Free Maya And The Tough Guy by Carter Ashby

not to watch her. He found himself relieved and relaxed when she left at six-thirty. Tension returned when she walked back in at nine. It was gone again when she left at eleven. He had no idea how he was going to survive working with her.
    Being a Monday night, Janice was his only employee after eleven. There were only a few customers at the table and none at the counter. Janice sidled up to him. He slipped his arm around her waist. “You regret rejecting me? Wanna come up after work?”
    She laughed as though he’d suggested the absolutely ridiculous. “No, I’m good.”
    He nodded. “Figures.”
    “I was just thinking,” she said, but then she stopped talking.
    He waited a moment, then let her go and stepped back so he could look at her. “Thinking?”
    “Yeah. About the bar.”
    “Okay,” he said slowly.
    “It’s just, the lighting’s kind of bright in here, you know?”
    Janice had worked here for four years, since he’d first bought the place. She’d never mentioned anything remotely related to the lighting. “Bright?”
    “Yeah. I mean—I think—stark is the word she used. Stark. What do you think that means?”
    “Bright,” he answered. “Who said?”
    She shrugged. “Maya. Actually, she asked me if I thought it was a little stark, and I said yeah, I guess, and she said maybe if we mentioned it, you might like the suggestion.”
    “What suggestion?”
    “To change the lights or something. Make it dimmer. More—intimate, I think she said.”
    “Hmm.”
    Janice shrugged again. “I don’t know. Seemed like a good idea.” She looked around and wandered away.  
    Jayce stood there frowning, wondering what he was supposed to think about Maya’s criticisms of his bar.

CHAPTER EIGHT

    Kellen was due home Wednesday. He’d been gone two weeks, and Maya was excited to have her brother-in-law home. Sometimes she wondered how Kellen and Damon could be related. Damon was cocky, hateful, and abusive, whereas his little brother was the kindest, most generous person Maya knew. The morning after Damon had given her the worst beating of her life, Kellen had been the one to carry her to the hospital, never hesitating to take her side in the matter, even at the risk of alienating his family. Of course, his family had come around, and his actions had led him to the love of Maya’s best friend, Zoey, so Maya took comfort in the fact that he’d been rewarded for his gallantry.
    For her part, she didn’t see how she could ever repay his kindness. He was more family to her than anyone else outside of her children. But Kellen’s attention was no longer solely Maya’s. With Zoey in his life, his priorities had made a dramatic shift.  
    Zoey was beyond excited to have him back. She fluttered around the house cleaning and rearranging things. Fluttering was not a typical Zoey behavior. She even bought a new dress and was likely wearing new lingerie underneath. Maya suddenly felt very out of place.  
    “Maybe the kids and I should crash out at Kellen’s tonight,” Maya offered on Wednesday morning. Zoey was having a cup of coffee before heading to work. The kids had already taken the bus to school.  
    “Don’t be ridiculous. You won’t be home from work until after one.”
    “I wish their grandparents weren’t sick.”
    “Maya, honestly, stop worrying. Kellen will be just as excited to see the kids as me.”
    “I somehow doubt that.”
    Zoey kissed her on the cheek and went to work. Maya puttered around the house for a while, doing laundry and getting dinner prepped. She sat at the kitchen table with her laptop working through the GED prep material in the online course she was taking. Later, she called her babysitter to see if she would be available to watch the kids that evening. Then she drove to the bar. She didn’t go all the way in, instead turning up the back staircase, knowing that Jayce wouldn’t be downstairs just yet. She climbed one floor. At the landing was the daunting door. She