Free The Courtship Maneuver, Complete Series (An Alpha Billionaire Club BBW Romance) by Alexa Wilder

domestic beer, but it didn’t look like there was any other option. I knew better than to ask for wine.
    The pool hall didn’t look anything like I’d imagined. I didn’t really know what to expect, but I’d had a picture in my head of the pool table we’d had growing up, with its dark green felt and polished wooden frame. More of those and maybe someplace for people to sit, some couches and chairs.
    Balls and Sticks was nothing like that. A dank, acrid haze of smoke hung in the air. The tables were made of plastic and metal, the felt damaged and uneven. The cues looked ancient and warped. The floor was concrete, cracked in places, and far from clean. Light years from clean.
    A few people were sitting at the bar, and here and there along the far wall there were stools pulled up to ledges for bottles of beer and ash trays. But mostly, men were standing, playing pool or watching others play pool. There were a few women, but none of them looked like me. I saw one who had bleached blond hair with inches of dark roots, a cigarette handing out of her mouth and an orangey spray tan. In the back, a woman was wrapped around a man, whispering in his ear while he slipped his hand up her shirt. I looked away.
    Balls and Sticks was definitely a guy’s pool hall. And a lot of them were staring at me. I still didn’t get it. The other women here were showing a lot more skin. Nervous, and inwardly cursing my brother for getting me into this in the first place, I turned to lean into Sam, tucking my head into his shoulder.
    “Now what?” I asked. He wrapped his free arm tightly around me and said in a low voice,
    “What do you mean? I thought you had a plan, honey.”
    “Sam,” I said, willing to admit I was in over my head. “Seriously, how do we find Feliks?”
    I knew he was laughing at me after the way I’d insisted we come here and now was hiding in his chest, asking for help. But I wasn’t the most outgoing woman, and while the idea of coming in here and demanding to see Feliks had seemed like a good plan in my head, now that I was faced with a room full of strange men who all seemed to be staring at my breasts, I was terrified. Shit.
    Sam held me tighter and whispered, “The plan is that you drink your beer. We’ve got the next open table, and I asked about Feliks.”
    “When?” I stared up at him.
    “When I got our beers.”
    “Is he here?”
    “The bartender didn’t say. We’ll hang out for a while and if he doesn’t show, we go home.”
    I didn’t say anything. I wasn’t crazy about that plan. It seemed too passive. But I wasn’t going to leave Sam’s side to interrogate every man in the place, so I was stuck with it. I knew I was being a wimp, but most of these guys were creepy. There was a lot of long stringy hair, too many missing teeth, and way too many leering gazes for me to feel good about wandering around by myself. Not that Sam would let me. His arm around me gave no question as to whom I belonged.
    Our beers were almost empty when a short, skinny man sidled up beside Sam and asked “you look for Feliks?” He had a low, accented voice that sounded too deep to belong to such a narrow body. Sam nodded once and waited. The man’s eyes moved to me and he said,
    “So, here I am. Who is asking?”
    “Do you know Nolan Henson?” I asked. Feliks’s eyes narrowed.
    “Maybe. Who is asking?”
    “I’m his sister. He’s missing and-”
    “Yeah, I know he’s missing,” Feliks said, the words choking out on a laugh. “Missing or running is what they say.”
    “Tell us what you know,” Sam said, cutting in.
    “For what?”
    “Some of this, if what you have is any good,” Sam said.
    Feliks’s eyes fell to Sam’s hand and gleamed at the sight of folded bills. Sam was so much better at this getting-information-stuff than I was. It hadn’t even occurred to me that I’d need money. Again, I cursed my brother for putting me here in the first place.
    “I’ll talk to you. For that.” Feliks