The Protector (Lone Wolf, Book 1) (9 page)

“I’m up for it if you are,” said
Layne, hands still deep in her pockets as she cocked her head and regarded me
with a smile.
 
“If you’ve not overdone
it, Elizabeth?
 
Are you getting
overtired after the rehearsal?”

I hung there on my crutches and
shook my head.
 
The pain pills were
doing pretty well, and I purposefully hadn’t over-extended myself in the
rehearsal that day.
 
“Yeah, drinks would
be great,” I told Tracy with a grin myself.
 
“At McBride’s?”

“I’m insulted that you even had to
ask,” said Tracy with a chuckle and an absurdly campy wink.

So McBride’s it was.
 

Chapter 5:
 
Not Really a Date

Fun Boston history fact:
 
McBride’s was a lesbian bar long before any
of the other gay bars moved into town.
 
It’s been around since the
nineteen hundreds
.
 
How many lesbian bars can say that?
 
Way back then, of course, it was all pretty
hush hush and something that no one but ladies in the know talked about, but
nowadays, McBride’s wears its pride on its proverbial sleeve.
 
There’s a rainbow flag unfurled outside, off
the side of the building by the front door, and inside, the air of
be-whoever-you-want-to-be is as constant as the flowing booze, strobing lights
and constant, thumping dance music.

As such, while there are a hell of
a lot of lesbians here on any given night, there’s also a fair share of gay men
and everyone else on the queer spectrum you can think of, and a lot of straight
people, too, gyrating to the music on the dance floor and ordering as many
beers, liquor and fancy drinks as the lesbians.
 
Because of the mixed atmosphere, it was usually our place of
choice after a spectacularly good—or bad—rehearsal, where we went to celebrate,
kick back and relax.
 
And to party, just
a little.

Like tonight.

“You know, after a rehearsal that
bad, I should really just turn in my fiddles and consider a career in
housekeeping,” sighed Tracy.
 
“Who
knows, maybe I missed my calling?”
 
With
that, she swung back another shot.
 
She
staggered in her chair a little after that one.
 

We were both getting pretty
tipsy.
 
And Layne sat there, only taking
occasional sips out of a club soda and grinning indulgently at the both of us.

“You don’t want to go into
housekeeping,” I sighed, shaking my head.
 
“And let’s be honest—you weren’t nearly as bad as me today.
 
I missed a
lot
of notes.
 
Like, at one point, I played the measure
from the next
line
.”

“You guys are speaking Greek to
me,” Layne chuckled, signaling the bartender for another club soda.
 
Unlike how the bartender, a gorgeous woman
with long, black hair that curled around her shoulders like she was about to
pose for a shampoo ad, had treated us—mostly ignoring us and getting us our
drinks occasionally, the same as everyone else at the bar—she sailed right on
over when Layne called for her with a bright, dazzling smile, leaning on the
bar so that her chest, quite visible in her plunging black v-neck tank, was
impressively propped up on her arms, and breathily asked Layne if she was
sure
she couldn’t buy her a shot.

 
“No, I’m fine,” said Layne with a wry grin twisting her mouth
sideways.
 
“But if you want to buy me
that club soda…”
 
There was a subtle
shift in her body.
 
Before, it’d seemed
like she was lounging in the bar chair, like her body didn’t have a bone to it
and had just pooled into the seat like pouring water in a glass.
 
Now, she leaned forward a little, her lips
slightly parted, and shimmering, like she’d just licked them.
 
Her eyes went dangerously dark as her
muscles tensed almost imperceptibly and you were immediately aware of the raw
power in her, and suddenly, as I stared at this gorgeous creature, the bar had
become much, much,
much
too hot for me.
 
I tugged at the front of my sweater, trying to remember how to breathe.

The bartender had apparently
experienced a similar reaction, as her jaw was almost on the bar itself, and
she poured Layne a club soda so fast, the glass almost catapulted off the
counter when she slid it toward Layne.

But, of course, Layne caught it with
a hand that moved too quick for me to even follow.

I’d had a few drinks at that point,
but seriously…she was
fast
.

“Well,” said Layne, her rich, velvety voice moving
in commanding waves over me.
 
I stared
at her and breathed out slowly, conscious of the fact that, when she spoke, my
heart rate began to skyrocket.
 
“For
what it’s worth,” Layne practically purred, “I thought you were
both
perfect—you’re great musicians and shouldn’t be so hard on yourselves.”

“There you go again!
 
Liar, liar,” said Tracy, wagging her finger
in Layne’s face, her speech a little slurred.
 
“Everyone knows it’s impossible to hear individ…indi…each musician in an
orchestra
separately
,” she sniffed and shook her head, slurring her
words a little more than she had a few minutes ago.
 
But then, she
was
knocking back the drinks pretty
fast.
 
“You’re just trying to be all
flirty, I
know
it,” she breathed in what she probably assumed was a sexy
manner but what only ended up making her look a little asthmatic.

I coughed into my drink, but she
didn’t get the hint that, perhaps, she was being a little unsubtle.

“Now see, that’s where you’re
wrong,” said Layne, her head to the side a little as she leaned forward,
placing her elbows on the table and crossing her arms on the tabletop, her muscles
rippling beneath her skin from where she’d rolled up the leather of her
jacket.
 
Her eyes flashed as she
murmured softly, the words rumbling in her throat:
 
“I have
impeccable
hearing, and I can tell you:
 
you two are good at what you do.”

“Hah,” said Tracy, her nose
wrinkling like it does when she meets a challenge head on.
 
“
No one
has that good of
hearing.
 
If you think it’s that
impeccable,
prove it!” she said, waving her hand that happened to be holding a beer in
it—some of the beer sloshed up and out of the neck, spattering onto the floor,
but not much.
 
“Tell me what someone in
this bar is saying, something you couldn’t
possibly
hear.
 
That guy.”
 

Layne glanced past Tracy’s shoulder
to the man she’d indicated with her sloshing drink.
 
He was about ten feet away, murmuring something into a smaller
man’s ear.
 
None of us could see his
mouth, because the smaller man’s head obscured it.
 
They were both wearing tight-fitting t-shirts and skinny jeans,
both had ultra-gelled hair, the color of which was hard to see in the dimly lit
bar.
 
The taller man had his hand on the
shorter man’s waist.

I only glanced at the men for a
moment, though, because I had to turn back to look at Layne.
 
It was how she was tilting her head, her
eyes unfocused but flashing in the dark interior of the bar.
 
Her handsome face took on an intense look of
concentration, her full lips open just a little.
 
I stared at them, taking a deep breath and another sip of my
martini as warmth began to grow in my belly.

After a heartbeat, Layne’s grin
returned, her eyes focused, and she tapped the tabletop with a short
fingernail.
 
“He’s telling his boyfriend
that they’ve had enough to drink, and they should head out to Doctor V’s,
because it has a better atmosphere for dancing.”

Tracy snorted, shaking her
head.
 
“C’mon, you can’t fool us.
 
‘Fess up:
 
you
so
just made that up.”

But then, as we watched, the taller man hooked his
arm tighter around the shorter man’s waist, tossed a few bills on the bar top
for a tip, and ushered his boyfriend past us and right out the door.

“That was just a lucky guess,”
sniffed Tracy, though her widened eyes told me she wasn’t quite sure about
that.
 
I glanced at Layne, my eyebrows
raised, and she shrugged a little, sitting smoothly back in her chair, one lazy
arm looped over the back of it, and her leather jacket open enough, and her red
t-shirt tight enough, that I followed the path of her chest, and…

Oh, God, she’d caught me staring.

The blood rushed to my cheeks, and
I ducked my head a little, taking a gulp of air.

“What about you, Elizabeth?” Layne
murmured then.
 
She didn’t move—if at
all possible, she lounged even more comfortably in her chair, but there was
something about her face, about her single raised eyebrow and flashing eyes
that made me shift in my chair, made me lean toward her across the table, as if
she was magnetically tugging me in her direction.
 

“Yes?” I asked, biting my lip.

Her mouth quirked sideways, and she
grinned, the grin deepening into a very wicked smile as she cocked her head a
little.
 
“Pick someone for me to spy
on,” she whispered, lowering her voice into a velvety growl.

I watched her mouth forming those
words, a little spellbound by it, the drink slowing my reflexes and making me
forget just a bit that staring at the body
parts
of my body
guard
was kind of unforgivably rude and inappropriate.
 
I cleared my throat, circling my martini glass with cold fingers
as I gazed out across the bar.

I caught the glance of a woman
leaning against the bar, talking with two other women.
 
She had short brown hair, stylishly cut, and
was wearing a blazer and dress pants, like the two others she was with.
 
She was also drinking a martini, and as I
glanced at her, she didn’t stop speaking to her companions, but she did raise
her glass to me a little, her mouth taking on the tiniest of smiles.
 

“What about her?” I asked Layne in
a stage whisper.

Layne sighed and gazed at the woman
across the room.
 
Layne lifted her chin,
met my gaze head-on as her lips flattened to a hard line.
 
“She’s asking her friends if she should come
over and buy you a drink.
 
She thinks
you’re hot, but she…”
 
Here Layne began
to grin again, her mouth curling triumphantly at the corners as she tossed the
hair out of her eyes and narrowed them.
 
“She thinks you’re with
me
.”

“You’re just guessing!” hooted
Tracy, but she fell silent as quickly as if she’d been stung, because the woman
was walking across the crowded bar toward our little table, then.

She reached us and leaned down
toward me, a few wisps of brown hair haloing her face.
 
“Hi,” she murmured.
 
She smelled of expensive perfume and booze,
and up close, her face showed worry lines around the corners of her mouth as
she cleared her throat.
 
“I never do
this kind of thing,” she said, biting her lip as she stared down at me, “but I’ll
kick myself for it later if I
don’t
—so, I was wondering if I could buy
you a drink?”

I stupidly blinked for a long
moment—half because I was so shocked that Layne could
possibly
have
heard this woman over the loud music, the incessant talking, laughter and
clinking of glasses, and she’d been
twenty feet away
and
whispering
—and
half because that sort of thing doesn’t usually happen to me.
 
I gulped.
 
“I’ve…I’ve had enough for tonight, but thank you—that’s very nice.”
 
I tried to think of some excuse as she began
to frown.
 
“…I just got into an
accident,” I said quickly, pointing to my crutches, positioned much like Tiny
Tim’s as they leaned against the table.

I’d meant the words to indicate
that
because
I’d gotten into an accident, I was pretty bushed.
 
But she stood quickly and took a step
back.
 
It’s not as if I had the
plague
,
but she retreated quicker than if I’d announced I was just diagnosed with
dysentery, heading to the bar without looking back.
 

“That was a little rude.
 
She must not like reminders of her own
mortality,” said Layne snidely, with a shake of her head, but her body language
and her smug smile told me all I needed to know:
 
she was very happy that the woman had left us so quickly.

“Okay, so you really
do
have
good hearing,” Tracy finally admitted, eyes wide.
 
“But, seriously, that was a little spooky—how the hell do you do
it?
 
How the hell could anyone
possibly
have that good of hearing?”

Layne shrugged a little, lifting up
her club soda and taking a sip.
 
I
watched that motion, watched the inherent grace in it, could also see her bicep
move as her arm moved, and I realized I hadn’t seen her very much without her
jacket.
 
Even though it was warm in
here, and even though I knew that she ran a warm temperature, Layne hadn’t
taken off her leather jacket in the bar.
 
“Honestly, it’s not much of a trick—I just come from a family that has
really great hearing.
 
Call it good
genes,” she said firmly in answer to Tracy’s question.
 
But it wasn’t really an answer at all.