Gloria blinked rapidly but said, “Do what you like. You usually do.”
Chapter six
Tune after tune blasted from the DJ booth, and Matty loved every second. She sang along to most of them, dancing behind the bar with the others as she poured one drink after another for the lucky ones with a free night and the cash to enjoy it.
Sometimes, envy pricked at her, then she would remind herself no one ever really knew what people had given up or suffered, that hid behind those happy faces.
Life had a way of doing hurtful things to a person. She knew it all too well.
Divorce had been brutal. One minute she was in her thirties and still with the only real partner she’d ever had; the next, she was alone. But it had been the right decision for them both. With Amelie, love had always been tangled up with survival. They’d needed each other once. When that need faded, so did their relationship.
Her past still haunted her, of course. It probably always would. But she’d learnt how to live with it; to let it sit beside her without controlling her. Now she could look back and say, “That was never my fault.”
She’d been dealt a shitty hand, one that got worse before it got better. But she’d made a conscious decision to change and Amelie hadn’t liked that.
When Matty finally moved out, jobless and broke, it was her friends who’d stepped in. They’d reminded her she was worth something and helped her get back on her feet.
Now she was on relatively solid ground—paying her way, looking forward to something better. Something beautiful. A place where she could feel wanted again. Desired.
She worked her way along the bar, serving one customer, then another. Each time a space opened, someone else stepped into it, waving a tenner and wearing the same pleading look as the last, hopeful she’d move to serve them next.
Most nights, faces blurred into one another. She’d lean across the bar, tilting her head to catch drink orders shouted at her ear over the bass. But for the moment, the DJ had slowed things down, easing into something smoother. Softer. Something with sway.
Matty handed off change to the last customer, grabbed a towel to dry her hands, and out of habit asked, “What can I get you?” Not even looking up at first.
When she did, something charged stirred in her.
The woman standing there looked vaguely familiar, but Matty couldn’t quite place her.
“I’d like an Old Fashioned,” the woman said, her voice smooth, rich, unhurried. “Can you manage that…” she asked, her eyes dropping briefly to the name badge all staff wore, “Matty?”
And then it hit her—hard—right in the solar plexus.
Recognition split through her like being struck by a bolt of lightning—generating a pulse between her thighs, and a wild thrum in her chest.
The woman from the office.Sloan Slater.
“Coming...” Her throat felt dry, The word cracking on the way out. She swallowed and managed to add, “Right up.”
Sloan smirked knowingly—a look Matty had seen before and hadn’t understood at the time. Now she did, however. It was sexy—hot, actually—the kind of smirk that made her feel exposed without even being touched.
Sloan didn’t move. She just watched, eyes fixed on Matty, calm and commanding, as though she had all the time in the world.
Matty grabbed a glass, her hands only just steady, filled it with ice, and added the ingredients, trying not to rush while still feeling watched.
Then, from the pocket of her low-slung jeans, she watched as Sloan pulled out a twenty and slid it across the bar. “Keep the change.”
She took her drink and turned away without another word.
Something in the way she left made Matty want to call her back, offer her a coaster—anything to keep her there.
But instead, she just watched.
Watched as Sloan Slater disappeared into the crowd and was swallowed whole by it.
“Two Buds, please.”
The voice dragged her back to the present. Matty blinked and looked up. Two guys, half-drunk and grinning like idiots, leant across the counter.
