The Last Second Chance: A Small Town Love Story (Blue Moon Book 3) (12 page)

“Like what—Oh my God! The brewery!” Gia grabbed his arms in a surprisingly strong grip for someone so petite. “Have Emma move here and manage it! You’re a freaking genius!”

Jax laughed. “It would give me a lot more time to chase Joey if I wasn’t babysitting that place all the time. She’d help us grow it, guide us into catering and weddings. Plus, you’d have a sister and Franklin would have another daughter in town.”

“I could make out with your face right now,” Gia announced.

Jax held up his hands and laughed. “Whoa, there. There’s a code. No making out with another brother’s woman.”

He saw a flicker in her eyes. “What? Are you disappointed you can’t make out with my face?”

The flicker was gone as quickly as it had come. “That must be it,” she said lightly before scooping an obscene amount of jelly on the bread.

“Anyway, keep it quiet about your sister. I’d like to talk to her before I get Carter and Beckett excited about the possibility.”

“My lips are sealed,” Gia said, sliding half a sandwich toward him. “But, if you can make this happen my dad and I will be really, really grateful.”

“Grateful enough to make me a lasagna?”

“Every month for the rest of your life.”

J
ax filled
a pint glass of the thick, black stout with one hand while searching frantically for a second clean glass with his other.

The bar of the brewery was hopping and the tables were already filling up with the dinner crowd. He would have been pleased had it not been for the fact that his bartender called in sick and one of the cooks was a no-show. And then, due to an issue with the supply company, they’d had to eighty-six the wings and pulled pork.

Everyone on staff was pulling double duty.

Jax was manning the bar and trying to help at the host stand. The servers were taking turns expoing food between waiting tables. He’d left a panicked voicemail for his mother, but drew the line at calling either of his brothers. They’d each taken a turn this week playing manager on duty. Plus, he didn’t want to hear their taunts about ‘poor baby Hollywood’ who can’t handle the dinner shift.

If the orderly Beckett were here, he’d try to organize the chaos instead of moving with it. Diners would wait for an hour for their appetizers. And Carter would do his best until he had enough and then he’d sneak out for some peace and quiet.

Nope. Tonight it was up to him. Keeping the staff on task, keeping the customers happy. Oh, yeah, and this was the night he was supposed to finish up the draft of the script that had been hanging in limbo for eight months. Now that the studio had locked in a new hotshot director, it was suddenly imperative that he finish the script.

Two more customers sat down at the bar and Jax wanted to just pour himself a shot and join them. Instead, he tossed them menus and grabbed the phone that had been ringing incessantly for the last hour.

“Yeah? What? I mean, John Pierce Brews,” Jax answered.

“Jax? You sound like you’re running a marathon,” his mother chirped.

“Mom, I will go to every fucking Movie Club meeting from now on if you can get in here and help. I’m drowning.”

“Be there in fifteen.” Phoebe hung up without another word and Jax sent up a prayer of thanks for family. She might take special enjoyment in torturing him, but when backs were to the wall, Phoebe Pierce would ride into battle for her boys.

Sunny, a waitress barely old enough to buy her own beer, hustled around the corner and flung a burger and fries at him.

“Order up for Pete.”

Jax stared down at the plate. “No onions. It’s supposed to have no onions,” Jax yelled over the noise.

Sunny slapped the ticket on the bar. “Your fingers were on the wrong keys in the POS. Says MP PMOMD.”

“Fuck,” Jax muttered. He spun around and dumped the plate in front of Pete McDougall, the flannel-wearing proprietor of Karma Kustard. “Two choices, Pete. You can pick off the onions or I can.”

Pete wisely chose to see to the chore himself.

“You’ve earned yourself a free beer,” Jax told him.

Pete whooped and sank his teeth into his newly onion-less burger.

Jax tossed a dozen glasses in the rotating washer and hustled to the far end of the bar. Of course everyone down there needed another round. At least they were entertaining themselves.

He found a stash of clean glasses behind the bar and started pouring drafts. Jax was thankful that in a brewery, the clientele was more likely to order beers than mixed drinks. He could handle a rum and coke or vodka rocks, but was dreading the day some smart ass asked for a cosmo. His cellphone buzzed next to the register. It was a call from Al. She’d called three times in the last two days. He knew he was making her more nervous by not answering, but it wasn’t really an option now.

He felt a zap of electricity shoot up his spine. An awareness of presence.

Joey.

He turned around and spotted her sliding onto a stool at the corner of the bar. She looked entirely too good. Her hair was loose, framing her delicate oval face in chestnut waves. There was color on her high cheekbones, probably flushed from the winter wind.

Thick lashes framed eyes the color of cognac. She wore a simple ribbed sweater with a v-neck deep enough to be interesting.

But he didn’t have time for interesting. Not with Fred and Phil waving him down for another round and the bar printer spitting out a continuous stream of drink orders from the servers. He was also pretty sure he smelled smoke, which meant someone’s entrée was going to be a while longer. Or the whole place was going up in flames.

“I don’t have time to go a few rounds with you right now,” he snapped at Joey.

He dove for the taps as the printer spat out another order. The tape now reached down to the floor.

“You look a little understaffed,” Joey observed.

“You think?” He didn’t have time to deal with her smart-ass observations from her smart-ass, sexy as hell mouth. “Cause this feels like a walk in the damn park to me.”

“Jax, we got a problem,” Sunny said rushing up to the bar, bringing a stronger waft of smoke with her. His cellphone rang again.

“Oh for fuck’s sake! How do you make a Sex on the Beach?” he muttered staring at the six-foot tape of drink orders.

Joey slid off her stool and slipped behind the bar. Jax caught a whiff of her shampoo as she brushed past him.

“What the hell are you doing?” he snapped.

“Showing you how it’s done. What’s your login for the POS?” she asked, jerking a thumb toward the register’s touch screen.

“Hey, Joey, can we get a round down here?” Bruce Oakleigh called, waving an empty wine glass.

“Who comes to a brewery and orders wine?” Joey muttered to Jax.

“Bruce does.”

“Keep your pants on, Bruce, and I’ll throw in a dish of maraschino cherries,” Joey said good-naturedly. Login?” She arched an expectant eyebrow at Jax.

Fine. The night was destined to be a disaster anyway. What did it matter if the kitchen caught fire and people were walking out on tabs? No one would ever come back to John Pierce Brews after tonight.

He scrawled his login code on a napkin and abandoned the bar and Joey to follow Sunny into the kitchen where his first order of business was putting out a fire on the grill.

“It says well done, Julio, not meteoric.”

The cook flashed a gold tooth at Jax, “I aim to please.”

Lila, one of the dining room servers, ducked her head under the heat lamps. “Jax, we need an expo to get us back on track,” she said, waving at the window overflowing with food. “Then I need some discounts for some disgruntleds.”

“Anyone walk out yet?”

Staff or customers?” she asked, loading up a tray of meatloaf and burgers.

“Both. Either,” Jax said morosely.

“Still got everyone, but some complimentary desserts and table touching will go a long way.”

“The cream ale ready yet?” Julio asked.

“Kegged and ready to go. We’re releasing it next weekend.”

“You could do a free preview tonight. Send out samplers to the tables,” he suggested.

“You’re a genius, Julio.”

“That’s what they tell me,” the cook said, turning back to the grill, his dark hair tied back in a stumpy ponytail.

“I’ll hook up the cream and tell Joey,” Lila volunteered. “And if you’re in the mood to give things away, a round of drinks and a big, fat thank you might go far with the staff tonight.”

“Consider it done,” Jax said.

Lila winked at Julio and danced out of the kitchen, tray laden with steaming hot entrees.

Jax worked furiously, traying up food, hopping on the line to help Julio and Nan on the grill and fryers. He became an expert in building side salads and dropping fries. He kept an ear out for sounds of unrest from the bar, but the chaos in the kitchen kept his full attention.

He was covered in sweat and nursing a deep fryer burn when Joey poked her head around the corner.

“Need a shit load of clean glasses and a new keg of lager. And Al said if you don’t get a draft to her by Sunday, she’s going to fly out here and slap you upside the head,” she announced before disappearing again.

Jax blinked. Joey didn’t look panicked or pissed off and she’d had time to answer his phone, which meant things must have quieted down out front.

He hurried down the back stairs to the key room. The cooler felt like heaven to his overheated body. His comfortable Henley had seemed like the logical choice on a ball-freezing January night. But between the heat lamps, the grill, and the ten miles he must have sprinted so far tonight he was wishing for gym shorts and a t-shirt.

Jax unhooked the kicked keg and tapped a fresh one. He reminded himself to take a look at the sales numbers tonight. After the chaos, of course.

What had he been thinking opening a brewery?
he wondered. Those visions of sampling beers and arguing with his brothers at the bar seemed like a naïve fantasy compared to the reality of actually running a bar and restaurant.

Jax skirted the expo line and grabbed a tray of clean glasses before swinging back around to the front of the house. Maybe if things had slowed down enough out front he could talk Joey into grabbing a bite with him. He wanted to know how things were going at the stables with the new additions and partnership.

It was another naïve fantasy. Jax bobbled the tray when he was greeted with the mob scene. Joey had ditched her sexy little sweater and had stripped down to a slinky black tank. She’d pulled those dark brown waves back into a high ponytail. Pulling pints and laughing, she looked like every man’s fantasy.

It was three-deep at the bar. Jax set the tray down hard enough to have the glasses tremble, but no one noticed him.

“Okay, on three,” Joey yelled over the noise.

The bar counted down with her as she ticked off the numbers on her fingers overhead.

“Three, two, one—”

Everyone made grabs for the shallow bowls Joey had spaced out at intervals on the bar.

Jax peeked in the bowl closest to him. Maraschino cherries.

“Cherry stem tying contest,” Wilson Abramovich announced at his elbow. Wilson, Blue Moon’s jeweler and loyal Beautification Committee member, was grinning at his wife, Penny, as she contorted her face in a valiant effort to win.

“Don’t get too creative there, Phil,” Joey yelled to one-half of the newlywed couple as she poured two drafts simultaneously. “I don’t wanna have to give you the Heimlich.” The bar roared with laughter.

Joey reached for the tape the printer spat out and Jax watched her catch Lila’s eye from the service bar. She made a slicing hand over her neck. Cutting someone off apparently.

Joey glanced in Jax’s direction. “Care to try your ‘tongue,’ boss?”

“Ohhh,” the crowed cheered at the challenge.

Jax leaned in close enough that he could tell Joey wanted to back up.

“You already know the things I can do with my tongue, Jojo.”

Another woman would have blushed or slapped him, but not Joey. She took it as a challenge.

She held out the bowl of cherries to him. “Race ya.”

As if he could say no to the laughter in those eyes or that cocky-as-hell grin. No, he’d always been in over his head when it came to Joey Greer.

Wordlessly, he plucked a cherry out of the bowl and with his gaze never leaving Joey’s face, popped it into his mouth. One bite and the sweet juice tickled his taste buds. But there was something even sweeter he wanted to taste.

Her.

As if reading his mind, Joey leisurely fished a cherry out of the bowl.

“You’d better hurry up, Joey,” Mrs. Penskee from the animal rescue warned from the middle of the bar.

“I’m giving him a handicap since he can’t keep up,” she said with a wink, inciting another round of “Ooohs.”

Joey brought the cherry to her lips, parting them just enough that Jax and every other man in the bar leaned forward in anticipation. Jax briefly forgot what he was doing with the cherry stem and nearly choked on it.

She knew exactly what she was doing, but that did nothing to slow the southern migration of his blood.

Holding the stem, Joey popped the cherry into her mouth and Jax felt his cock turn to stone.

She gave him a feline grin. “Get ready.”

If he were any readier, he’d drag her down to the beer-soaked floor and tear off her clothes.

Joey popped the stem into her mouth, reminding Jax that his tongue had its own business besides panting after her. He’d just bent the stem in a V when Joey hooted triumphantly. One end of the stem poked through her lips.

“No freaking way,” Jax challenged.

“Bet me,” she said, the tip of the stem moving hypnotically between her full, pink lips.

“A hundred bucks,” he heard himself say, knowing he’d already lost.

“Deal.”

“C’mon and show us,” Jax said, gesturing at the crowd.

Someone started a drumroll and others joined in.

“Come see for yourself.” It was a taunt and he took advantage of it. Jax closed the gap between them, but rather than using his fingers to pluck the stem from her lips, he used something more fun.

His open mouth settled on her full, ripe lips for just a second. Long enough for the crowd to erupt and his dick to get impossibly harder.

His teeth scraped her lips as they closed over the stem and drew it out of her mouth, a perfect knot intact.

He didn’t hear the hoots and hollers of his neighbors and friends. Didn’t see the cellphones recording the moment or the looks of interest that passed between customers.

All he saw was the fire in Joey’s eyes. Unpredictable, that fire was. He stayed close so she couldn’t swing hard with her fist should she decide to react that way.

But she didn’t hit him. She held out her hand, palm up. Cocky as a quarterback after a game-winning touchdown.

“I believe you owe me a hundred bucks.”

He owed her more than that. Jax took the cherry stem out of his mouth and fished out his wallet. He made a show of counting out the bills to the delight of the crowd.

He dropped the money into her waiting hand and watched her count it. Satisfied, she held up the cash. “Next round’s on Jax,” she called, sauntering away to applause. God, she was something. The girl of his dreams, the source of his torment. She was everything he wanted in this lifetime.

“Ooh! A cherry stem tying contest? Let me try.”