I pulled into the parking lot behind Barbacks and sat there for a moment, staring at the back door, bracing myself.
“Okay,” I said to my empty car. “You’re an adult. You had a nice time with a guy you like. Mark’s going to tease you about it. That’s fine. That’s normal. You can handle this.”
I checked my reflection in the rearview mirror, then I looked down at shorts that were, thankfully, returning to a respectable level of bulge-ness.
“Andyou, behave,” I said, wagging a finger at my rebellious lower digit.
I looked like someone who’d spent the night receiving a mind-blowing blow job but had the acting skills of an aardvark that would never be able to hide his shell.
Aardvarks had shells, didn’t they?
Never mind.
There was no hiding from this.
“Fuck it,” I muttered, then got out of the car and pushed through the back door at two-thirty, which gave us an hour and a half before we opened for the Lightning game. The door was already unlocked. I could hear Mark’s voice from inside saying something about TV placement. Jacks responded with his usual golden retriever enthusiasm about everything.
I sucked in a breath, straightened my shoulders, and walked into the bar like I had nothing to hide.
Mark looked up from behind the bar where he wasorganizing bottles. Jacks was somewhere in the back, probably hauling cases of beer like they weighed nothing.
“There he is!” Mark called. “Our fearless leader. Only thirty minutes late.”
“I’m not late. We don’t open until four.”
“You’re always here by two on watch party days. It’s one of your neurotic habits.”
I watched Mark’s expression shift in real time.
From casual.
To curious.
To laser-focused predatory interest.
“Why are you smiling?” he asked.
Here we go.
“Like what? I get to smile. I can be in a good mood. It’s pretty outside, and we have a big day ahead. Life is good. Why shouldn’t I smile? Smiling is good. No, smiling is great. I like smiling. Everybody likes smiling. Why? What are you hinting at? Are you hiding something? Because I’m not. I’m definitely not. I’m just smiling because . . . because smiling is good.”
He set down the bottle he was holding.
His eyes narrowed as he crossed his burly, hairy arms. “Out with it.”
“Out with what? Nothing happened.”
“You’re lying. You’reterribleat lying. Your facedoes this thing.” He gestured at my head. “Jacks! Out here. Now! Come look at his face!”
Jacks appeared from the back room carrying a case of beer like it weighed nothing, the curls falling across his forehead bobbing with each step. “What’s wrong with his face?”
“It’stoohappy.” Mark was grinning now, that insufferable grin that meant the puzzle pieces had just fallen into place, and he was about to make it everyone’s problem. “He got laid.”
My face betrayed me by turning eight shades of red.
“OH MY GOD.” Mark clapped. “You did! You banged the lawyer!”
“Nobody banged—”
