Trial Run

Lainey POV I changed four times. I finally went with my good dark jeans, the ones that fit like I had paid more for them than I had. I put a top with them that was cute without showing too much. It was the kind of outfit that had always been good for tips and had never once gotten me grabbed. I wore boots, too. Closed shoes. I threw a jacket over my arm at the last second. The days were still hot, but the nights had started cooling off, and I would be walking home in the dark. "How do I look?" Travis looked up from the couch, and his eyebrows went all the way up. "Smoking hot," he said. "Damn, Lane." He reached for his keys on the box beside him. "You want me to take you?" "No, it's okay. I have to get used to walking." "Okay." He didn't even hesitate. He set the keys back down, tipped his face up, and kissed me goodbye. I let myself out. It was supposed to be a fifteen-minute walk. I did it in ten, because my nerves were doing most of the walking. Ten minutes wasn't bad at all, at least not at three in the afternoon, with the sun out and half the town watering things in their yards. They were getting better at it. Nobody dropped a hose this time. The woman with the petunias gave me a wave that was almost normal, and the man two doors down called out, "Afternoon!" a little too loudly, like he had been practicing. "Afternoon," I called back. He looked thrilled. On Main Street, the waitress from the diner was out front, wiping down a table that was already clean. She looked me over from top to bottom and gave me a thumbs-up with the rag still in her hand. "Go get 'em, hon." I hadn't told anybody in this town that I had a trial shift. I had stopped being surprised by that kind of thing somewhere around the second casserole. Midnight might be scary. I had thought about that while I was getting dressed, about the same road with no streetlights and the woods running right up to the edge of it. I would be okay. I had put a full can of pepper spray on my keychain. I had gotten myself home from plenty of late shifts before, and I had done it in a much bigger town than this one. I pulled open the green door at three thirty. I wanted to be early. It was cool inside, and dim after the sun. The broken glass was long gone. The floor had been mopped, the chairs were down, and somebody had lined the stools up along the bar so straight that they looked measured. I had only seen the place for five loud minutes the day before, and I hadn't really looked at it. It was a good bar. It had a long oak top, worn pale where years of elbows had rested, and a row of taps with the handles polished. There was a jukebox in the corner that looked older than I was. It smelled like lemon and old wood. Somebody took care of this place. He was behind the bar. He had a case of beer open on the back counter and was stocking the cooler, bottle by bottle, with his sleeves pushed up past his elbows. That was all he was doing, standing there putting beer away. My breath left me anyway. He looked up when the door opened. I swear his breath left him too. He went still for one second, with a bottle in each hand. Then he turned away from me, fast, and shoved both of them into the cooler. "You're early," he said, to the beer. "Yes. I like being on time." He glanced back over his shoulder. One corner of his mouth went up, and it was the closest thing to a smile I had seen on him yet. Then his eyes went down. They went over the top, and the jeans, and the boots, and all the way back up, slowly. I felt every inch of it. I suddenly had no idea what to do with my hands. "I hope this is okay," I said. "It's what I used to wear." He swallowed. I saw the exact moment it happened. I saw it because I was looking at his throat, and I was looking at his throat because I wanted to put my mouth on it. I wanted to lick it, right there where it moved. I shook the thought off so hard that I nearly shook my head for real. "You're perfect," he said. It hung in the air for about half a second. "It's perfect," he said, rougher. "The outfit. It's fine. You might bring in more customers." I laughed. It came out higher than I meant it to. I had a boyfriend at home on the couch. I kissed him goodbye ten minutes ago. I was not going to stand in my new boss's bar and think about his neck. I set my keys on the end of the bar, pepper spray and all, and put on my best first-day smile. "So," I said. "What would you like me to do first?" He took a very long time to answer.