“You know, you’re the last person I expected to say that. Couples like us come in here all the time, right?”
He said the words kindly, but Charlie knew she’d messed up. She would never have thought that about anyone else. A whole lifetime had gone by, and she still hadn’t shaken off those voices in her head. “When I was growing up, it was butches and femmes, not...”
“When you were growing up? I mean, you were out, right? Didn’t that reproducing the binary stuff die out in the queer community in, like… the seventies?”
“I was… not out for a long time. And not in small town Arkansas.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. That must have been tough.”
“That’s why I moved here. Started over.” She didn’t want to talk about it. Especially not with Carla looking at her with those liquid eyes.
“I think that you moved here, but I don’t think that you really started over.”
Dammit. Why was Carla so perceptive? Why was he making her dredge up all of these memories? “Yeah, maybe not.”
“So… any other excuses?”
Had she ever been so young and optimistic? “Yeah, the bar. Remember?” She was being snippy. What was wrong with her today?
“It’s your early night. Practically your day off since you don’t ever really take one.”
“I have stuff to do on my day off.” That was a complete lie, and she suspected that Carla knew it.
Carla only seemed amused. “Were you planning on eating tonight? I know you’re sick of the fifteen things on the menu here, even though they’re delicious. Share a meal with me.”
She hesitated. If he was going to keep pushing, how bad could dinner be? They could hang out, she could tell him why things wouldn’t work, and then things would go back to normal.
“I… OK.”
“Awesome!” When he smiled like that, it was like the sun coming out. “I’m making feteer meshaltet and ful medames.”
It sounded tasty and exciting, the way that the syllables rolled from Carla’s tongue. Yet Charlie heard herself barking out a response. “What is that?”
“The ful is a mashed fava bean dip. And the feteer meshaltet is a kind of layered bread with minced lamb inside. It takes forever to make, but it’s soooo good. My grandmother always makes it when I visit.”
Charlie felt her heart fluttering. Carla wanted to cook for her. Not just cook, but make something special. That sounded… serious.
Then she realized the question she should have asked. Were they going to Carla’s apartment? She’d been thinking something casual, like a restaurant. Somewhere public. Definitely nowhere near a bed. Or even a couch.
She could imagine Carla, stretched out decadently across a mattress, inviting her to do wicked, wonderful things.
Things that would never happen in reality.
But oh, did she want it, now that it was a possibility.
“You’ll love it. I promise.” Carla pressed a quick kiss to her cheek.
She wanted to press a hand up to touch it. That soft brush of warmth already felt like fire in her veins. To be so close, to smell the scent of his shampoo and feel the warmth of his breath…
She already wanted more, but he’d danced away before she even realized he was there.
She stood rooted to the spot while he hung the broom up on the wall, then stretched luxuriously, silhouetting the graceful curve of his spine and the soft swell of his breasts.
She’d wanted to touch him before, but now she was burning with it.
And equally certain that whatever this was would be doomed before it began.
“Got to get home to start cooking, so I’ll see you at seven!”
Then he tipped his hat and waltzed out the door.
What. The. Fuck.
***
For the rest of the evening Charlie could barely remember a customer order or even pour drinks.
She just kept thinking about that kiss. It was hardly a real kiss, just a touch of closed lips. The sort of kiss that you’d give to your granny.
Yet she found her hand sneaking up to her cheek again and again throughout the night.
Carla had kissed her. Carla wanted her.
Nina had been right, which was both terrifying and exciting.
She just wished she had more time to think about it. She wasn’t sure whether she needed to talk herself into it or talk herself out of it, though.
It didn’t help that Nina had apparently told everyone, that traitor.
During a lull in the orders, the other bartender sidled up next to her. “Hey Charlie, have you figured out what you’re wearing tonight?” He was fabulously, gorgeously gay, with mascara dramatically highlighting his eyes and a t-shirt so tiny it was barely there. He probably would have cut it shorter, but she’d told him that the WHIRLWIND logo on the back needed to stay.
She glared at him. “My clothes.” She gestured downward. Black cargo pants and a black Whirlwind shirt. When she got off duty, she’d exchange the black apron for a warm flannel.
The bartender tsked. “Oh, no, honey. You have to dress to impress. Nice, crisp collar with a tie, at least.”
She grumbled at him. “I hate ties.”
“You like Carla’s ties, right?”
She wasn’t going to fall for that one. Of course Carla’s ties were sexy and adorable. It didn’t mean that she wanted to wear one herself. Or admit how nervously excited she was for this… dinner.
She filled two pitchers of beer, stacked up glasses, and escaped to deliver them.
She got claps and whistles when she reached the table.
“Hey Charlie!” That was Parker, leaning back dangerously on one of his chairs. “I heard you’re getting lucky tonight!”
“I’m not getting lucky,” she hissed. “And I am going to kill Nina.”
Taylor shook his head. The lumbering giant was the quiet one of the bunch. “Nina didn’t tell us. Or at least Nina didn’t tell us first. Carla’s been posting these pictures of everything he’s cooking for his date, so we figured he finally wore you down. Nina just confirmed it.”
“He didn’t…” Charlie crossed her arms over her chest, the tray tucked under one elbow. She was more amused than annoyed, though she tried not to show it. “Why do I have no privacy anymore?”
Eric gave her a skeptical look as he drew Micah to his side. He was the mature one, though his eyes sparkled with humor. “I think a better question is why you thought you ever had any privacy to begin with. You and Carla are the nightly drama that we all come in to see.”
Charlie narrowed her eyes. “You’ve been betting on this, haven’t you?”
Heads nodded, their expressions ranging from sheepish to mischievous. Parker and Dakota gave each other a high five, presumably because they’d won something.
“You know,” Dakota added conspiratorially, “just because Carla’s a Dom doesn’t mean he only likes to top.”
That was… really intriguing information. “I can’t believe you just said that.” She gave Dakota a stern look, though nothing that came out of their mouth surprised her anymore. “Please tell me you’re not betting on what we do in bed.”
“All I’m saying,” they leaned in closer, “is that a nice strap-on could make him a very happy queer.”
The whole group broke out in laughter and Charlie groaned. When had this become her life?
It was nice, though. This crew was a tight-knit group and it felt good to be included in that. She kind of thought of herself as part of the bar, like the glasses and bar stools. She provided a service. She sat back and watched while everyone else found their happily ever after.
This teasing, as raunchy and ridiculous as it was, meant that she was part of something, too. She knew that she cared about all of them, and it was nice to know that they cared about her in return.
Even if it was as embarrassing as all hell.
Angel put a hand on her arm. “Just ignore them. You do what’s right for you. You give so much to this community and e
veryone just wants you to be happy.”
“Um, thanks,” she finally said.
Could she see herself being happy with Carla? Maybe. If Carla still wanted her.
She took herself back to the bar to fill the next order. Maybe if she concentrated enough on filling orders, she wouldn’t have to think about seven o’clock creeping closer and closer.
Chapter 2
Carla
Carla ran his fingers over the hole in his worn kitchen table again. It looked a bit like a storm cloud, but he wouldn’t let that feel like an omen. He loved this table. Loved his cheerful little apartment.
Now he just needed Charlie inside of it.
He wondered, for the hundredth time, if he should have gone to pick her up instead of just texting her his address. She hadn’t texted back, but he could see that she had read it.
He rearranged the decorative plates on the table. He’d already put the food back in the oven to keep warm, but it would dry out if it stayed there much longer.
He tried to remain positive that Charlie would show up. It was 7:30, and they hadn’t exactly agreed on a time. His apartment was only a five-minute walk from the bar, but she could have gotten held up by something. She could have even gone home first to change.
He wasn’t usually this nervous on dates. He’d been through the normal rounds of awkward dating website encounters, forgettable hook-ups at clubs, and playful flirtations with friends to see if they evolved into anything more. If there was a spark, he went for it. If it didn’t work out, no harm done. He was open about his kinks and usually had subs flocking to him.
Charlie just threw him off his game. She was just so mature and confident and… ugh.
Usually he knew exactly what he wanted in a partner. They’d talk about their interests, in bed and out of it, and scenes would start to form in his head.
With Charlie, it was all nebulous. She was so stern and stoic sometimes that he thought maybe, just maybe, she could be the person he switched for. But then again, he often got a hint of something else, something fragile… He’d love to have her on her knees or decorated in rope, her body blissed out in relaxation or eager with arousal.
He was probably getting his hopes up for nothing. At best she was probably vanilla, and he would be happy with that, he thought, if it was what he could get. At worst, she just wasn’t interested at all.
Sometimes he felt like she was just humoring him. She certainly mentioned his youth often enough, though working with teenagers all day definitely let him know just how old he really was.
Charlie, though, made him feel just as awkward as his students, unsure all over again. With anyone else he could shift easily from a low-key vanilla flirtation to Dom mode, depending on the person and the situation. With Charlie, he had no idea what he wanted or how to get it.
He just knew that he wanted her with a passion that burned.
It had started out slowly. He’d felt an immediate attraction based just on the commanding way that she held herself and that short-cropped hair, but he’d pushed it back as they became colleagues.
What had grown instead was something sweeter and deeper. He’d stick around to chat with her after closing and listen to her stories about the bar. Under her gruff demeanor, she had so much conviction and life, so many challenges she’d overcome and people whose lives she changed.
Then he’d started to notice her eyes. Her lips that he had to remind her to put balm on during the winter.
One day last year, he’d walked into Whirlwind, saw her standing behind the tap chatting with a regular, and discovered that he was in love.
Only then had he realized that he hadn’t dated anyone in half a year because she was all he could think about. He lived for those chats after trivia night. For the way that her face lit up when he walked in the room before she carefully buried it. For the way she became curt and maybe just a tad nervous when he stood too close.
So, of course, he immediately started making a fool of himself. He couldn’t decide whether to play it cool or flirt, whether to keep it businesslike or try to cozy up together.
He was sure that he ended up looking ridiculous most of the time. The other employees teased him mercilessly, as well as some of the regulars who knew him from the kink club around the corner.
Until today, he hadn’t even been certain that she was interested. He still wasn’t entirely convinced. She shut him down so quickly most of the time, hurrying off into the kitchen and responding to him in monosyllables when he got too close.
He would have stopped completely, assuming that she wasn’t interested, except for the way that her eyes followed him sometimes. He’d caught her in the mirror over the bar watching him, eyes commanding and full of fire.
It helped that the whole damn bar was rooting for him, and he’d had several people swear that Charlie blushed every time his name came up.
He got regular reports every time that she looked at his ass or gazed at him adoringly while he stood on the small stage reading trivia questions.
That was pretty much all that kept him going when his flirting fell flat. He’d spent months agonizing over asking her out and now he was sitting at his kitchen table alone.
He wondered if he should text her again.
Their conversation earlier had revealed a whole slew of things that he’d suspected about her but hadn’t been sure about, and he was beginning to increasingly think that her rejection wasn’t about him but about her own insecurities.
He didn’t want to scare her off, but maybe she needed some encouragement.
Actually, he knew that she needed a lot of encouragement. She just might not be ready to accept it from him.
He told himself that he wouldn’t have any expectations for tonight. Just a nice meal and time spent together outside of work.
He pulled out his phone and took a picture of the little bowls of olives, pita, and cucumber-feta salad. Hope you’re hungry!
There. That was fine. Friendly and fun. Encouraging but not too pushy.
He set the phone down and decided to tidy up the room. Not that it needed it, since he’d gone on a cleaning spree this weekend while he worked up the courage to ask Charlie out. But he needed something to do while he waited, and the kitchen was already spotless.
He started lining up the books on his bookshelf, not really seeing them as he tried to unpack Charlie’s mysteries.
She was so abrasive on the outside, tolerating little bullshit and shooting straight from the hip. But below that was a great listener who charmed all of the patrons at her bar. Folks poured their hearts out to her and she gave that tough-love advice to set them straight, without ever being overbearing. She was pretty much the archetypal parent to every baby queer who ventured her way.
Buried even more deeply, he was now increasingly sure, was an inner fragility. Someone had hurt her, and she’d never let herself recover. Carla only caught it in brief glimpses, little moments of insecurity and loneliness that he was sure she never meant for anyone to see. Yet at her core was a steel pillar of strength. Life might have given her lemons, but she’d made a goddamn lemon cake and grown a fucking lemon tree to share with all the neighbors.
It had taken him even longer to realize that Charlie was much more shy and introverted than anyone would think just by watching her. As a bartender, she was funny and outgoing, laughing with customers and amused by the antics of her employees. She had her schtick down and she was good at it. But she never shared anything personal and she didn’t have friends outside of work. When she left Whirlwind, she spent time alone.
It was all of these contradictions that drew Carla in. Charlie’s unpredictable dance of approaching and retreating. Something told him he had something to offer her, that despite her shrugs whenever BDSM came up, she might be a lot more interested than she let on. The idea had kept him up late on many nights as he pondered possible combinations between the two of them, his hand between his legs.
Of course, Charlie’s sexy package didn’
t hurt either. He knew that she didn’t see herself as attractive, but there was something about those thoughtlessly rumpled flannels and cargo pants over those soft curves that did something to him.
Carla was meticulous about his own clothes, but he loved that Charlie didn’t give a shit and had given up on trying to impress anyone. He enjoyed even more that she was comfortable with her weight and her body. He loved the way that her thick belly and pillowy boobs gave her a presence, a hefty space in the world that she claimed unapologetically.
Yet when he looked her in the eyes, sometimes she blushed like a teenager on her first date before giving him a glare.
Delicious, delicious contradictions.
Her age, far from being a detractor, was a bonus in Carla’s opinion. His last girlfriend had been four years younger and never really got her shit together. It had been exhausting. Carla liked taking care of his partners—in certain ways—but the inability to function in basic daily situations wasn’t attractive or sustainable.
With Charlie, he suspected the situation might be just the opposite.
There was just something about Charlie’s capable confidence that made Carla want to take control and shatter that composure. To give her a chance to escape responsibility and rest her burdens. Maybe with the help of some rope and a blindfold. He could imagine that all too easily...
Carla realized he was getting ahead of himself, again. The chemistry was there, but that didn’t necessarily mean she was kinky.
Or even joining him for dinner.
He sighed. Another fifteen minutes had gone by, but there wasn’t any sign of her. She hadn’t answered his text, either.
He was debating putting the food back in the fridge when his doorbell rang.
He was so startled that he jumped, and he might have actually run over to the intercom to buzz her in. Totally not cool, but at least Charlie wasn’t there to see it.
He waited impatiently by the door and reminded himself to relax. He stretched his arms over his head and swung them back down just as he heard the bell announcing the elevator.
“Over here!” He stuck his head out and shouted down the hallway. There were a lot of apartments on his floor and it could take a while to make sense of the signage.
Whirlwind Page 32
