After being away from everything I knew and found familiar all my life, to walk into a bar and have the women behind it give me a smile and a greeting, it made me feel home in Brownsburg for the first time since I’d been there.

It felt better gabbing with them both as I drank glasses of chilled white wine and people watched.

Though, now, I didn’t know what Cheryl was talking about.

“You’re givin’ up on what?’

“Men,” she decreed.

We’d been discussing the best brands of extra hold hair spray.

How did we get here?

“Uh…why?” I asked.

“’Cause, see, I’ve been livin’ in this ’burg for, like, ever, and the minute I hauled my shit over the city limits was the minute that commenced a dry spell unprecedented for me. And I work in a bar. That shit’s impossible.”

“A dry spell?” I asked.

“Babe, a dry spell. As in, I haven’t been laid…in forever,” she shared.

Clearly, as she barely knew me outside of us being in a waiting room for a joyous event and us mingling at a wedding reception during another one, she had to get this out. And as a sister, even without years of bonding over martinis (or tequila) and discussions of the best beauty brands of anything, I had to let her.

“That sounds like it sucks,” I noted, though I didn’t share with her that I had possibly the world record in dry spells after Vinnie, so I knew her pain like no other.

“It does,” she agreed. “And it does more, seein’ as you been in this bar once, and Tanner Layne has been checkin’ you out. From the moment he walked in the door, his eyes went to your ass and his eyes have been strayin’ your way the last twenty minutes.”

“Tanner who?” I asked.

She jerked her head along the bar and my eyes went to the other end, where a very good-looking, dark-haired man was sitting, smiling, and talking with Feb.

“Tanner Layne. Now, I’d go there,” Cheryl announced. “I’d go there the last four times he’s been in. I’d go there when my radar pinged when he moved to town not long ago and I’d never even met him, I just sensed his off-the-charts ability to provide quality orgasms. I’d go there right now in the bathroom or the office. But he only looks at me to order a drink. You, though…”

She trailed off so I said, “I’m taken.”

“Yeah, you’re you and that’s all a’ you,” she replied, rounding my head with her hand, including my big hair. “And your man is way hot. But he’s in Chicago. You look like you, Tanner Layne looks like him, your man is in Chicago, shit happens.”

“I gave him a calendar for his birthday with my schedule written in it, family birthdays, shit like that, and he told me that’s all he ever wanted. A life reflected in the busy family times written on a calendar stuck on a wall in the kitchen. He asked me if I was gonna give that to him and I said yes. So that guy is hot and Benny might be in Chicago, but that shit is also not gonna happen.”

I finished my pronouncement and Cheryl stared at me but did it saying, “He said that’s all he wanted out of life?”

“Yep.”

“And that doesn’t freak you?’

“Absolutely not.”

“What do you want out of life?”

“A man who wants a calendar on the wall in his kitchen written all over with busy family times.”

“Then you’re sorted,” she noted, her eyes lighting, her lips curling up.

“Yep,” I agreed, knowing my eyes were lighting and my lips had curled up.

“’Cept you live here and he lives there,” she pointed out.

“My lease is up in October and then I’ll live there.”

To this, her eyes got big, her mood deteriorated, and she surprisingly snapped, “What?”

“Well,” I started hesitantly, uncertain of her sudden mood swing. “I’m movin’ in with Ben.”

“Great,” she bit out. “Finally, you stroll in J&J’s and I’m ready to groom you to be my wingman. Feb can’t do it ’cause she’s taken and has a baby, and Colt would lose his badass mind if I took her out carousin’. Vi used to do it, then she got hooked up with Cal, and he’s arguably more badass than Colt and would definitely lose his mind if Vi went out carousin’ with me. And I know this for fact ’cause I asked, she told him I asked, and he lost his mind. You look like you’d be a good wingman and you’re the only semi-kinda-single woman I know in the ’burg that I like. Now you’re leavin’?”

I felt for her. A good wingman was hard to find.

Still, I answered, “Yep.”

“Freakin’ awesome,” she said, not meaning it. “Now how’m I gonna get laid?”

“We could go carousin’ while I’m still here. You’ve got a coupla months.”

“What you doin’ Wednesday?” she asked instantly, and I grinned.

“Carousin’ with you,” I answered.

That was when she grinned.

Feb moving caught my eye and I looked down the bar to see that Tanner Layne was now taking a phone call.

He really was hot.

But Benny was so totally hotter.

This thought and the man’s age made my eyes go to Cheryl and I asked, “Tanner Layne have kids?”

“Yep, word is two boys.”

“One named Jasper?” I asked.

“No clue, seein’ as he hasn’t fucked my brains out so we could get down to the pillow talk of sharin’ how many offspring we might bring to a Brady Bunch scenario.”

I smiled at what she said but kept eyeing Tanner Layne as I muttered, “I wonder if he’s Jasper’s father.” I said this as I hoped he was because those genes would undoubtedly be dominant and that would mean, once Cal lifted the ban, Keira would get a live one.

“Who’s Jasper?’ Cheryl asked, and I looked back at her.

“The boy Keira has a crush on.”

She jerked up her chin high on an “Ah.” Then she said, “I’ll find out,” and moseyed toward Feb.

I sipped my wine, and after a couple of minutes, Cheryl moseyed back.

“Jasper is the oldest,” she confirmed. “His other one, Tripp, is younger. Neither have been picked up doin’ stupid shit by Colt or anybody as far as Feb knows. But she’s willin’ to interrogate Colt about Jasper’s suitability for Keirry.”

“That’d be good, seein’ as Cal’s reluctant to give her the go-ahead to make her play with the kid because, according to Kate, he’s a high school player.”

“I’ll get Feb on it,” she said.

“Thanks,” I murmured, then we both went silent since Tanner Layne was throwing some bills on the bar and he was doing a chin lift to Feb.

He walked the length of the bar, eyes on me, and when he got close, his head tilted slightly to the side, his lips tipped up, and his eyes got lazy. Then he walked right on by and out the door.

I had to admit, my nipples tingled a little, but then again, that was an automatic female response to a hot guy head tilt/lip tip.

I also had to admit it was nice to know I had it in me to be sitting on a barstool and get the hot guy head tilt/lip tip.

But mostly, it was just a pleasant thing to happen while I passed the time until I could phone Benny.

***

“You okay?”

This was Ben’s greeting that night at 12:45.

“Please tell me you’re close to a bed,” I replied, my voice sleepy and throaty. The first because I’d just woken up and called Benny. The second because I was multitasking so I’d already engaged my vibrator.

Ben’s voice was no longer concerned but something a whole lot better when he demanded, “Tell me you’re serious, cara.”

“I’m very serious, Benny.”

“How far gone are you?” he asked.

“You still got work to do, honey,” I answered.

“Fuck, baby,” he growled and there it was. That was all I had to hear. Benny got to work.

Luckily, that wasn’t all Benny gave me. He gave me a whole lot more and he did it until he heard me come. Then I set my vibrator away, rolled to my side, curled up, and in my throaty, quiet, post-orgasm voice, I gave him a lot more until I heard him come.

I was silent a moment for him to come down before I whispered, “I miss you, honey.”

“Comin’ to you this weekend.”

I blinked at my pillow. “What?”

“My turn.”

“So soon?” I asked, my heart leaping, hoping he would confirm that yes, he was coming back to me and soon.

“Done with this shit. I’m down there or you’re up here every weekend.”

Even though I loved that I idea, it worried me.

“That’s a lot for you at the restaurant.”

“Two months. They’ll cover me.”

I knew that was a sacrifice for Benny.

But it made me happy, and not just because I’d see him more, also because he wanted to see me more and he was a man willing to make that kind of sacrifice for me.

“Cheryl is gonna have to make do with a weekday wingman,” I muttered, thinking that’d work for her because she probably worked most weekends.

“What?” Ben asked.

“Nothin’,” I answered.

“Cheryl’s wingman?” he pushed, and I pressed my lips together because I had a feeling Ben was a man of the Colt and Cal variety. “Frankie,” he prompted in a warning, not throaty, sexy, post-orgasm voice, but in a growly, sexy, getting-pissed, post-orgasm voice.

Yep, Benny was a man of the Colt and Cal variety.

So I gave it up. “Cheryl asked me to be her wingman.”

“And you said yes?” Ben asked, like I told him Cheryl asked me to help her bomb the Canadian embassy.

“She needs to get laid,” I explained.

“Seen her, figure she can accomplish that feat on her own,” Ben returned.

“Every girl needs a good wingman, Benny,” I shot back, my voice not throaty, post-orgasm anymore either, mostly because I was kind of getting pissed.

“Maybe. It’s just that hers isn’t gonna be you,” Benny declared, and I stopped kind of getting pissed and just got that way.