I took a step forward.
Then another.
Before I knew it, I was walking across the bar toward the corner booth, my heart doing something complicated in my chest, my hands sweaty, and my brain providing zero useful information about what I was supposed to say.
The man was absorbed in his papers, his brow furrowed in concentration, one hand holding a pen that he was using to make notes in the margins.
I stopped at the edge of the table.
“Welcome to Barbacks,” I said, my voice coming out steadier than I felt. “I’m Finn.”
He looked up.
Our eyes met.
And I forgot how to breathe.
Chapter 9
Chase
The letters on the page I’d been trying to read for five minutes were dancing. Symbols that usually carried so much meaning had morphed into little cartoon letters doing a jig across the page of the Henderson divorce settlement I was supposed to be reviewing for tomorrow morning’s meeting.
I blinked a few times, trying to bring them back into focus.
The letters kept dancing. I was pretty sure Disney music was playing in the background.
Or maybe my mind was colluding with my empty stomach to play tricks on me.
I pushed back from my desk and rubbed my eyes so hard I saw stars. When I opened them again, the clock on my computer screen read 8:47 p.m.
I’d been at the office for over twelve hours.
And I still had at least three more hours of work to do.
How could I love the law and hate being a lawyer at the same time?
My phone buzzed, rattling against the wood of the desk. I glanced down to find another notification, one of many I’d been ignoring for the last hour because looking at my phone would mean acknowledging that the outside world existed, while I was stuck in a converted sunroom office that smelled like old carpet and desperation.
I picked it up anyway.
It wasn’t a text. It was Instagram. Someone I followed had posted.
I swiped to open it, mostly because staring at my phone was better than staring at dancing letters, and found myself looking at a post from someone named Maya Richardson. I didn’t remember following her, but my feed was full of people I didn’t remember following, so that tracked.
The post was a photo of a bar interior. It was clean and well lit. TVs showed sports, and a long polished bar looked inviting. The caption read:
GRAND OPENING! Barbacks - Ybor’s newest hot spot and Tampa’s only gay sports bar! Come, eat real food from a real chef!
Check us out! 1847 E 7th Ave
My stomach growled so loud I looked around to make sure no one had heard it even though I was theonly person left in the office.
Real food from a real chef.
God, that sounded good.
I hadn’t eaten since . . . lunch?
