12. Kiss My Blarney Stone

Female voices stopped Noah in his tracks. He cocked an ear, straining to make out to whom those voices belonged and what they were saying.

He recognized the first as Dixie's, and she was using her most soothing tone, the same one she'd used to tell him a chunk of his staff couldn't make it in tonight.

"Now I heard you asking Charlie how you could repay his brother, and this is the best way."

A different female voice, opposite from Dixie's in its pitch and level of hysteria, rose. "Not dressed like … like … this! Besides, I haven't done it in forever. Does Noah know? What if I screw up?"

"Don't you worry, hon. You'll do just fine. It'll come right back to you, same as riding a bike."

"Dixie, I can't wear this!"

"Here. Let me fix your face." Some rustling sounded. "Even if you screw up, no one's going to care as long as you're wearing this adorable outfit. All's you have to do is smile and shake your tush, and you'll have every man eating out of your hand tonight. And don't get your women's lib feathers ruffled—or is it ‘feminist' now? Well, PC don't matter here because we're talking real world, and in that real world the paying customers will be men. They tip better when you flaunt what the good Lord endowed you with. This is a truism I've experienced my entire adult life."

"But this top doesn't fit!" the voice wailed.

"Fits like it's supposed to."

The next noise sounded like Dewey growling, "Hubba, hubba."

"Just a little more gloss," Dixie continued, "then you go show Charlie. If his eyes don't pop out of his head, then I'm a monkey's aunt."

"How about if she shows Noah instead?" Noah ducked out of his hiding place and nearly tripped over his shoes.

What. The. Actual …?

His mouth dropped open. He wasn't sure what he'd expected, but it sure as hell wasn't Hailey Bailey dressed as a saucy tavern maid. Said wench was currently tugging at an off-the-shoulder ruffly white blouse that couldn't hide her cleavage if it tried—mostly because said cleavage was accentuated by a skin-tight, bright green lace-up bodice that shoved her boobs above the top's neckline. She wore two long, blond pigtails and a lot of makeup that highlighted her high cheekbones and pouty lips. His eyes involuntarily swept down the rest of her, taking in a flouncy skirt that matched the bodice and barely covered her ass, thigh-high white stockings tied with tiny green bows, and black high heels.

Body parts south of his belt began shifting without his permission. "What's going on?" His voice had climbed several octaves.

Hailey gave him a hesitant smile at the same moment her cheeks ripened with an alluring shade of pink. "You're short on help, and I used to wait tables, so Dixie and I thought …"

Dixie mocked a Vanna White presentation. "What do you think of our little Fr?ulein?"

"She's German!" he sputtered. When surprised eyes landed on him, he ran on like an idiot. "German is Oktoberfest, and this isn't Oktoberfest. It's Saint Patrick's Day. She needs to be Irish—a leprechaun, a Blarney Stone …" Not someone whose micro skirt I want to lift up as I bend her over a table.

Dixie pursed her lips. "A Blarney Stone?"

"All the customers'll see is a hoochie mama dressed in green," Dewey crowed unhelpfully. "Perfect for Saint Patty's Day." Noah didn't like the way the old roadie's eyes were coasting up and down the hoochie mama's body.

Charlie chose that moment to round the corner. "Holy shit!" He clapped a hand over his mouth, no doubt to keep it from falling open like Noah's had.

Meanwhile, Hailey squirmed and pulled at the outfit, which only made matters worse—or better, depending on one's point of view. Noah's baser side was certainly a huge fan of the visual.

He cleared his throat and put on his best I-am-the-boss voice. "Can someone please give me the whole story?"

Dixie raised her chin a few stubborn inches. "When Hailey Bailey here heard we were shorthanded, she offered her services."

Noah bit back the urge to ask what kind of services. "That doesn't explain the … the getup."

"Her baggy jeans and dowdy top—" Dixie slid Hailey a sheepish look. "Sorry, hon. Let me rephrase. Her attire didn't exactly fit the occasion, so I dug up this outfit in our lost and found. And look! It fits her perfectly." She pursed her lips. "That ol' watch needs to go, though."

Noah flicked a finger in Hailey's general direction. "We don't dress our waitstaff in … in outfits like that one." No, this outfit was best suited for the Brothel, one of the other bars in town. Hell, even they didn't dress their waitstaff in skimpy costumes.

"It's too small," Hailey protested. "And I'm not taking off my watch."

Charlie, meanwhile, stood with arms crossed, shamelessly eyeing her from the cute pigtails Noah wanted to pull to her fuck-me heels that made him want to do other aforementioned things to her. A huge grin split his brother's stupid face. "You might want to reconsider your dress code, bro. This look really rocks. And for the record, I like the watch."

"Why the hell are you here?" Noah growled.

He leveled Noah with a dumbstruck expression. "Because you need me?"

Oh right.

"We might have enough fill-ins now for you and your brothers to entertain the folks with your li'l ol' rock-and-roll show," Dixie drawled.

Noah barely registered the suggestion because over Dixie's shoulder, Hailey's wriggling was a distraction Noah was struggling to ignore. Damn it, he didn't have time for this!

"Boss? The band?" Dixie prodded.

"Uh, we'll just have to find a playlist on Pandora or Spotify and crank it up. Once people have a good heater going, they won't notice."

The tavern wench raised a hand. "Do you have a karaoke machine? You can explain that the band is stuck, which people will understand, and spin the karaoke substitution by saying your patrons demanded it, and you're giving the public what it wants."

Noah wanted to kiss her. Whether the desire had more to do with her provocative outfit or the karaoke suggestion, he had little idea. Then his hopes plummeted. "The tavern doesn't own one."

"We have one we could loan for tonight," Dixie piped up. She took in all the eyes staring at her—except Dewey's, which had yet to peel themselves off Hailey. "Why are ya'll looking at me like that? Dewey and I enjoy singalongs same as other folks. Don't we, hon?" Dixie smacked his chest, and he stumbled backward. "Don't we like to sing karaoke in private?"

Rubbing his chest, Dewey shifted his gaze to his wife, seeming to recognize she was shooting him daggers. He grimaced at her. "Why, yes, we do, sugarplum."

"Then go fetch it here," she ordered with an imperious finger wave. As Dewey slinked away, Dixie dusted off her hands and turned to face Noah. "Sounds like we've solved every last one of your problems, boss."

"Yay!" Hailey clapped and bounced in place, which made a number of other delightful parts of her jiggle. A wardrobe malfunction might be in her future, and Noah couldn't decide if that was good or bad.

As he wrestled with this question, he became acutely aware that while his other problems might be fixed, a growing one was pressing against his fly and wasn't going away anytime soon.

Tossing a pigtail over her shoulder, Hailey took on a prim pose and in a demure tone asked, "Where do you want me?"

Now there was a loaded question. In so many places and so many ways. Noah stifled a groan. Thank fuck she'd stopped rearranging her costume, but that hadn't stopped Charlie's latest round of ogling.

"Charlie," Noah snapped, "why don't you go check our glasses supply?"

Charlie's eyes flew to Noah. "Already did. You're all set."

Damn.While Noah searched out a new excuse, Reece made an entrance through the back door. "Had to run a quick errand. I am now reporting for duty." As Reece pulled off his scarf, his eyes took a quick tour of the attraction that was Hailey Bailey, and he broke into a broad smile. "I approve of the new uniform, Noah. It'll go a long way toward your, uh, bottom line."

Just put me out of my misery now.

Reece didn't put Noah out of his misery, but he certainly snagged his attention. "I just spotted a van with the Celtic Knots' logo parked in front of Dell's. Weren't they supposed to be your act tonight?"

"Yeah, except they couldn't make it over the pass."

"Looks like they made it just fine."

On his way out the back door, Dewey hollered, "Those turd blossoms said they couldn't get theyselves over the pass. Too bad they didn't get stuck and stay stuck. I'm gonna find out what's going on."

Dixie bellowed after him, "We need the karaoke machine more than we need you getting into a fight." Fanning herself, she turned to Hailey. "That man can be such an animal."

Noah clenched his jaw to keep it from exploding. "How about if I go over there and deal with Dell and the damn Knots myself." He relished having a target where he could direct the maelstrom brewing inside him.

"They signed a contract, right?" Hailey ventured.

"No, it was a handshake thing over the phone," Noah gritted out.

She rolled her lips between her teeth, as if to keep from saying, "In other words, you were an idiot. Got it."

Reece put a staying hand on his arm. "Marching over there isn't gonna help you get ready for tonight. Besides, Keating loves getting under your skin, and you don't want to give him the satisfaction of seeing how much he's pissed you off. It'll make him yank your chain even harder next time."

Without a doubt, there would be a next time. Noah let out a defeated sigh. When he conceded they were right, they all peeled away, leaving him facing Hailey.

He smoothed his beard. "Sorry about just now."

"Why? What did you do?"

"I might have overreacted to the way you're dressed. I acted like ... I'm not sure how to define it." A jealous lover.

"You never said what you thought of it." Her blush returned, and this time he was close enough to notice it spread across her décolletage and below her neckline. She studied him with those glacier-blue eyes.

"Um, it's, yeah, I …"

She flashed him an impish grin. "You know, you're kinda cute when you're ready to implode."

"Cute?"

Her eyes rolled to the ceiling before coming back to rest on him. "Okay, not cute. Hot."

"I'm hot when I'm ready to implode?" he jabbered. Her words amped up the inconvenient electrical current in his bloodstream. Was that hot in a pissed-off kind of way or hot as in … hawt? "Wait. I'm not ready to implode."

"Whatever you say, barkeep." She pivoted and sashayed away, her tiny green skirt swaying with the suggestion of heaven beneath its folds. His brain whirligigged, then seized.

When rational thought came back online, he blurted after her, "For the record, I'm on the Blarney Stone bandwagon."

"Good to know," she called back before she disappeared.

He was still standing there, staring into the space where she'd been seconds before, when Charlie whacked him on the back. "What's with the shit-eating grin?"

"I was just thinking this crappy day might be turning around." It had taken a giant step from lousy to … promising. And he couldn't wait to find out what else it brought.

Hours later, the place was humming, and it wasn't even five. Noah was feeling it, and he busted out the occasional dance move between orders. Customers were happy to congregate and celebrate with their fellow humans outside of their homes, where they'd been trapped by the storm, and didn't seem to notice when he or his staff screwed up. He and Charlie made the drinks strong and kept them coming so people wouldn't mind the hiccups too much.

One reason they might not have noticed the goofs was because they had somewhere far more interesting to focus: Hailey, as she twirled between the guests with her "Name-Noah's-Dog" box or with their orders, laughing and teasing without missing a beat.

"Fuck me, who's the hot new girl?" Micky spun on his bar stool, his eyes tracking her. "That chick has got it going on!"

Micky was getting on Noah's nerves, and his answer came out a little harsher than he meant. "I don't recommend saying that too loudly, or you'll find yourself wearing a sixteen-ounce pour."

Micky remained fixed on the tavern wench. "Who's doing the pouring? If it's her, maybe she'll lick it off me."

"Dixie. And she'll add it to your tab." Noah's teeth might have gnashed. "And, dude? You can look, but you can't touch. And I don't recommend looking too much."

"Damn," Micky lamented.

Noah added mint garnishes to a pair of Moscow mules and delivered them to the end of the bar before getting to work on the next order. "That ‘hot new girl' is the owner of the 4Runner you're supposed to fix. Is it done yet?"

Micky whipped his head back to Noah. "Huh? That's her car? The girl you got stuck with on Coal Bank Pass? Shit, if I'd a known that, I would have washed, polished, and vacuumed that damn hunk of junk while I was at it. Hee-yoo! Lucky you, man."

"Is it fixed?" Noah repeated.

"Yeah, it's all fixed and sitting in front of the Moose. That's why I'm here." Micky stood and grinned. "Think I'll go let her know I took care of her."

"Amy joining you tonight?" Noah bit out. Micky was so damn enthralled with Hailey he either ignored Noah or didn't hear his not-so-subtle reminder Micky already had a girl.

Beside Noah, Charlie clattered ice into a blender. "Slow your roll, bro. He doesn't have any designs on her. He's just stating the obvious, which is what every other man in this joint has noticed. But maybe you can't see with those green eyes of yours." He chuckled, sounding extremely proud of himself.

"What? I'm not jealous. I just don't like customers getting friendly with the staff."

"Yeah, right. If she's your definition of staff, then I'm Zoe Saldana."

Noah guffawed. "Seriously? Where did that come from?"

"No idea. Just popped into my head. Maybe because I really likeZoe Saldana."

Noah distributed the contents of a shaker between two chilled glasses. Luanne, one of their local part-timers who offered to help out on her day off, scooped them up on her tray.

Wiping his hands on a bar towel, Charlie gave Noah a thoughtful look. "You like this girl, don't you?"

Noah polished a spot on the bar. "She seems nice."

"‘Seems nice,' my ass. You can't take your eyes off her." Charlie raised a shot glass of Jameson he'd stashed behind the bar. "It's about time you got your head out of your ass and stopped chasing someone who only wants to steer you around the corral by your leads."

Noah fished out his own stash and downed the rest of his pour. The whiskey trailed delightful heat to his belly.

"Hey, I've dated other women," he protested.

Charlie snorted in response. "Name one."

"You wouldn't know her. She lives in Denver." Noah cringed inside as yet again his most recent foray into "dating" popped up from his memory banks. Sandy had been texting him ever since he'd hauled ass two days ago, and he froze every time he tried to compose a polite message that said, "Thanks, but no thanks," without hurting her feelings. If he didn't nip what he shouldn't have restarted in the bud this time, he was in danger of sliding back into that messy mudhole where what he saw as a no-strings fling meant lots of hearts and flowers to her. The last time he'd broken it off, their "casual hookup" had morphed into her accusing him of misleading her, followed by lots of crying. Messy. Had he misled Sandy? He'd turned over their conversations so many times he could practically recite them verbatim, and nowhere could he find where he'd signaled he wanted to get serious. Hell, he hadn't even been in the market for casual when he'd met her, but she had come on strong, claiming to be interested in only a one-nighter. Since she lived in Denver—a convenient five hours away instead of right down the street—he'd capitulated. One night became two became three, and she began planning a future that included him. And it wasn't that he didn't want long-term with someone—he just knew he didn't want it with her.

"Oh right. The girl you dated while I was working on your building. That doesn't count because she's a return to the familiar, which is something you tend to do. You need to put yourself out there, take a risk."

Noah sliced up a lime and threw the wedges into a glass dish. "You don't know what the hell you're talking about, Charlie."

Charlie merely laughed and turned to help two people who had just taken seats at the bar. Unfortunately, one of those people happened to be Germaine, a redhead who occasionally worked in the visitor's center and someone Noah had almost climbed into bed with after drinking way too many shots one night soon after he'd opened. It seemed Germaine had been on a mission to get him there ever since.

The hazards and benefits of bartending were two sides of one coin.

Germaine twisted a hank of hair around her finger. "Hi, Noah."

He leaned his palms against the bar. "Hey, Germaine. What can I get you?"

Pulling her bottom lip between her teeth, she blatantly ran her eyes up and down his frame. He half expected her to crawl over the bar and take a look at the rest of him. "I'm not sure that what I want is on the menu," she purred. When he merely lifted an eyebrow, she wiggled her pointer at his empty shot glass. "I would like to buy you another one of those. Open a tab for me?"

He poured himself a measure and lifted his glass in thanks. "Sláinte." Throwing the Jameson down his gullet, he wiped his mouth on his sleeve and realized he'd slopped something on it—which gave him the perfect excuse to check on Chance. Germaine and her friend were whispering between themselves, and since the bar was in the midst of a rare lull, he swiveled his head to Charlie. "Hey, I need to check on Cha—uh, I need to run upstairs."

"Yeah, sure. I got you." Charlie's smooth cadence followed him as he left the bar behind. "Hi, Germaine. Who's your friend, and what can I do for you two?"

Noah was feeling no pain when he jogged into the back hallway, aiming for the door to his loft. He pulled up when he noticed his normally shut office door ajar and a flash of kelly green behind it. Poking his head in, he was startled to see the hoochie mama—Hailey! Her name's Hailey!—perched at the edge of his couch.

Her eyes grew wide, and she hopped to her stockinged feet. "Oh, I'm so sorry! My feet hurt, and Dixie said … I hope it's okay that I'm taking a load off. It's been so busy …"

Closing the door behind him, he took a few steps toward her. "It's fine. I'm glad you got a minute to take a breather. It has been nuts."

She dipped to pick up her heels, and Noah took in her long, slender neck and the fascinatingly irregular hairline at her nape. A pigtail was cockeyed, and he idly wondered if someone had tugged it.

"I should probably get out of your way so you can do whatever it is you came here to, um, do."

All of him didn't want her to go. Instead, he wanted to freeze the moment in this bubble where only the two of them existed. "No need to rush. Relax while you can." She let the shoes slip from her fingers and leaned against his credenza, bracing her weight on her hands.

He stuffed a hand in his front pocket and smoothed the hair at the back of his head, searching for something to say to keep her there. "Thanks for helping out. You're working your ass off out there, and you're doing a great job." God, could he sound any lamer? Except it was true. She was a model employee, the rare kind, the kind who did the hard work with a smile and a touch that made each customer feel special, whether they deserved it or not. The kind he wished he could replicate ten times over.

"It's fun. And everyone is so nice." She waved a hand around his office. "I see you're a Colorado Blizzard fan."

"You follow hockey?"

"When I can. Do you have a favorite player?"

It was an easy question, and he grinned. "Yeah, my cousin, Wyatt Tompkins."

Her eyes bugged. "The goalie's your cousin? Oh wow! How did this not come up while we rode out the storm?"

"I guess we had too many other topics to cover." An array of new topics occurred to him, along with a desire to dig into them all and get to know her better. What kind of music did she like? What did she think of—

"Didn't he get married a year or so ago?"

"And has since had twins. Well, his wife had the twins." He didn't want to talk about Wyatt or the wedding or meeting said twins and how they had led him to Coal Bank Pass in a snowstorm, so he followed with, "If anyone gets too friendly, you come to me, got it?" He jabbed a thumb against his chest.

She flapped her hand. "Thanks, but I doubt I'll need to. They're harmless. I've had worse."

This shouldn't have surprised him, but it kinda did. More than that, though, it dismayed him. "Really?"

She shrugged. "One of the hazards of being female."

"I'm sorry."

"That I'm female?" A cute little smirk tugged a corner of her mouth.

Never! He found himself immensely grateful not only for her gender, but for the match it was to his. "No, of course not."

Crossing her arms, she leaned against a cluttered credenza he needed to clear. "Did you know they call you the ‘keeper'?"

He shook his head. "Why?" He kept his eyes fixed on hers so they didn't drift down to her neckline and all that skin.

"Well, the most obvious reason is you're their favorite bartender. But apparently, you have a reputation for listening to everyone's troubles and keeping them to yourself. Your female customers are especially appreciative of your ability to keep a secret. I wonder why?" She sent him a sly wink.

"Oh," came his witty response. While part of her statement gave him a warm flicker of pride, the other part made him squirm under her amused scrutiny. Or maybe the shots of whiskey sloshing in his empty stomach explained his sudden discomfort.

"I can't blame them. You do shake a mean martini, barkeep. And the way you toss those liquor bottles. Phew!" She faked a forehead swipe.

For a breath-stealing moment, their eyes locked, and he couldn't break it.

What is really going through that beautiful head of yours?

She cast her gaze down and pushed away from the credenza in an uncharacteristically jerky way, so different from her usual feline grace. A spray of greenery stuck to the hem of her skirt, and she plucked it off and held it in her open palm. "Oops, I hope I didn't crush this. What is it?"

He ate up the distance between them, leaving mere inches of space, and lifted the vegetation from her hand. "Mistletoe. I really need to organize that credenza."

Her pale blue eyes darkened as she scanned his face. "Mistletoe?" The word rolled out of her mouth in a breathless rush. Was it possible she was as hot and bothered as he was?

"It's left over from Christmas last year. We had it hanging everywhere," he spouted. "Dixie thought we could save it and reuse it this year, but it's looking a little ragged." He held it over his head to see if it would crumble.

"Barkeep, are you trying to get yourself kissed? If so, it's the wrong time of year."

He yanked his gaze back to hers. "I thought any time of year was the right time," his mouth said for him.

A kiss wasn't what he'd been going for … or was it? Hailey had been dancing in his line of sight and his mind's eye, dousing him with hits of dopamine for most of the day, and the Jameson had dissolved his restraints into a mellow amber puddle.

He wanted her. Despite knowing he shouldn't, despite the sirens blaring in his head. It wasn't only his libido talking, though. Something else was at work, an undercurrent that was as powerful as it was vague and elusive.

For an electrified instant, he swam in the depths of those crystalline eyes, recording every fleck, every nuance of their shading, while a debate escalated in his head. He shouldn't do this. It was a bad idea. The reason why was a little fuzzy, though, and the alarms faded to a dull noise.

She probably thought he had lost it as he stood there, holding the damn mistletoe in the air while he stared down at her. But if she did, she didn't show it. Instead, she tilted her chin up and glanced at the desiccated plant, murmuring, "So are you just going to hold it there all night?"

Again, his mouth took over for his short-circuited brain. "Until I can invent a different reason why you should let me kiss you, then, yeah, I probably am."

Her eyes flared and lowered to his mouth before slowly leveling with his again. "Who says you have to invent anything?"

The challenge was charged and unmistakable. And so damn welcome. He tossed the dead weed aside and wrapped his hands around her slight shoulders, pulling her flush to him. Unlike the night they'd spent in his truck, she was soft and pliable against him, and a thrill raced up his spine. Rising on tiptoe to meet him, she parted her lips.

He needed no other invitation.