I Found You. Jane Lark

her insecurity lately.

      “Lindy, just give it a rest. Be the one to call me tomorrow if you like, it’s a Saturday, surprise me then…”

      She hung up.

      She’d be pissed off and angry now.

      My good mood deflated like someone let helium out of my balloon. I made a sorry face at Rach and stood up, then moved further along the carriage, and with one arm looped about the bar to hold me steady, I called Lindy back. The subway was coming off the far end of the bridge. I’d lose my signal soon.

      “Hi,” she answered, sounding annoyed.

      “Sorry.”

      “Yeah, right…”

      “I’m trying my best to make this work, Lindy. You know I haven’t been out, or really made friends here. Rachel just offered to get me out of the apartment and help me get to know the city a bit, to cheer me up, alright… It’s nothing.”

      “It isn’t nothing, Jason. She’s living with you in a one bedroom apartment. She’s after what she can get. She’s taking advantage, and…”

      And of course in Lindy’s opinion that could only be about money, nothing to do with the fact Rach might actually like me.

      “Think whatever you want to think, Lindy.” I kept my head down so my voice didn’t carry. “I know why she’s staying, and it isn’t to get money out of me. I like her, alright? She’s good company. I’m sorry you’re jealous, but I’m not making her homeless just ‘cause you’re jealous. This has to stop, understand. You can’t keep running her down every night.”

      Lindy stayed silent for a minute. Then she said, “You know, Jason, if you were really trying at this, you wouldn’t even be in New York, you’d be here, where you belong, with me and your mom and dad. Bye.”

      She hung up again.

      I didn’t call back.

      I slipped the cell into my inside pocket where my wallet was and went to sit back down opposite Rach again.

      “How’s Lindy?” She gave me a sweet smile. I looked for sarcasm in her expression and found none. She understood. I could see it in her eyes. She knew I felt like trash because I could do nothing right for Lindy.

      I smiled back as her smile turned sympathetic. “Fine.”

      “It’s alright, tonight’s gonna cheer you up and put a smile back on your face, Jason Macinlay.”

      I got up and shifted to the seat next to her and then started asking her about the club she was taking me to. I wanted to lighten the mood again. I’d felt good when we’d left the apartment, now I was feeling all small-town-guy-in-a-big-city.

      She had me laughing by the time we got off the subway, although it wasn’t a belly laugh. I still felt a bit down over my argument with Lindy. I wasn’t sure Lindy and I would ever work out now, and yet we’d been together forever, and I’d thought it would just go on like that. I couldn’t see my future anymore. It was ridiculous, I’d been so sure of everything until I’d come to New York. Or perhaps Lindy had just been sure of everything and I’d fallen in line…

      “Do you wanna go to a bar first?”

      “You’re the party planner…” Lindy’s call was seriously flattening this for me.

      “Then we’ll go to a bar, and I’m buying the first round, and you’re having a shot, not just beer.”

      I smiled at her, my hands in my pockets again.

      “Come on, cheer up,” she said. “A girlfriend who wants to take over the world won’t end your life.”

      “Just limit it…” My gaze caught hers, and for the first time in days she gripped my arm.

      “Come on, I’m on a mission now, I’m cheering you up whether you like it or not.”

      Her touch felt reassuring and comforting. I really wasn’t a bastard, was I? Lindy made me feel like I was.

       Chapter Six

      I picked a quieter bar to start with, to break Jason’s ill-mood. I thought a noisy bar straightaway may be annoying as he wasn’t in the right mind. It wasn’t empty though. Nowhere was empty in the middle of New York on a Friday night. I’d deliberately picked a place Declan wouldn’t go to, but even so, I scanned the place looking for him when we walked in. It was safe. I knew everywhere I’d chosen would be safe. They were too down-market for Declan.

      We found space at the bar and I gestured for Jason to occupy a bar stool as I waved my hand at the guy who was serving. “Hey!” He was up the other end. He’d just finished serving someone else but he came straight over.

      “What can I do for you, pretty lady?”

      “Two of your best beers and two shots of tequila, with lemon and salt; we’re slamming them.”

      “Coming right up.” He gave me a broad sidelong smile, flirting a little, but I wasn’t interested tonight. Tonight was all about giving my new friend, and official knight in shining armor, Jason, a good time.

      When the bar tender set the tequila shots down in front of us, I picked one up and gave it to Jason.

      He looked at it and then at the quartered lemon and salt pot. “What are they for?”

      “Don’t tell me you’ve never in your life slammed tequila?”

      “Uh-uh.” He shook his head.

      “Jason Macinlay, you seriously need to live a bit more.”

      “That’s what I’m meant to be doing here isn’t it? That’s why you planned all this.”

      “I planned all this so we could have some fun. I’ll pay for these and then I’m gonna teach you how to drink tequila slammers.” I handed the barman my money and he gave me a wink, obviously inwardly laughing over Jason’s naivety. I made a face at him. He laughed as I turned back to Jason.

      “I guess I’m going to be the clown tonight.”

      “You’re not. Okay, what you do is put some salt on the side of your hand first, like this…” I showed him and he copied, with a concentration frown marking his forehead.

      I wanted to laugh. He did look funny, and puzzled, I seriously couldn’t believe he’d got to twenty-two and never drunk tequila shots. But then I’d been drinking long before the legal age.

      “Then take a piece of lemon.”

      He smiled, and copied me again.

      “So now you lick the salt, drink the tequila and then suck the lemon; easy.”

      I picked up my shot glass, licked the salt off with one sweep of my tongue, downed the tequila in one, and then sucked on the quarter lemon, grinning at him and meeting his questioning, smiling brown gaze, with the lemon still between my teeth.

      His eyebrows lifted. “You’re mad.” But as he said it he picked up his shot glass then licking the salt, he drank the tequila and made a face a moment before sucking the lemon. His gorgeous face was all screwed up when he put the sour lemon down.

      I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to kiss him and the night had only just begun. Sister… Sister… Sister…

      “I’m not sure I liked it.”

      I laughed. “It’s not a drink to like, it’s a drink to get drunk on and have fun with. Anyway now you can have your beer while the tequila starts running through your veins and making you relax.”

      His smile lifted. He looked seriously sexy tonight. He’d worn a dark navy shirt with really thin white stripes breaking it up in places. The dark color