The blonde turned on her barstool. Velma’s gray eyes met his.
“Brek?” He did know that voice, and those eyes, that mouth, that body. Hell, he’d spent months tasting every inch of her. How had she found him?
Brek swallowed hard. He’d learned long ago that certain events burned themselves onto the retina to be taken out later and mulled over—the memories that never fade. No, they always stayed as crisp as the original memory. This was one of those times. The image of Velma sitting at a bar in the mountains with a small stream of sunlight playing across her face would stay with him forever.
He was fucked, and he didn’t even care.
“You with him?” Jackass jerked his chin toward Brek.
“I’m not sure.” Velma shifted and toyed with the white paper wrapper from her straw.
She looked smaller, her eyes haunted.
Jackass stepped back, and Brek got the full punch of Velma. Fuck, he missed her.
He was lost. No point in fighting it. He wouldn’t be able to walk away again.
“Am I?” she asked.
“What?” he replied.
She tilted her head to the side. “With you?”
Brek briefly studied the dried mud caked on the toes of his boots.
“I need to talk to him,” Velma told Jackass. “Alone.”
Dude got the message, because he grunted in disgust at a conquest lost, grabbed his beer, and headed for the pool tables.
Brek strode to her, his boots stuck against the sticky floorboards from spilled drinks and God knew what else. He planted his ass on the stool next to her and inhaled her scent.
Strawberries and Velma.
“I just called you.” She dropped the paper straw wrapper and angled her body his direction.
“I know.” He rolled his shoulders, but he couldn’t meet her eyes again. Not yet.
“Some things can’t be said on a voice mail. I figured I’d come tell you in person.” She placed her hand on his and linked their fingers together.
He let her.
The wall in front of him held a huge mirror and an assortment of whiskey to numb the type of pain he had experienced. Her thumb stroked his knuckles, and his heart stalled.
“I think I figured out when I fell in love with you,” she said finally.
“Velma.” He dragged his hand from hers and ran it through his hair. God, this hurt.
“It happened around the time you decked that guy for me.”
He glanced to her. The light in her eyes caught in his heart. They couldn’t do this. “Velma, don’t know what you’re here searchin’ for, but it’s pretty clear lookin’ at your spreadsheet…you don’t know a thing about me.”
“You’re Brek. We went up to Red Rocks together.” She hauled a zipped canvas bag onto her lap, dug through it, pulled out a bound report with a clear cover, and handed it to him.
He glanced at the rows and columns…another fuckin’ spreadsheet. Her spreadsheets didn’t know jack shit. He pushed it away. “Not interested.”
Clearly ignoring him, she continued on as though he hadn’t spoken. “I printed it. Not really logical to lug my computer all this way.” Carefully, she flipped through the pages and landed on the last one. “You’re on this page. I highlighted your row.”
She had added columns, including number of orgasms given, spontaneity, creativity, and about a dozen other things.
