thanks for scaring him off. My attempts weren’t working so well.”
Garrett’s nostrils flared then and his pupils dilated. For a moment, I thought he was going to hunt the guy down and beat the shit out of him. But, in true gentlemanly fashion, he quickly calmed himself down and refocused his attention when he saw how upset it made me.
“I think that asshole ruined your beautiful dress,” he noted, reaching into his back pocket for a clean bar towel.
My stomach twisted as I accepted the proffered cloth. This wasn’t even my dress. It was far too expensive for anything that would hang in my closet. The polite thing to do was to offer Charlotte the money to pay for it, now that it was likely irreparably stained with whatever berry concoction I’d been doused in. The only problem was, I didn’t have the money to do that.
Thinking fast, despite all the liquor I’d consumed tonight, I decided I needed to go home, change, and soak the dress in cold water before the stain set. It was my only shot of salvaging the expensive material. But one glance over at Charlotte, who was doubled over laughing at something Alice was saying, told me neither girl had any interest in leaving the bar so early in the evening.
Garrett saw me shiver as my adrenaline wore off and the feel of wet, clammy cloth penetrated my skin.
Shrugging out of his plaid fleece, he thoughtfully offered me the oversized garment. “Here. Take this. The last thing you need to do is catch a cold after what just happened. I’m going to find that guy and make sure he’s trespassed from the bar permanently. We don’t need his kind around here. Women shouldn’t be afraid to come to Maverick’s.”
Alice had truly found herself one of the last “good guys” out there. Even though we’d only just met, I was happy for her. I hoped it worked out between them.
Humbly accepting the clean garment, I said, “Thanks. I’ll get it back to Alice so she can return it to you the next time you see each other.”
Garrett waved away my promise. “I’ve got a million of them. No worries.”
The second bartender waved over at Garrett then, and he raised his hand back at him to acknowledge he noticed. “I’ve got to go. Vincent is getting swamped with orders. Are you going to be okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I assured him. “Thank you for coming to the rescue. Go back to work, Garrett. I’ve got to try and clean up before heading out.”
“Okay,” he reluctantly returned. “I’ll talk to you later before you go just to make sure you survived the rest of the night unmolested.”
I laughed at his jest, and he rushed back to help Vincent with the backlog of impatient customers.
Trudging dejectedly over to Alice and Charlotte, I shouted over the music. “I have to go. Some girl just spilled her drink on me after some asshole tried to feel me up. You guys can stay if you want. I’m calling it quits and taking an Uber home.”
