Love, Exes, and Ohs

by Violet Duke

  It’d been over a half a year since she’d formally taken over the full responsibilities of being part-owner of Ocotillos—her friend Dani’s family brewpub—but it still surprised her how different the rush of pride was whenever she heard a compliment like that now.

  “Be sure to try the beer pancakes,” she suggested to the woman. “They’re my favorite.” Checking her watch, Xoey saw they were still an hour from opening up for brunch, even though the food would be mostly ready. “Hey, if you folks are in a rush—or just starving from your drive—you can knock on the door and tell them Xoey sent you.”

  If she’d had a business card, she would’ve given the woman one. But she hadn’t bothered to make herself any. Which was why most of the emails she got from vendors and other folks she came across in her day-to-day operation always spelled her name with a ‘Z’ instead of an ‘X.’

  Still. Any small act she could do to keep herself away from the straight and narrow was one she readily welcomed in her life.

  The woman blinked in surprise at Xoey’s offer. “Oh! Wow, are you the…manager there or something?” She gave Xoey a curious look.

  Xoey laughed good-naturedly. She was perfectly accustomed to the reaction—her casual bartender-chic appearance didn’t exactly scream ‘responsible business owner.’ “I am, and one of the part-owners there as well.”

  “I’m sorry to sound so surprised.” The sweet soccer-mom-to-be looked immediately contrite. “It’s just…you look so…young.”

  Ah, the polite description for her stiletto boots and diamond studded belly button piercing she knew was just barely visible under her loose waistband-skimming tee. “No worries at all. Most folks around here think I look ‘young.’ When they start thinking I look old, that’s when I’m going to start looking for some apologies.”

  The woman laughed. Checking her own watch, she shot Xoey a lopsided grin. “You know, we might just take you up on the name-dropping. If only because I never get to do anything so glamorous back home—that’s usually the sort of thing only my sister, the sophisticated MBA with the high-powered lunches, gets to do.”

  “Well then I absolutely insist.” Xoey grinned back warmly.

  As the woman stood up to join her fiancé, a glance around at the dogs and dog owners around the park brought the curious expression back to the woman’s face, along with a dozen or so invisible floating question marks.

  “I don’t have a dog,” supplied Xoey helpfully. “I can barely take care of myself, let alone a pet.” She gave a grinning shrug. “This way, I still get to get my weekly canine fix without having to worry about—” she pointed over at the woman’s fiancé, who was currently on poop patrol, “…any of the responsibility.”

  Isaac plopped down beside Xoey on the bench just as she was giving one final wave to the woman and her now leashed and poop-free floppy-eared pup.

  “Hey, that’s a damn cute puppy. I’m adding him to my list,” he declared, planting a quick peck on her cheek in greeting, along with an icy cold cup in her hand.

  She wasn’t sure which was making her shiver.

  “You have over two dozen dogs on that list of yours. Unless your future wife is Mrs. Doolittle, buddy, you’re going to have to start making some cuts to your future white picket fence pet,” she replied in an impressively steady tone.

  It had taken awhile after their break-up, but with time, Isaac’s lips on her skin no longer made her punch-drunk with lust.

  Not outwardly, at least.

  Sipping his piping hot black coffee, he nodded over at the fancy iced mocha drink he’d brought for her—or as he liked to call it, the milk and sugar with a splash of caffeine—and gave her a smug smile as he reached for the bag of doughnuts she’d brought for their breakfast.

  The man knew her frighteningly well.

  It had begun as a game a while back. He’d guess what she was selecting for their little weekly breakfast picnic, and bring the drinks he knew would pair with it. In the last few months, he’d only been wrong once. And that was only because she’d purposely ordered the exact opposite of what she’d intended just to mess with him.

  Of course, they’d ended up having to go out for a second breakfast that morning, but it had been worth it. She really had been craving biscuits and gravy that morning. It was freaky how he always managed to just know.

  Isaac munched on a doughnut thoughtfully and watched the puppy in question flopping along next to the departing couple. “Nope, that one’s too cute. He’s staying on the list.” With a half shrug, he concluded, “I guess that means I’ll have to marry Mrs. Doolittle.”

  Xoey was just plain shocked at the sharp bolt of pain she felt tearing through her chest over the joke.

  “Hey, you okay, sweetie?”

  Isaac squeezed her knee, a worried gaze running over her face. And then lower.

  To where her hand was pressed hard against her heart.

  “Heartburn,” she fibbed, rubbing her chest the way she saw folks on antacid commercials do it.

  Instantly, her bag of bacon doughnuts were yanked off her lap. “I knew these things were bad for you. You’re calling your doctor in the morning to get a check-up. Sometimes, heartburn is a symptom of something dangerous.” Reaching into her pocket, he pulled out her phone and entered her password to unlock it.

  She peered over and saw him googling something. “What are you doing?”

  “Checking to see if these cups of liquid sugar and caffeine over ice you drink can cause heart problems.” He read through the results for a minute and shook his head. “Apparently not, but better to switch to tea or just plain water to be safe.”

  Intense hazel eyes proceeded to x-ray every inch of her body, while gentle, utterly masculine hands that every inch of her body still remembered stroked her back.

  She released a jagged breath.

  Which of course, he interpreted as her final descent toward the big, bright light at the end of the tunnel.

  He gripped her hand. “Do you want me to take you to urgent care or the E.R.?”

  “I’m fine, Isaac. Calm down.”

  He did not look convinced.

  Which was probably why his fingers were now sliding over to her wrist to check her pulse.

  Good lord, the man was just too lovable sometimes.

  “I lied, I don’t have heartburn,” she admitted, to stop what was clearly going to be a call to 911 in a bit.

  A puzzled frown crossed his features, along with marked relief. “What’s going on, Xo?”

  “I just…I was holding my heart because I was jealous. Of Mrs. Doolittle.” She snatched back her precious bacon doughnuts. And to make this less of a declaration of the heart, she quickly threw in, “If you go off and have a few dozen puppies with Mrs. Doolittle, who’s going to come to the dog park with me every morning? I’m too old and set in my ways to break in a new weird friend who’ll get me the way you do.”

  Silence.

  Until warm, calloused fingers reached over and broke a piece of doughnut off of the one she’d been eating.

  After a few quiet moments of chewing, Isaac slung his arm on the back of the bench behind her. “Can you imagine the industrial-sized pooper scooper I’d have to buy to pick up after a few dozen dogs?” He shook his head. “I think Mrs. Doolittle and I would be doomed within the first week,” he lamented gravely. “Looks like you’ll be stuck with me for a bit longer, babe.”

  Improbable promise coming from a catch like Isaac or not, Xoey held on to it tight like a security blanket.

  With no fitting response coming to mind, she simply passed him the chorizo breakfast burrito she’d packed for him this morning—one of his favorite handheld breakfast foods.

  Then they sat and watched the dogs running around the park as they ate.

  “Hey,” she asked softly when they’d run out of food. “Did you see the paintings of the town that were being sold at the art show over at the town center last week? The ones painted by the traveling artist who’d lost the use of h
er hands?”

  An appreciative smile brightened his expression. “I did. I managed to stop by before it ended. They were good; she really captured Cactus Creek well. And last I heard, the business owners in town bought every single one of her pieces.”

  Xoey had heard the same thing. “Did you see the one of the dog park?”

  He tilted his head over at her and nodded. “I did.”

  “Did you see she painted us on this very bench?”

  “I did see two people sitting down, yes. You think that was us?”

  Frowning, and just a touch hurt, she asked. “You don’t?” Sure, the blurred figures made nondescript with muted colors and lots of brush strokes could have been another couple, but she’d been certain it was them.

  “I wasn’t sure.” He slid a thumb over the corner of her mouth to brush away a stray doughnut crumb. “Which is why I bought it so we could examine it and know for sure.”

  Her heart stopped in her chest, before picking up again at triple the speed. “You did?”

  “Yeah. I thought it’d be nice to have a pretty painting in my gym to class the joint up a bit. You know, balance out all the fists-of-fury MMA photos and what are essentially man meat posters on all the walls by the ring.”

  Chuckling, she wouldn’t put it past him to do just that to stick to this story.

  “Buuut now I’m thinking the pastels aren’t really meshing with the color vibe of my gym.”

  She giggled again.

  “Sooo,” he shoulder-bumped her. “I was wondering if you could do me a huge favor and hold the painting for me in your office. Until I find someplace better to put it, that is.”

  Adorable. Simply adorable. “I guess I could do that for you.”

  “You’re the best, babe.” He patted her knee in thanks. “And you know what?”

  She glanced up at him.

  “I think that’s us in the painting, too.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  XOEY POURED A SET of four shots and slid it over to the handsome flirt who normally would’ve gotten a second glance from her by merit of his sexy, broad shoulders alone. Tonight, however, she just smiled politely and pocketed his extravagant tip without so much as a playful wink to ensure an even bigger tip on his return trip to the bar.

  “You okay, Xo?” called out her assistant manager as he came over to change out the cash drawer. “You look a little down.”

  “Just tired. It’s been a long week.”

  That was mostly true. Ever since she’d taken over as co-owner and general manager of Ocotillos this past spring, she’d certainly been working a heck of a lot more. But her exhaustion lately seemed more of the life variety than the vocational one.

  “I keep telling you, if you’d let go of your old bartending shifts, you wouldn’t be half as wiped out on the weekends,” scolded Sam. “True, the tip pool would see a drastic drop, but everyone would understand. Even Dani didn’t put in this many hours.”

  “She did if you count her brewery hours,” Xoey reasoned as she filled a mug of their seasonal beer on tap and shook up a Mexican martini for a cute young couple that had the whole newlywed vibe going on.

  Sam locked up the cash register drawer and gave her a look. “Is that why you’ve been working so much? Honey, you haven’t got a single thing to prove to us. We’ve been operating at max capacity ever since the Chocolate and Beer war. There’s no way Dani would’ve kept up the hours she did for all those years had we been this successful back then.”

  True. Logically, Xoey knew that but it never stopped her from pounding her feet on the pavement, crushing all those scattered shards of the glass ceiling she’d burst through. She owed Dani infinite success on a silver platter for not just taking a chance on her, but for pushing her to get to where she was now. A decade ago, she would never have imagined she’d be running and owning the very brewpub she’d once waitressed in just to make ends meet.

  When one of her ridiculously sexy regulars gave her a roguish pout of the made-for-TV variety that only he could pull off, Xoey blinked and wondered what that was about. Shrugging, she gave him his change and tapped her finger on the bar to call the attention of the next customer waiting.

  Suddenly, Sam untied her bartending apron and gently, but firmly, pushed her out of her usual tending spot.

  “What are you doing? I still have three more hours in my shift,” she protested, noticing that all the bartenders and barbacks she passed gave her nods and waves that were the equivalent of a friendly boot out the door.

  “Not anymore. Rico Suave back there was flashing you his best telenovela grins and busting out his reserved-for-the-smart-coeds pick-up lines on you earlier and you didn’t notice a single one.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I never fall for them and you know it.”

  “But you usually flirt back to protect his fragile male model ego, and you always give him constructive criticism for his new material so he can get out there and grace our drunken female customers with the best game possible.”

  Why yes, that was a free service she provided to her favorite bachelors.

  She sighed. “New material—really? And it was good?”

  “Would’ve worked on my wife for sure.”

  “Dammit. I guess I am feeling a little off.” She glanced at the time. Ten p.m. What on earth was she going to do with her night now?

  Her attempt to head up to her office was cut off at the pass by two of her senior waitresses.

  “Nope. Honey, you need to take the night off. We’re just about ready to call an intervention—you’ve been working too hard these days, missy,” scolded Elle, the closest thing she had to a mother in Arizona.

  More gentle hands turned her around and nudged her over to the dining room.

  ‘Shove’ was probably a bit more appropriate.

  Elle took the hairclip holding up Xoey’s waist-length hair and gave the tumbling waterfall of haphazard waves a little primping fluff as her partner in crime, Terri, pulled Xoey’s shoulders back even more—or rather, thrust her boobs out even more—and then sent her toward a table of three hot guys with a go-get-um-tigress ass slap, with what was either a waitressing tray or someone’s dinner check.

  She imagined this was how brothel madams did it back in the day, too.

  Not one to get embarrassed really, Xoey just shrugged and made her way over to the three amused faces welcoming her approach.

  One of which, she recognized. “You.”

  “Well, well,” rumbled the deep, smiling voice she’d never heard indoors until now, “if it isn’t my favorite construction site troublemaker.”

  He was one to talk—this one had heartbreaker written all over him. If Matthew McConaughey had a half-brother with Latin roots, this guy would definitely be him.

  She sidestepped over to the seat across from him.

  Though he’d made it clear his lap was also a viable seating option.

  “Nice to see the face of ‘Rivera Constructions’ finally doing something other than disrupting the peace at my dog park sanctuary,” she said with a smile when he scooted his chair closer.

  He sighed in mock offense. “If you’d bothered to learn my name all those times you came by to terrorize my men, you’d know I’m more than just the face—”

  “He’s also the ass of the company, too,” broke in the All-American sexy smarty sitting beside him.

  Man, that guy made glasses look good.

  “I was going to say a different body part altogether,” commented Mr. Tall, Dark, and Dominant sitting beside her.

  If she were able to see auras emanating from people, she was positive his would be the color alpha.

  Shifting her gaze back and forth between the three men, she shook her head. “It’s not absolutely necessary for you three to be this good-looking at the same time is it? Can’t you maybe take turns being the pretty one for the night so my customers don’t rubberneck and trip over their tongues as they walk past here?”

  Señor McConaughey quirked an impre
ssed brow at her. “You’re one of the new co-owners here? I’ve chatted with your business partner Dani a handful of times over the past six months.”

  “And you’re still single?” Xoey did a double take. “Seems like my meddlesome little friend has been severely slacking in the matchmaking department.”

  “Not for lack of trying,” replied the other two, almost in unison.

  That had Xoey laughing. Figured Dani would’ve tried to set these guys up about two seconds after, ‘hello.’

  “She means well.”

  “Didn’t say we were complaining,” returned Dr. McSizzling with a quiet wink.

  Two more familiar faces joined the mix then, grabbing the open seats across from Xoey with mirrored looks of amusement.

  Xoey looked from the three guys to her two girlfriends, who they all clearly knew.

  “Told you they’d find a way to meet her before we introduced them,” chuckled Sienna as she reached over to greet each of them with that just-one-of-the-guys hand slap in greeting that she did with every guy in town.

  Lia studied everyone at the table as she did her equally tomboyish head-nod-hello in each of the guys’ directions. “I don’t know. I actually think the exact opposite happened here. It is Xoey, after all. And these are three of the biggest players to ever move to Cactus Creek.”

  Xoey ignored her friends’ ribbing and looked at this decade’s three best candidates for singlehandedly ending female chastity in the tristate area. “You guys live here?”

  Whoa. She must’ve been more out of it lately than she thought to have missed this development. Usually she knew all the best town gossip first.

  “They moved in this past week,” answered Sienna. “Bennett here just finished building the guys a swanky apartment building over by that dog park you go to all time.”

  Bennett! That was his name. Xoey actually had learned his name when she’d first gone over to yell at them for scaring the dogs at the park with all their early morning construction ruckus. Weird how she hadn’t made an effort to get to know him more. The man was gorgeous, and clearly a good guy to have passed muster with Lia and Sienna.