by Rebel Carter
“Leave? Why would you ask me to leave?” She wanted to know, but the murmur of answers from patrons around her answered her question before the owner could say a word.
“You're causing a scene.”
“Who yells at people like that?”
“She’s his fiancée! Can’t even say hello to him without a Karen telling on her.”
This was going to handle itself just fine. I sighed and rubbed my temples before I turned back to Honey and stepped up to the counter.
I jerked a thumb over my shoulder. “I’m really sorry about that.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for. You saved my ass.” She shook her head at me and held up her hands. She had nice hands. Long fingered, nails painted with a sweet pale blush that went with her tan. I looked away. I shouldn’t be noticing her hands.
“What can I get you?”
“Quad americano, black, please.”
“Of course. It’s on me,” she rushed to tell me, but I stopped her with a shake of my head.
“What kind of fiancé would I be if I let you do that?”
She grinned, the light I had seen earlier returning to them. “What kind of fiancée would I be if I didn’t pay for it, after you just rescued me?” Her eyes focused behind me and she turned her head, hiding a giggle in her hand. I could hear the blonde being hustled out of the coffee shop by Gus and the outright disapproval of the other customers.
“You don’t even know what you just did,” she said, reaching out and putting her hand on mine. It was just a brush of her fingers but it made my blood sing. Seeing her fingers resting on the back of my hand, the pink of her nails contrasting with the ink on my skin made my head swim. It looked fucking perfect. I jerked my hand away from hers and looked away when I saw the hurt in her beautiful eyes. I couldn’t have her touching me. Couldn’t have that side of me waking up and wanting her more than I already did.
The redhead joined us then and she beamed in my direction. “You didn’t say you had a fiancé. What the hell, Honey bun?”
A near shriek sounded behind me, but I didn’t bother looking. I knew it was the blonde trying to save face. “He owns it? A man like that with her doesn’t make any sense!” She was insisting to someone, probably that Gus guy, maybe just anyone in earshot. Either way I ignored her.
“Don’t listen to her,” I advised Honey when I saw her flinch at the bullshit the blonde was spewing on her way out. “She’s just trying to look less shitty.”
“You mean classist,” the redhead said with a nod towards the blonde. “She comes in here every day acting like she’s Marie Antoinette, and I for one always wanted to take her bleached head off, so thank you for that,” she said, nodding at me.
I grunted a reply that had the redhead giggling and skipping off to the espresso machine but not before she flicked a finger at Honey. “You have a lot to tell me about after this rush, Honey bun.”
“Sure,” Honey answered, voice weak. She looked back at me and took the card I was holding out to her. It was heavy and black, and she turned the metal over in her hands for a second before she looked at me. “She’s right, but thank you for what you did,” she said, swiping the card.
I frowned. “What the fuck do you mean she’s right?”
She looked startled at my question but answered me all the same. “A man like you wouldn’t be with someone like me.”
My throat tightened. I could see she believed that. Thought I wouldn’t want a woman like her. I shook my head at her. “Listen to me, a woman like you doesn’t want a man like me. Men like me are dirty.”
“Wha—“
“Men like me don’t deserve sweet.”
Her eyes dropped to my mouth for a beat before they met my stare. “I’m not sweet.” Her voice was husky, a touch too low to be proper. Christ. I loved the sound of her voice. I scoffed, reaching out to take the black card she still held. Our fingers brushed and I sucked in a breath at the slight slide of her skin against mine. She was soft. I knew if I kept touching her she'd be soft all over. I couldn’t touch her all over, not without losing control, but that didn’t stop me from brushing a calloused finger over her knuckles.
“You couldn’t be any more sweet if you tried, Honey,” I said, her name rolling off my tongue like I’d said it a million times.
Her eyes went soft and she bit her bottom lip. “Sir,” she began, and I groaned at the word. Her eyes went wide but it was too late. I closed my hand around her wrist and pulled her towards me. By now the entire morning crowd at A Different Brew were pretending they didn’t see us. Our coupledom having been established via a bitch fit, and none of them seemed ready to take me on in the pursuit of caffeine.
God how had she known to call me that?
“You shouldn’t go around calling just anybody Sir, little girl. You might have to answer for it,” I warned her, the words slipping out of me before I could stop.
She let out a soft exhale and then smiled at me, her eyes still soft on me. “I think I’d like answering to you.”
Fuck.
My fingers flexed on her wrist and I could feel the pull between us ratcheting up. I needed this woman. It didn’t matter what was going on around us, the blonde could be screaming her head off beside us and I wouldn’t have given a shit so long as Honey kept looking at me like she was.
I needed this woman to be sweet for me. Sweet and needy. Dark eyes soft on me while she screamed for me. I could see it plain as day, her dark curls spilling over her shoulder with her head thrown back, legs wrapped around me while I bounced her on my cock. She would feel good–no, better than that. She’d be perfect.
It would be perfect.
“Quad Americano, black, for Honey bun’s man!”
Honey jerked back and took her hand with her. My fingers tingled from where our skin had touched and I blinked and shook my head, coming back to myself.
“Do you think—“
“That's me. I gotta go,” I said, cutting off whatever it was she was about to say. A feat fueled by pure strength of will. I wanted to hear whatever it was she was about to say. I would listen to this woman all fucking day if I could.
She opened her mouth again and then nodded at me. “Have a good day, sir.”
I gave a jerky nod but was already moving before that blessed word fell from her perfect mouth. How could a soft ‘sir’ put me on my ass like this? I didn’t even know her, but I knew without a doubt that I needed her.
“Thanks,” I murmured, taking the cup from the redhead.
She winked at me. “You got it, boss man.”
I gave another grunt and kept moving. I shouldered through the crowd that was now falling back into motion, the earlier scene and my nearly pulling a barista over the counter and into my arms already old news, and finally fucking made it onto the sidewalk.
It was only then that I let my weak ass look back at Honey. She was already waiting on another customer, a smile curving her lips. I took a sip of my coffee and winced at the unforgiving temperature of the drink. I swallowed it down and kept watching her for another minute before she looked up at me.
Our eyes met and I felt the pull between us again. It didn’t matter that there was a counter, a crowd of people and a whole damn door between us. The pull was there, and I knew she felt it too. Which is why I turned on my heel and started walking.
Nothing good would come out of me tasting Honey.
Chapter Two
HONEY
“Hey, when the fuck did you get engaged?”
I blinked and looked up from the cappuccino foam I was making. “What?” I asked, shutting the milk wand off and turning to look at Tiffany, who was glaring at me with her arms crossed over her chest.
“Don’t you ‘what’ me,” she said, jerking a thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the door. “Where’s the rock that big man gave you?”
“What rock?” I looked over her shoulder where she was still jerking her thumb and had to swallow down the disappointment I felt when I d
idn’t see the man she was talking about.
My fiancé.
We’d locked eyes after he’d stepped out of the coffee shop. After he’d saved my ass from whatever today’s Karen was ready to unleash on me. I knew he’d seen me watching him, and that he had looked right back at me before he’d stormed off. When he’d paid for his coffee and taken it from Tiffany I hadn’t so much as seen him slow in his steps on the way out the door. But that look on the sidewalk? I knew I had seen it, and that it had as much interest in it as mine had, even if he didn’t much seem like he wanted to be in the shop.
He had looked tired. Haggard even. Like he hadn’t had a good night sleep in a week or more. His clothes were impeccable, even if I could see the fatigue on him. None of that really took away from how handsome he was. He was a big man, dark hair peppered with silver that was thick and lush but cropped close. The silver that threaded through his hair might have made some men reach for a box of hair dye, but on him? No. On him it worked, on him it looked well earned, hinting at the life experience he possessed. That dark and silver paired perfectly with his eyes, eyes the color of blue that looked like the expensive bottled water sold in all the shops I worked in, the kind that I couldn’t afford so I drank tap. And fuck, his cheekbones and jawline? The man was all sharp angles and chiseled bone structure, even if his nose was slightly crooked, the look of a body part that had been broken once or twice. I could see tattoos on his hands, thick inky lines that covered the backs of his hands and disappeared beneath the sleeve of his expensive coat. There were the telltale lines poking up and over the crisp collar of his dress shirt which told me he was probably covered in tattoos.
A man like that might scare some. His bulk, height and demeanor pushing them away, but me? I found him beautiful. I’d give my right eye to see the art on his chest. It had to be gorgeous. Just like him.
My chest tightened and I swallowed hard knowing I was blushing just thinking about the man’s bare chest. Remembering how his cerulean eyes had dropped to mine when I had...well, I don’t really know what the hell I had been doing when I greeted him. I didn’t flirt at work. Not ever. It wasn’t smart to shit where you ate–even if where I ate changed daily. I didn’t like taking chances like that but the second I had laid eyes on him I knew he was different.
This man woke something up in me. Something I kept a very tight hold on in normal circumstances but that had come tumbling right out of me the damn second our eyes met. I’d wanted him to come close and grab me. His hands firm and warm on my body, to drag me close and shove me over the counter before he slipped his hand down the front of my jeans, strong fingers sliding down to cup my pussy. My nipples ached thinking about the day dream that had suddenly forced itself back in my brain.
All of that had led to me greeting him with a little more enthusiasm than I normally did. I might have pushed my tits up too. I frowned. That damn blonde had gotten in the way because she’d seen the same thing I had in him. She’d seen it and didn’t like that he’d noticed me, so she’d done her best to get in the way.
I got it.
I mean it sucked, because it was real shitty how she did it. But I understood what happened when a man like that was suddenly in front of you. You’d do crazy things for a man like that. So the blonde has shown her hand. Too bad for her it’d been the wrong play, but even still–I understood her motivation to act.
There was a certain elegance to a man that looked like he could take you apart and have you begging for him to keep going with each and every piece that you lost to him. He’d scoop up the broken parts of you that had fallen to the floor and take them with him, filling his pockets with you on his way out and leaving you alone and wanting more.
The fucked up thing was he probably didn’t even notice the effect he had on women. A man like that was in his own world.
But even still….
If this were a romance book he would come back and smile at me. He’d had a terrific smile. One that warmed his whole face up and made him look years younger. He would stroll up to the counter while I tried to pretend I hadn’t been staring after him and he'd slip his number, printed on fancy card stock and he would ask me to dinner. All of this would make our meet cute. A story we would laugh over at dinner, regrettable but ultimately so perfect because it had brought us together. He'd kiss me goodnight after a lovely evening and we would date. Everyone that saw us would just know we belonged together. An unlikely pair that just fit.
But because this wasn’t a romance book he didn’t come back. Shit like that didn’t happen to women like me. This was real life.
The sidewalk was empty save for a nanny and toddler scurrying past holding hands, their heads bowed and collars upturned from the morning chill. I sighed, turning back to the cappuccino foam in front of me and hoped that Tiffany wouldn’t see my face.
“Uh, don’t “what rock me”, you little secret keeper. I’m talking about the rock you’re not wearing on your hand. Letting all of us know you’re gonna marry that hunk-o-burning love.” She jerked a finger towards my hand as I poured foam into a cup and only when I had placed it on the counter and called out, “Dry cappuccino for Aaron!” Did she snatch my left hand and give it a shake.
“Where is the rock?!”
“You keep saying that, but I honestly don’t—“
She shook my hand at my face. “He said you were his fiancée. Don’t play with me. He told all of us you were his fiancée,” she said, gesturing out towards the cafe that was full of customers looking our way curiously, if discreetly. “I bet they tell page six about this.”
“About what?” I squeaked, and pulled my hand back with a jerk.
“That the owner of Law Acquisitions is a friend of the working class,” Tiffany said gleefully. “And that he’s in love with you.”
“No, Tiff—“ I shook my head, ready to set her straight on the kindness he had done me when she continued on.
“Lawson Sokolov, is like one of the city’s most eligible bachelors and they are going to lose their shit when they find out he’s off the market. It’s going to be awesome.” The way she said awesome made my stomach drop while simultaneously fluttering with excitement. I shook my head. No, I could not like awesome, not when it came to Lawson Sokolov’s fictional dating status.
“He’s what?” I asked, pushing away the dread and excitement that was brewing in my stomach.
She raised an eyebrow at me. “How do you not know that?”
I bit my lip and glanced towards the front of the shop. The big windows were bright and glittering with sunshine, making Lawson’s earlier entry into my world seem like it had happened in another universe, not that morning.
“Don’t know what?” I hedged, and Tiff scoffed.
“Don’t play coy, you little minx.”
I would have given anything to have met him before today. Anything for the words that I didn’t know that man to be a lie. Lawson Sokolov was a stranger to me. I should have told her she knew more about him than I did, that until this morning I had never laid eyes on him or heard the man’s name but for some reason the words wouldn’t come. Instead I kept hearing him say “my fiancé. My girl,” and even if it was fake it felt too good, felt perfect, to be his. Even if it was all a lie.
I’d been raised to lie with a smile on my lips, bending the truth to fit whatever fucked up reality my mother spun around us. But this wasn’t like that. This was warm and it was Lawson. The way people had looked at me in the shop when he’d claimed me had changed. Even the screaming Karen had been knocked on her ass thinking I was his.
Being Lawson’s girl would be far better than anything I’d known. Even if he’d hightailed it out of the shop without so much as a pause in his step. He’d looked back.
Being Lawson’s was worth a lie.
So I didn’t tell her the truth.
I aimed a smile in Tiffany’s direction and shrugged. “He doesn’t talk about that with me,” I demurred.
Tiffany blew out a sigh and bumped my sh
oulder with hers. “It makes sense that you’re in and out of shops so much with the app if you’re with a man like that.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, wiping down the counter in front of me and surveying my work station. Everything was orderly and neat, just the way I liked it.
“I didn’t get it really, but now I do. Keeps you free for a man like that.”
I paused and glanced at Tiffany, she was looking out the windows in the direction Lawson had gone earlier, no doubt thinking of the man just the same as I had been.
“Free...yeah, that’s it,” I finally said, clearing my throat and forcing the smile on my face to stay in place.
“Super smart of you. If the paps had found out where you worked, it would be a circus. If you keep moving around then they’ll never catch on to it.”
I nodded. “Exactly. Makes things simpler that way.” I put away the towel in my hand and straightened, glancing at the clock at the far end of the shop. My shift was over in a few minutes which would be the perfect excuse not to talk about the colossal lie I had just told my very brand new friend.
“Just got a few minutes left on the clock. I’m going to do a quick restock, okay?” I said, jerking a thumb over my shoulder towards the small back room where we kept the dry goods.
Tiffany’s eyes went to the clock and she blinked in surprise. “Holy shit, you’re done in ten. How did that happen?”
“Time flies when you’re having fun.”
“Definitely,” she agreed and beamed at me. “A shift with you is more fun than I deserve at work.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere, Tiff,” I laughed, but I flushed at her praise. It was nice to hear that you were wanted. Even if Tiffany’s words were casual, they were needed and warming all the same. It was another reminder why I liked being around the other woman.
“Awesome, then do you want to get dinner later this week?” she asked, and I stopped my search for the clipboard with the inventory supply list.
