Blake's Choice by Louisa Masters

Chapter One

    Mandy sat at the bar, fiddling with her beer bottle and staring at the man in the corner. He was there nearly every time she was, which was every Friday lately. Since her best friend Karen had hooked up with Daniel, they came here a lot.
    The guy in the corner looked familiar, and not just because she saw him every week. Had she met him before? Mandy was pretty sure she’d remember if she had—the guy was smoking hot. Tawny blond hair, just long enough to tell that it curled. Teal-coloured eyes highlighted a face that had surely been carved from granite—no man should have cheekbones that high. The eyes had to be contact lenses, though. Eyes that colour just couldn’t be natural. He was almost pretty, except for the piercings. Three in each ear, two in his left eyebrow, one in his nose. And the tattoos on both arms and the side of his neck. She was pretty sure he’d have more under his shirt.
    “Stop staring.” Toni’s amused voice cut into Mandy’s thoughts.
      She turned to face forward on her stool and found her favourite bartender propped against the other side of the bar, grinning. Her hot pink tank top matched her hair and revealed a heavily tattooed torso.
    “I’m not staring,” Mandy defended herself, even as heat rose in her cheeks. Toni’s smirk told her she wasn’t fooling anyone. “Okay, so maybe I looked for a little longer than is polite, but you have to admit he’s hot.”
    “He is,” Toni agreed, but didn’t say anything else.
    Mandy raised an eyebrow. “He’s here a lot,” she prompted. Toni was normally verbose, but for some reason she was being close-mouthed. “What’s his name?”
    Toni took Mandy’s beer bottle—which was not quite empty—and replaced it with a shot of tequila, a salt shaker and a piece of lime. “How should I know?”
    Mandy surveyed her new drink, lips pursed. She didn’t cope very well with tequila, but Daniel was driving, so… First salt, then the burn of tequila, followed by the sharp, sour tang of lime. Mandy gasped then sucked vigorously on the lime, glaring at Toni. “What was that for? You know I always regret tequila.” Toni shrugged, and Mandy circled the conversation back to where she wanted it. “You know all the regulars. I refuse to believe you don’t know who he is.”
    “You can refuse all you want.” Toni cracked a small smile, and refilled Mandy’s shot glass.
    “Are you trying to get me drunk?” Mandy eyed the glass again then looked around for Karen and Daniel. They were dancing, although it looked more like foreplay to her. They always danced like that.
    “Absolutely,” Toni deadpanned. “I’m going to get you blind drunk and then take advantage of you in the store room.” Since Toni’s current boyfriend was six-foot-five, two hundred plus pounds and covered on all visible skin with tattoos—the complete opposite of Mandy—she snorted. And reached for the tequila.
    Several shots later, she had a definite buzz on. The room rocked gently, which she knew from past experience meant she was swaying on her stool. She’d been wheedling Toni on and off about Mr Hot-Stuff in the corner, but Toni kept distracting her with tequila. Not that she was hard to distract.
    “Whew.” Karen climbed onto the stool next to Mandy. “I’d kill for a drink.” She looked at Mandy, then at the empty glass and the salt shaker. “Not tequila, though.”
    Daniel leaned on the bar on Karen’s other side. “No tequila. You got it, baby. Beer, Toni?” The words were barely out of his mouth before Toni was sliding two bottles of beer across the bar. Daniel lifted his to his sexy mouth for a long swallow. “So”—he put the bottle back on the bar—“what have you been up to?” He glanced at Mandy’s glass. “Aside from getting plastered.”
    “I’m trying to make Toni tell me who Mr Hot-Stuff is,” Mandy announced, gesturing broadly towards the back corner. Daniel didn’t even look, and Karen’s mouth tightened.