Page 23 of Bastard Bartender

“I have no doubt about that,” I muse as she points to the corner pocket.

With her next shot in, she does a little victory dance.

We laugh and joke while we play. For as good as Marie is, I’m terrible. It’s not for a lack of trying. As a woman who prides herself on knowing rules and facts, I use the knowledge Marie imparts on me, but it’s no use. Sometimes, I get a ball in. Most times, I miss horribly. No matter what, we laugh.

When the club version of “Tainted Love” plays over the speaker, we use our pool sticks as microphones, and we sing the opening lyrics of the song.

Marie lines up her shot again and sings as she sinks the ball. While she plays, I snap my fingers and walk around the table. She misses, and now, it’s my turn. I’m spending more time dancing to the song than focusing on what I need to do during the game. When I miss by an inch, I stand up and just continue to sing, rather loudly this time.

As I’m swaying my head from side to side, I glance over at the bar and see Nic watching us. He has a rag in his hand as he wipes down the countertop, and there’s a sly grin on his face as he watches us sing and dance.

Feeling brazen, I stand my stick in front of me and sing into it, still turned his direction. My motions are exaggerated, and I must look like a fool with the way I’m belting out the song and gyrating my body. If I come off as a fool, you’d never know it by the expression on Nic’s face. His eyes crinkle, and his mouth opens into a laugh.

My heart begins to beat wildly, and there’s a shiver up my spine that goes straight to my head. I turn back to Marie, who has cleared out every ball on the table.

“Rematch?” she asks, which is silly because we’re not really playing against each other seriously.

I nod and let her rack again. She breaks them, and we are back to our game. The blue number two ball is near the side pocket. I line myself up with the cue and get ready for an easy shot. When I miss, I grimace because, well, that was supposed to go in.

“Stop poking and let your cue do the work.” Nic’s comment has me searching over my shoulder.

He’s walked out from behind the bar. I’m still bent over with my ass perched in the air when I glance at him. His eyes roam down the spine of my back and land on my butt, forcing me to stand tall and sneer playfully at him.

“I don’t poke.”

“You poke,” Marie chimes in from the opposite side of the table.

I stick my tongue out at her because she could have told me that before.

“I’m not a poker,” I state again and then add, “Wait, what do you mean by poking?”

“You’re stabbing the cue ball with very little follow-through,” Nic states.

“Oh.” I bite my lip.

With a long stride, he steps up to me and takes the pool stick. His large, firm hand grips it easily as the other runs up and down the shaft of the stick.

“Billiards is a game of strokes. You have too much tension in your arm, and your grip is too far forward.”

He’s talking, but my attention is fixated on the way his hand is moving so fluidly on the wood. He clears his throat, and my eyes jump up to his face.

What was he talking about again?

“Let me show you.” He places a hand on my lower back and directs me toward the table. His hand is splayed firmly on my thin shirt, and the heat of it warms me.

I take the pool stick from him and get into position. To my surprise, he steps up behind me. His groin is lined up with my ass as he hovers over me.

His mouth is just a whisper from my ear as he places a hand over my fingers and instructs, “Lighten up on your grip. No one wants their shaft squeezed.”

I look up. “Are you equating the art of billiards to a hand job?”

“If that’s the metaphor you’d like to go with, then yes. Now, relax your wrist and just slide the stick through your fingers. Feel how fluidly it moves?”

I do. In fact, I’m feeling a little too much. As Nic gently guides our arms, his body makes the tiniest of rocking motions into mine. Perhaps it’s been a while since I’ve gone to bed with a man that I’m a bit strung up. The feel of his hard body pressed against my soft one is quite distracting.

“Did you hear what I said?” He chuckles into my ear.

I shake my head. “No. Probably because you’re invading my space, and it’s throwing me off.”