Quinn’s POV
The smell of cigarettes and cheap cigars fill the air early tonight letting me know that I’m in another small town and another local shit hole bar. Just the same as the last couple small towns. This was never meant to be my fulltime job but it had served me well as I tried to put myself through college. It was my only go to as I tried to keep a low profile. Luckly my skills behind the bar spoke for themselves and I had no problem getting a job with every move I was forced to make.
The patrons were always the same. You had your group of married men that conveniently lost their wedding rings for the night. Which made no sense to me since everyone in the bar knew they were married, to the lifelong bachelors, who were still reliving their jock years of high school. Then you had your women of the town who were either desperate for love or the ones that everyone in the town had their turn with them.
It wasn’t hard figuring out right away which ones were going to be my tippers and which ones I knew barely could afford to be here. Living paycheck to paycheck I knew where to focus my attention to and I made sure I flirted to get my tips not knowing when my next move would have to be.
“This isn’t your first rodeo. You will do good here.” Tonya tells me as she picks up a tray of drinks I had just made for her to serve a larger table of men sitting in the back of the bar. Tonya was around my age and I could clearly tell she was one of those girls that got stuck in a small town because of a boy she met in high school. She stayed behind because of him only to get her heart crushed by him a couple years too late to ever get out.
“Unfortunately, I have been doing this since I was of age to serve a beer.” I tell her as I begin to wipe the counter where the tray was just sitting.
“Trust me, I get it. I have been working here since I turned eighteen.” Tonya tells me as she starts walking back to the table of men in the back of the bar and I watched her as she began to hand the drinks out to the group of men.
I had seen a few of them walk in earlier and then the group kept getting larger as the night went on. They were the only ones that I hadn’t been able to put a label on. They were definitely big like jocks but they all were behaving like married men should. Not a single one of them has made any advances to Tonya. She was a beautiful girl with long blonde hair almost to her waist and the biggest blue eyes I have ever seen. There was no way that one of them wouldn’t be interested in her. It was the first time in my bartending career that I was thrown off.
“Miss, can I get a beer?” I heard a man at the end of the bar ask pulling me from my profiling attempt of the men.
“Coming right up.” I said as I turned to pour him another draft and then moved to hand him it.
“Thanks. I haven’t seen you here before. Are you new?” The man asked me and I had already profiled him as a married man with at least three kids at home and almost old enough to be my father.
“Yeah, it’s my first day on the job. My husband and I just moved right outside of town.” I said lying to him knowing that the husband line normally shut the married men up.
“Oh well, welcome to Beaver Falls, where the only place to hang out on a Friday night is either here or the drive ins.” The man said as he took a sip of his beer.
“I’ll have to remember that for family night with the kids.” I told him giving him another lie so he would leave me alone.
“You have kids?” He now asked me almost with a slur and I knew I would be shutting him off soon and sending him home to his wife.
Leaning over the bar towards him, I could smell alcohol reeking from him before I say, “Yeah, three kids and three different baby daddies. You?”
The man looked at me speechless when I heard someone else call for a drink and I left him in thought. I moved around the bar serving drinks as it began to get busier as the night went on. More men began to come in and join the men in the back and Tonya continued to bring their orders for me to fill. My curiosity got the best of me and I had to ask her, “What’s up with the group of men back there?”
Tonya turned and looked at them and turned back to me and said, “They are just a bunch of local boys that get together every Friday night to leave off some steam.”
Well, that was vague, I thought to myself, but didn’t push the subject. Just as I finished filling their order the door to the bar opened and my attention went straight to it as two large men walked inside together. The men began to scope the bar and the larger of the two men’s eyes met mine. Something about his gaze on me felt intense and almost eerie and I had to force myself to look away from him as my heart began to race.
Thankfully someone at the bar called for me to get them another drink and I quickly moved to the other side of the bar to put distance between myself and the men that just came in. When I was done getting the patron a rum and coke, I turned to see that the two men had joined the others in the back of the bar and Tonya returned to the bar with their orders.
As I began to fill their order, I asked Tonya, “Who are the two men that just came in?”
Tonya turned her back to me and leaned against the bar as she stared back at the group of men before she said, “That would be Jaxson and Bishop. The two hottest bachelors in this town.” Tonya then turned around to look at me and said, “They are sort of like royalty here. Their family owns like half this town.”
Now it all made sense. They were rich boys that thought they could have whatever they wanted and that’s why they walked in here acting like they own the place. I placed the drinks on the tray for Tonya and she took off towards the table as I leaned against the bar. I looked back at the one that had looked at me when he came in.
He was engulfed in a conversation giving me time to check him out without him knowing I was staring at him. He was dressed in a plain black tee shirt with blue jeans which didn’t scream rich, but bad boy. He had dark hair that looked messy and unfortunately I couldn’t see his eye color from this distance. I am sure they are a dreamy blue. He totally had the “I am the man in charge” persona as everyone at the table held onto every word he said.
As if he knew I was staring at him he looked in my direction busting me looking at him. My face heated as a blush creeped onto it as I was busted. Quickly, I turned away from him and reminded myself why I was in the mess I was and that all men were off limits to me with my history of them.
