“I just want to make sure you’re okay, that’s all.”
“So you break my shoe?”
“I evened the pair,” he managed. Now her ire was fully focused on him, the jerk at the bar long forgotten. Suddenly, the heel fiasco was all his fault, instead of the handsy SOB who’d started all this—or the wimpy bartender who couldn’t defend her even in his own place. “I didn’t want your feet freezing, or for you to fall and break your knee hobbling around like a pirate.”
She stuffed her other foot in the other boot and zipped it. They both glanced down at the flattened boots and saw her toes pointing oddly in the air. The once sexy ankle boots looked a bit like something that one of Santa’s elves might wear. Now Beck really did want to laugh. Hard. But he had to swallow his chuckle as she glared at her feet, exasperated.
“I look ridiculous now.”
Beck said nothing. She did, kind of, look ridiculous in her elf shoes. Not that any of the guys at this bar, or any other bar, would care. No man would be looking at her feet. She could wear a pair of stuffed bear paw slippers and still get hit on by every straight guy in the place.
Allie frowned, more tendrils of loose hair falling forward in her face, her bun all but coming undone. He wanted to put his hands in her hair and finish the job. He longed to see her face framed by the silken auburn streaked with red, wanted to feel that silky hair once more on his bare chest. He mentally shook himself. More thoughts like these and he’d have a hard-on in the bar, right there. And he’d promised himself: hands off Allie. Period.
“I don’t think your new boyfriend will care about the shoes, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Beck offered.
“Boyfriend?” Confusion crossed Allie’s face.
“The bartender?” Beck reluctantly nodded toward the bar, still not quite believing that the solidly below-average man was Allie’s choice to replace him.
“Him?” Allie laughed, confusing Beck. “He’s not my boyfriend. Any more than you are.”
The sting of the comment was surprisingly sharp. Beck blinked fast. “Sure seemed like you guys were friendly.”
Allie’s gaze focused on him with the intensity of a lion looking for the weak member of a pack.
“Were you watching me?” she asked, a note of accusation in her voice.
“Of course I was.” If she were in the room, then that was where his attention would be. Plain and simple. That hadn’t changed, might never change. “So you’re not dating him?”
Allie laughed. “The bartender? No.”
Relief flooded Beck. “Good.” That bartender couldn’t handle a woman like Allie. She was way out of his league.
“I don’t even know his name,” she added.
This felt like a punch in the gut. “You kissed a guy and you didn’t even know his name?” Beck felt like an alien had come down and taken over his friend’s body. She was not the make-out-with-strangers-in-a-bar type. Allie picked her lingerie with care, and her men with more deliberation. It was one of the things that made Allie…Allie. They’d spent enough time at enough happy hours to know how the other operated, enough time together lamenting the Aspen dating scene to know what made the other tick. It had been why they’d been such great friends. Until the blizzard that had snowed them in on top of the mountain and everything changed.
“Why?”
Allie shrugged. “Because Mira dared me to.”
“Dared you?” None of this made sense. “What the hell is that?”
Allie laughed. “I’m playing a game of double dare you. So why do you care? Don’t you have some mark to make tonight? Is it Channing?”
Beck flinched. They were back in Allie and Beck mode, friends mode, where she’d be his wingman at the bar and he’d reveal the real truth about what it was like being Aspen’s most-talked-about bachelor. It was comfortable. Dangerously comfortable.
“No, I can’t stand Channing.”
“She sure likes you.” The words seemed to have some weight to them. Beck tried not to think about what that meant. Despite the fact they were acting like good old friends, something was off. Beck knew exactly what. It was because he’d tasted every inch of her body and he’d liked it. Liked it so much, he craved another round. And another. “Well, I’m sure you’ll have your pick of the bar. Anyway, I’ve got to go. The bartender told me he’s off in fifteen minutes.”
Now Beck felt like he’d been hit with a ton of bricks. She was going to take that lame guy home after that pathetic show at the bar when he let that patron slobber all over her? She was going to show him her red lace? His brain felt short-circuited. The world he lived in no longer made sense.
“You’re going to fuck him?” He stared at Allie as if seeing her for the first time. “You don’t even know his name.”
“That never stopped you before.”
“Yeah, but, Al. You’re not me.” He thought this was obvious. Al didn’t do casual. She’d never done anything casual in her whole life. She was all in or nothing. There wasn’t an in-between with her.
“I’m not?” The challenge in her voice was unmistakable. “Maybe I’ve been going about my life all wrong. Maybe I’ve been boring.”
What was she even talking about? “You’re not boring.” She was anything but. And taking after him was the last thing she ought to do. If only she knew how little he’d enjoyed anything or anyone since the weekend they’d spent together, how he drifted aimlessly through nights with strangers like a robot. He could go through the motions, but he felt numb inside, as if he was stuck in a performance trying to convince himself that sex could be half as good with anyone else. He already knew it would never be as good with anyone as with Allie.
“Al…” He sighed. He knew all he had to do was pull out his phone right now, and in seconds he’d probably have a Tinder hookup waiting in the parking lot. There was no way she’d believe that was the last thing he wanted with her standing in front of him. “If you take that guy home, it’ll be a mistake.” Then she’d feel the emptiness he felt, the uselessness of it all. “You’ll regret it.”
He was speaking only the truth, but she immediately took offense.
“I’ll be the judge of that,” she said. He recognized Allie’s stubbornness, but not this newfound determination to sleep around. She didn’t avoid her problems by having sex with strangers. That was Beck’s coping mechanism, as ill-advised as it was.
She cared too much, that was Allie’s problem, and she wasn’t built for casual sex. It was why it had been a colossal mistake for him to go there. He wasn’t a relationship guy. Allie deserved the guy who bought her flowers and wrote his own sappy poems in Valentine’s Day cards. Not the guy who didn’t plan his life more than a week in advance. “Please don’t take him home.” Beck realized he had no sway anymore. As much as he wanted to protect her and keep her safe from scruffy-bearded bartenders, he actually didn’t have a say in her life.
“Why do you care?”
“Because…” He never stopped caring—that was the whole problem. Because he was jealous, even though he had no right to be. “Because I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I think it’s a little late for that.” She blinked, and he worried for a second she might cry. If she cried, he’d be undone; he wouldn’t be able to keep his resolve. He’d pull her into his arms and beg her for forgiveness. And that wouldn’t help either of them. How could he tell her that he’d just find a way to disappoint her? Later, five or even ten years down the line, the Beck genes would come roaring to the surface. They always did.
“I’m…”