Free Stay with Me by J. Lynn Page B

his eyes at me.
    “What?” I threw up my hands. “Not like the bar can’t use my help. And I need money. Obviously. And maybe by working here I can make some tips and maybe get back some of the money, even if it’s a small percentage.”
    “Making tips?” He took another step forward, and I was stuck between him and the chair. “What do you think you’d be doing here?”
    I shrugged a shoulder. “I can bartend.”
    “Have you ever done that before?” When I shrugged again, he laughed outright. Now my eyes were narrowing on him. “Honey, it’s not that easy.”
    “Can’t be that hard.”
    Jax stared at me for a long moment, and then probably one of the most fascinating things to watch happened. Each tensed muscle relaxed, and a slow, knowing grin appeared on his lips.
    My tummy did a cartwheel.
    “Well, we can’t have this, now can we?”
    “Have what?” My tumbling tummy? There was no way he knew about that.
    “You not having any place to go.” When I didn’t answer, he cocked his head to the side. “Okay, honey, you want this . . . you got it.”
    For some inane reason, it felt like he was talking about something else, and tiny, tight coils formed in my belly. “Good.”
    His grin spread until a flash of straight white teeth appeared. “Great.”

Six
    T he bar opened at one in the afternoon, and since no one had moseyed on in, Jax set me up behind the bar slicing fresh lemons and limes, with one warning.
    “Please don’t cut your fingers off. That would suck.”
    I’d rolled my eyes and hadn’t bothered to respond, working quietly until I had all of them cut and ready to roll. For the most part, I was comfortable behind the bar as long as I didn’t pay attention to the framed photo I wanted to rip down and toss across it.
    But I did have better things to look at.
    Every so often, I stole a quick glance at Jax. He was leaning against the far corner of the bar, ankles crossed and arms folded across his chest, and his head was tilted toward the TV screen hanging from the ceiling.
    When we’d left the office, he explained that I’d be on his schedule, which apparently started at four in the afternoon and ran to closing. Why he’d been in the bar this early today, I had no idea. He worked the busiest nights—Wednesday through Saturday night, ten-hour shifts.
    Way past my normal, boring bedtime of like, eleven, but I could do it. I had to do it. I didn’t have time to waste trying to get a job at Outback like he suggested.
    As I kept stealing quick peeks, I tried once again to figure out his age. I could’ve just asked him, but I wasn’t sure if that was my business. He couldn’t be much older than me, but there was something about him that screamed maturity. Most twenty-one or so year-olds I knew could barely make it out of bed in the morning, including myself, but he had this air of confidence and know-how that I thought would come with someone older—someone with a lot of responsibilities.
    I glanced around the bar, seeing that it was still empty, and it struck me then, something that was right in my face. My gaze flickered back to Jax, his hair now dried and not styled, and the deep-bronzed brown waves fell this way and that all around the crown of his head.
    He was running the bar.
    It had to be him.
    Granted, I hadn’t met anyone else besides Pearl. I had seen the schedule in the office and there were two more bartenders, a Roxy and a guy named Nick. Another server who worked only Friday and Saturday nights named Gloria, and then there was a Sherwood who worked in the kitchen with Clyde.
    Maybe I was wrong and it was one of them, but I had a feeling I wasn’t, and I had no idea what to think about it. But I was curious. Why would he invest so much into Mona’s?
    Out of my control, my gaze drifted from where his hair was trimmed neatly above the back collar of his shirt, down the length of his back, and then lingered on the well-worn, faded jeans.
    God, he had a nice ass. A