The Love Laws

by Tamara Larson

  Love Law # 5 - Men can’t resist a damsel in distress.

  This is a slippery slope. A woman can quickly transition from being a damsel in distress to a needy drama queen if this strategy is employed too often or under lame circumstances. But it's totally true. If something bad happens to you, and the guy you're interested in must come to your rescue, you own that guy. At least temporarily. They love to look like a hero in your eyes. It feeds their ego like nothing else. If they can ride in on their white horse and fix whatever is wrong in your world, then they feel like they are fulfilling their purpose in life. Just like women were created to nurture, men were put on this earth to protect. And they will get off on doing this at every opportunity. Until it gets old or takes up too much time. Then you're high-maintenance history and they're moving onto the next damsel. So, even though it's tempting to invent drama to seem interesting and exciting, ultimately, they will figure out that you're generating dragons for them to vanquish and they will start to avoid you. As much as we like to believe that modern romance is like a fairy tale, it's really more like a jousting match.

  Kevin stared morosely at his glass of scotch. It was late and he was alone. Again.

  He’d spent many nights slumped on this particular bar stool in this particular hotel bar. He came here mostly because it was just a short stumble and an elevator ride to his suite, but he also liked the ambience. The lighting was soft and it was quiet here. Just the faint strains of jazz in the background and the murmur of voices to keep him company.

  For the most part this was not a place where ladies felt comfortable. There was a limited wine list but fruity mixed drinks were not offered. This was a place where men came to drink in comfort. Flat screen televisions were mounted along every wall, usually tuned into ESPN with the volume turned low. If women came in here at all they usually didn’t stay, finding the ambience a little too intimidatingly masculine and borderline morose for an evening of fun.

  For once Kevin was glad women were infrequent visitors to his favorite watering hole. Tonight he didn’t actually want to pick anyone up for a change. But being around people made him feel less isolated. Less like a thirty year old drunk living in a hotel with nothing but a long list of one-night stands to remind him how empty and lost he really was.

  Drinking was such a bad idea right now but he couldn’t face the reality of returning to his lonely hotel bed quite yet. He needed the dulling effect of alcohol to numb his churning brain and give him some peace. Self-medicating with booze had always worked in the past, and he needed it tonight more than ever. So he took a sip and waited for the familiar burn to distract him from the ache in his heart and in his jeans.

  Jamie had been cool and quiet for most of their 15 minute walk to her apartment. He had purposely kept the conversation light, but she had still responded with monosyllables to every single one of his questions. Her lack of response made it blatantly obvious that she was determined to forget about their make-out session in the theatre and discourage him from any further pursuit. And it was working. He was admittedly a cocky bastard but even his confidence was starting to flounder when met with her determined indifference. By the time they reached the door to her apartment building there was a strained silence between them.

  She’d thanked him politely for walking her home and then left him standing outside with his dick in his hand. Not literally, but close enough. He’d been half hoping she would invite him up for a nightcap, but that hadn’t happened. He’d been tempted to re-issue some kind of lame assurance that they’d meet for coffee the next day, but hadn’t wanted to seem desperate. He strongly suspected he’d already crossed into that territory. So he’d just waved jauntily and walked away like he didn’t give a damn if they ever met again. So untrue, but his pride demanded that he resist being totally pussy-whipped quite yet.

  A half hour later he was parked on his usual barstool, nursing a scotch and trying to make sense of what had gone wrong tonight.

  Rick, the bartender, approached from where he’d been serving a large party of Japanese businessmen at the opposite end of the long mahogany bar. He set a bottle of fine single-malt scotch on the bar in front of Kevin and gave him a sympathetic glance. “You look like you could use this. On the house, young man.”

  Kevin raised his glass in a salute, but didn’t reach for the bottle. “Appreciate it, but I’m good. Trying to cut back.”

  Rick’s bushy grey eyebrows went up in surprise. “Well, now. It’s about time.”

  Kevin set his drink back down on the bar and glared at the older man. “Seriously? Now my bartender is going to give me shit for drinking too much? You do see the irony in that, right? It’s like a pusher giving a junkie a hard time for smoking too much crack.”

  Rick winked. “Hey. Far be it for me to interfere in a man’s right to drown himself in overpriced hooch. And let’s face it: the management wouldn’t be too happy if I turned away your generous patronage. But I’m glad you’re slowing it down. My tip jar will feel the pinch, but you were starting to get that desperate look every time you came in here. The one that tells me the booze has become the problem rather than the solution.” He tapped the bar in front of Kevin and then cocked a thumb towards a few of the regulars sitting at two of the smaller tables in the middle of the room. “Some guys. They never figure out the difference. You know what I mean?” He gave Kevin an irritatingly knowing glance and then walked back to serve a customer on the other side of the bar.

  Kevin glanced over at the men Rick had been talking about. He’d seen them here many times: watching the large screen televisions and ordering drink after drink until Rick cut them off or closed down for the night.

  He’d thought they were just a couple of business men who stayed at his particular upscale hotel when their jobs brought them to Vancouver. It wasn’t until months later that he realized these guys lived in the city and had homes but chose to come here rather than sit in their houses alone.

  One of these men was in his sixties, dignified and well-dressed. The other was a loud-mouth, ham-fisted salesman named Greg who had caused trouble on more than one occasion. The two men didn’t interact or even seem to know each other. What they had in common was a growing look of desperation as the night progressed. Written on their faces was the dark knowledge that soon they would be alone with their thoughts and regrets. They kept drinking but knew, deep-down, that no amount of alcohol could keep the desolation at bay forever.

  Kevin was starting to recognize the look Rick was talking about now. He’d started seeing it on his own face when he looked across the bar and caught his reflection in the mirrors behind the bottles. At first he’d seen that ravaged look only occasionally, but lately it was almost always present. So often, in fact, that he’d started facing away from the bar to avoid his own haunted eyes.

  Tonight he didn’t look pathetic for a change. He looked pissed off. Part of that had a lot to do with Jamie’s latest rejection, but he couldn’t blame her for all of it. He’d also met with his agent, Lou, this morning and that particular meeting had not gone well. In fact, it had been a disaster. He’d worn his best suit in an attempt to look professional, but the window dressing hadn’t distracted Lou in the slightest. He wanted to know where Kevin was with the Rawlings book. His deadline was fast approaching and Kevin was typically finished months in advance. But that wasn’t the case this time. Not even close.

  The truth was that he was barely a third into the book. He’d gotten stuck when the nightmares began and nothing seemed to be able to get him past that point. He’d experienced writer’s block before, but nothing like this. He had a major case of creative constipation, just like Duncan had said outside Steamworks the other day.

  He’d asked Lou casually if he thought an extension could be arranged and Lou had just stared at him from behind his huge, oak desk.

  “Are you kidding me?” The slick, dark-haired agent had asked, giving him an incredulous look. “Because if you’re kidding me. It’s not very funny. You, my frien
d, have a contract with a major publisher who’s gone ahead and leaked the release date for ‘Dark Desires: The H.R. Rawlings Story’ on their website. If there was a problem you should have told me BEFORE we gave them permission to do that. Otherwise we both look like fools, right?”

  Kevin had blatantly lied and said he was having some problems with some fact-checking but expected the final product to be in Lou’s hands soon. The look of relief on Lou’s harsh face had been worth the deception. Lou was a shark, which made him a great agent in terms of getting a lucrative contract, but if he sensed weakness he would be all over Kevin, hounding him to work or even suggesting a ghost writer take over to meet their commitments. But Kevin wasn’t ready to admit defeat yet. He was convinced he could still overcome this set-back. He just needed to get his head on straight.

  Kevin ran his hands through his thick hair and then pushed the cut crystal glass full of Scotch away from him. It was time to go. He was just standing up, fairly steadily for a change, when a commotion broke out to his right.

  He stared as he took in the scene before him and thought seriously about just walking past without interfering. If he was smart that’s exactly what he would do. Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t made that way.

  The oversized bar patron, Greg, had his meaty fist wrapped around the wrist of a scantily-clad woman. His face was red and spittle flew from his mouth as he tried to pull the waif-like female onto his lap.

  The woman, of course, was Kerry. Duncan’s ex and the last person Kevin wanted to see tonight. She was valiantly resisting Greg’s efforts to overpower her but her 95-lb frame didn’t stand much of a chance against the salesman’s bulk.

  Kevin approached the couple, shaking his head at Rick as the bartender started to come around the bar to assist. As much as Kevin would like to avoid this situation he was partly responsible for Kerry being here and Rick didn’t need to be part of this scene.

  Kerry had informed him earlier in the week that she’d changed hotels to be close to him and she knew he often frequented this bar. She’d probably come here looking for him and instead had found trouble. Nothing new for her.

  “Let me go, you oaf!” She cried, twisting her painfully slim arm in an attempt to break his hold on her.

  Greg just chuckled and brought his hand up to tangle in her long hair. “Oh. I’m an oaf now, am I?” He gave her hair a sharp tug. “Seems like this oaf was good enough to buy you a drink. But now you’re too good for a little fun? I don’t think so.” His smile disappeared and he yanked her hard until she was sprawled across the table in front of him. Her short, white skirt parted revealing most of her thighs. Greg hooted like a frat boy and reached for her exposed flesh just as Kevin stepped into his line of sight.

  “Buddy. Seriously.” Kevin said as he calmly deflected Greg’s hand from touching Kerry’s bottom. “She doesn’t seem into you. Give us all a break and move along. After you apologize to the lady, of course.”

  Greg just stared at him for a long moment and then stood up. It was like watching a mountain shift in an earthquake. He was almost as tall as Kevin, but barrel-chested and flabby. Once standing, it was obvious exactly how drunk he was because he seemed to list from side to side like he was on a ship rather than firmly grounded.

  Greg patted Kevin on the shoulder in a friendly yet threatening gesture that would’ve crumpled a smaller man to the ground. “Listen, Writer-boy. I’ve seen you in here with a different skank every week, so don’t try and act like the hero.” He waved a hand in Kerry’s direction. “Why don’t you leave this little whore to me and we’ll just forget you stuck your nose where it doesn’t belong. Okay?”

  Kevin stepped forward just as Kerry made an enraged gasp.

  “Whore?” Kerry sputtered. She dodged around Greg and tucked herself into Kevin’s side, giving the red-faced salesman a withering look from her new position. “Even a whore would think twice before slumming with a tub of guts like you! Why don’t you go find an all-night buffet before my boyfriend removes your red nose and stomps all over it?” She glared at Greg and pushed Kevin forward until he was practically nose to red nose with the drunken giant.

  Inwardly, Kevin sighed. This is what he got for trying to do the right thing.

  The next thing he knew Greg was throwing an unexpectedly accurate and powerful punch at his face. He heard the familiar crunch as his nose broke for the third time, tasted the hot blood in his mouth and then the ground was rushing up to meet him as he lost consciousness. It was the shortest fight in bar brawl history and he’d lost in truly spectacular fashion. Could this night get any worse?

  *****

  He woke up in his own room. But he wasn’t alone.

  Kerry was there. Kneeling on the bed beside him and holding an ice pack to his throbbing nose. His shirt had been removed and for some unfathomable reason his jeans were unbuttoned.

  He groaned and pulled away from her, holding the ice to his nose.

  “Damn it. Kerry. What the hell? Couldn’t you have picked someone a little smaller to antagonize? Like a rhinoceros? Or maybe a baby elephant? Why that guy?” He carefully rolled over and sat on the edge of the giant bed as far from her as he could go without standing. His head was spinning and he didn’t trust his legs to hold him up. He didn’t really care if he fainted in front of Kerry at this point but he didn’t want to land on his face and do any further damage.

  He turned and glared at her and got his first good look at what she was wearing. He gaped as he noted she had changed into a very short towel. “Jesus. Put some clothes on.”

  “What?” She shrugged, unconcerned that most of her chest and all of her toned thighs were on display. “You got blood all over my dress. My very expensive dress, I might add. You bled a lot.” She gave him a disapproving look, like he had purposely gushed gore all over her white ensemble. “I thought you knew how to handle yourself. Weren’t you a cop?”

  He glared at her. “I do know how to handle myself. I thought he was drunk so I wasn’t expecting him to move so fast. Or hit so hard.” He pulled the ice pack away and touched his nose tentatively. Shit. That hurt. It was definitely broken. Again. “Why aren’t we at the hospital exactly?”

  “There was a doctor there at the next table. He set your nose after you fainted.”

  “I did not faint,” he said between gritted teeth. “That behemoth just got in a lucky punch. No thanks to you. Did you have to call him a ‘tub of guts’?”

  “He called me a whore.” She shrieked as she threw a pillow at his back.

  Kevin turned his head toward her and raised an accusing eyebrow but didn’t comment.

  “I am not a whore,” she said with absolute conviction.

  Kevin turned away to hide his rolling eyes. “Ker. You attempted to blackmail Duncan for a divorce and you took money from his grandmother to reject him. What do you call that?”

  “I call that good business sense and ancient history. Not prostitution,” she said with a glower and a flounce against the headboard.

  If his head hadn’t been about to burst he would have beat it against the wall in frustration. “Fine. You’re right. Shamoo was wrong to call you a whore. But what were you doing there in the first place? What are you still doing in Vancouver for that matter? And more specifically, why are you here in my room? Half naked?”

  “If you must know I’m back in this hell-hole of a city to meet with my lawyers. But there’s also going to be an open casting call for a new reality series that my agent is convinced I’d be perfect for. And I’m here in your room because I was worried about you and didn’t want to leave you alone. In case you had a concussion.” She flipped her long hair back over one shoulder and sniffed indignantly. “You’re welcome, by the way.”

  “Kerry. Did I hit my head?”

  “Well. No. But you never know.”

  “I appreciate your concern. I really do and I wish you luck with the whole reality show thing. But I’m fine. So, thanks for nearly getting me killed tonight but I really need to
get some sleep.” He stood up on unsteady legs and walked gingerly towards the door, buttoning his jeans up as he went.

  When he reached the door he opened it and turned, expecting to find Kerry reluctantly following him. She hadn’t moved. She was still sitting on the enormous bed with her shapely legs crossed at the ankle and her arms folded over her small chest. For once, she didn’t look enraged or smug or even haughty. She looked genuinely hurt and more than a little lost.

  The man in him could also appreciate the enticing picture she made. She was very beautiful with her inky black hair pooling around her hips and so much of her smooth olive skin on display. He still found her breathtakingly exotic despite her forlorn expression and poisonous nature. But for the first time he was unmoved by her beauty. He could appreciate it but it did not make him want to touch her. She didn’t excite him in the slightest. Instead his thoughts turned to Jamie and how much he would like to see her in just a scrap of towel. Kerry, however, left him cold.

  Inwardly, he cursed. He was a goner.

  Here he was: a grown-ass man in a hotel room with a beautiful, nearly-naked woman who clearly wanted him. And all he could think about was the one woman who found him repulsive? Was he an idiot? The answer was simple: Yes, yes, he was a complete moron. Why was he wasting time thinking about the indifferent lingerie designer? She had told him repeatedly that she wasn’t interested in him. She may have responded to him in the theatre for a few glorious moments but she would never consider having a real relationship with him. She thought he was a man-whore. She believed he was beneath her and maybe she was right to feel that way.

  He wasn’t delusional about Jamie. He knew she wasn’t an untouched angel. She had, after all, worked in a glorified strip club for a few years, but for some odd reason she still seemed untouchable to him.

  When Kevin looked at Jamie he saw a woman who positively sparked with conviction, integrity and passion. If these qualities weren’t enough to blow his mind it certainly didn’t hurt that she was also beautiful, independent and intelligent, not to mention quick-witted and feisty. A combination he’d never come across in his long and extensive history with women. How could he not be falling for her?