Moira Rogers - Crossroads

Her cheeks burned. “We’ll see.” She waved as they walked out, locked the door behind them and turned toward the table where her remaining guests waited.

Kat sat sideways in the booth, leaning back against Andrew. He was finishing up a beer and grinning at Derek, who sat across from them. Nick’s breath caught, and she made a concerted effort to breathe in and out.

He’d dressed simply in jeans and a gray button-up shirt that made his eyes look unbelievably blue. Nick tamped down the lust that rose in her and grabbed a bottle of top-shelf tequila and a handful of shot glasses from behind the bar. She walked over, the low heels of her slip-ons clicking against the floor. “Shots?”

“Oh God, more alcohol?” Kat laughed and struggled to sit upright. “Can I sleep on a table here? I don’t even remember where I live.”

“That’s why friends and taxicabs were invented.” Still, Nick lined up only three glasses and raised an eyebrow. “Andrew? Derek?”

Andrew shrugged his shoulders as gingerly as he could without disturbing Kat. “Hell, I’m game.”

“None for me,” Derek murmured, though his friendly smile managed to warm and confuse her at the same time. “Not sure how I feel about chasing carrot cake with tequila.”

Which was exactly why Nick had avoided the cake altogether. “Come on.” She poured the shots and sat beside him, acutely aware of the warm press of his thigh against hers. “Live dangerously.”

Andrew grinned and raised his shot. “To Kat, on a happy birthday.”

Nick clinked her glass against his and gulped the shot, grimacing as the liquor burned down her throat. “I should have fetched more limes from the kitchen.”

Kat snatched the last glass and tipped it back. She gasped, tears springing to her eyes as she slammed the glass down on the table. “Derek will go get some with you. You can teach me how to do body shots. It looks fun in the movies.”

With both men at the table shooting her apprehensive looks, Nick shook her head. “Maybe next time. My birthday’s coming up in a couple months, you know.”

Andrew hooted. “We can have another party.”

Nick toyed with her empty glass. “I don’t know. My father wants me to come to New York. He’s been after me about it for weeks.”

Kat listed a little to the side before Andrew steadied her. “Hey, you should take Derek. Mari said he’s taking some time off, and he’s going to be depressed if you’re not around to hit on.”

Derek glared at Kat, and a furious blush spread up his neck and cheeks.

“I’m sure he’ll find something to occupy himself,” Nick said casually, but she could feel her easy countenance beginning to slip, so she glanced over at Andrew. “Do I need to call a cab?”

“Nah.” He slipped one of Kat’s arms around his shoulders and laughed again. “Up, birthday girl. We’re being kicked out.”

“What?” Kat let Andrew nudge her out of the booth, but she swayed a little when he urged her to stand. “Oh, are they going to make out? Thank God. Finally. Let’s go.”

Nick could hear Derek grinding his teeth. “You better leave with Andrew, Kat, because if I take you home, I’m dunking you under a cold shower.”

“Bah. You’re no fun.” Kat looped her other arm around Andrew’s neck and beamed up at him. “Andrew will take me home.”

“God help him,” Derek muttered too softly for them to hear.

Nick unlocked the door, and Andrew led Kat outside. The street was still fairly crowded, and she imagined they’d have no problem grabbing a taxi without calling one. She cleared her throat and looked at Derek, who still sat in the booth. “Do you want another beer? Or I could make some coffee…”

He tilted his head. “Come sit down, Nick. We need to talk, since my drunk-ass cousin screwed up my careful plans.”

She secured the door again and slid into the booth opposite him. “She’s wasted, Derek. I own a bar . I know better than to listen to drunken ranting. It’s okay.”

He snorted. “She’s a drunk psychic, Nick. She understands more about what’s going on in my head than I do.”

He didn’t seem to want to take the graceful exit she’d offered, so she reached over, retrieved her shot glass and raised an eyebrow at him as she slowly refilled it. “Does that mean you want to go to New York with me?”

“Well, it wasn’t in my plans since I didn’t know about it.” He grinned, righted Kat’s glass and pushed it toward Nick. “Besides, I was more thinking about asking you out on a date before we went on vacation together.”

She bit her lip and filled his glass with the amber liquid as well. “Could have fooled me, Gabriel. All you’ve done lately is glare at me.”

“Yeah.” He closed his eyes and exhaled on a sigh. “I…was pissed at you. Only I didn’t have any right to be, so I was pissed at myself too.”

She pushed the shot toward him until it nudged his hand. “Why were you angry with me? What did I do?” What did I not do?

Derek’s strong fingers curled around the glass. He lifted it to his lips and tossed it back without opening his eyes, giving her a glimpse of the strong column of his throat as he swallowed. The glass hit the table with a hollow thud , and he finally looked at her again. “You went charging into danger. You went on a suicidal rescue mission, and I had to find out about it from Kat . I have no right to be angry that you didn’t tell me. But every time I think about it, every weird, freaky instinct inside me flips the fuck out.”

Nick froze with her glass halfway to her mouth and stared at him. It was a common reaction, a purely animal response to instinct. Which meant he considered her, at least on some level, to be under his protection. “What do you think about that?” she whispered. “Rationally, I mean?”

“There’s nothing rational about it. But the human in me says I should have asked you out already, and then I wouldn’t be fighting with myself over whether or not you’re mine.”

Mine. She couldn’t breathe, much less drink more, so she lowered the shot of tequila and studied the planes of Derek’s face. She knew every inch of it already, every dimple and expression, a knowledge borne of countless hours of desire. Of yearning. The words escaped before she could stop them. “Will you come upstairs with me?”

He wanted to; there was no mistaking the desire. He groaned and slid his hands over to cover hers. “God, Nick, don’t tempt me. I’ve been trying far too hard not to screw this up, and right now I don’t think jumping into bed with tequila as a third wheel is the way to go. But…if you don’t need to go to New York right away, maybe a date? Dinner, at least. Someplace without nosy shapeshifters and obnoxious psychic cousins.”

Her heart thumped. “Do those places exist in New Orleans?”

“I’ll find one.” He smiled at her. “It’d be worth it.”

She hoped he couldn’t feel her trembling, though she knew better. “We could always order in.”

He licked his lips, and his gaze dropped to her mouth. “Okay. I’m going to get up and leave, and I’m going to call you when we’re both sober. Because that’s the responsible thing to do.”

Nick wasn’t drunk, and she’d be willing to bet Derek wasn’t, either. “Do you have my number?”

“I think so.” He flashed her another of those quick, nervous smiles and eased out of the booth. “Either way, I can find it. Especially since Kat and Andrew are probably spray painting it across the side of my truck right now as a subtle hint.”

“Only if they couldn’t find a skywriter this time of night.” She followed him to the door, trying not to stare at the broad expanse of his back.