Boss Daddy: A Secret Baby Romance by Black, L. (good books for high schoolers .TXT) 📕

“Christ, what was that?” Jordan asked, coughing.

“We had to empty that bottle of the Japanese tequila,” Matt said.

“Those two words should never, ever be in the same sentence,” I added.

“I know, but it was a vendor gift, and I felt bad letting it sit around. At least it’s gone now,” Matt said.

“Can we have something else?” Jordan asked. “Something to make me forget that taste?”

“I got it,” Mason said, getting up and going around the back of the bar. Reaching up, he grabbed a bottle of the top-shelf Irish whiskey, bringing it down and pulling out larger glasses. Filling half the glasses with dark soda, he added the whiskey and passed them out.

“That’ll do,” Jordan said happily as he sipped on the drink.

“You’re paying for those,” Matt replied. “Tom said even we have to pay for the top-shelf stuff.”

“Tom, shmom,” I said. “Is he here to police us, right now?”

Mason laughed. “It’s fine, put it on my tab if you need to. We deserve this.”

It had been a good quarter. The meeting that morning with Tom had been primarily to go over the numbers. Since the quarter technically had begun with the old bar burning down, and then several weeks of nothing as we tried to find out who did it and rebuilt in a new space, we expected a pretty heavy loss. Especially when the advertising for the new spot and all the fees came in from the sale. But Tom had taken on a good portion of the up-front costs, and we hit the ground running with themed nights and a lot of empathy from the community over how the old bar went up in flames.

Yet, when it was all said and done, we actually cut a profit after all. It was unbelievable how busy we had been since we opened up, and the extra tables and booths the new space afforded us gave us more room for customers, resulting in more sales. A small uptick in price to offset the cost of moving, wasn’t even blinked at, and our sales were absolutely through the roof. When Mason said we deserved the extra drink, he wasn’t lying. We’d worked our asses off for that moment.

“When does Ava come in?” I asked. Ava was Mason’s wife and the mastermind behind our themed nights. Her work was essential to our success, along with her ability to run the bar like a magician.

“She’s coming in around six,” he said.

“Aw, man,” Jordan said. “I was looking forward to a nap.”

“Poor baby,” I said, and Jordan shoved me jokingly.

I stood up to follow Mason to the back when I heard a knock on the door. Figuring it was someone who left something, I turned back to tell them to come back later, but when I saw who was at the door, I broke out into a wide smile.

“Hey, Mason,” I called, “I’ll help you guys in a minute!”

I walked over to the door and opened it, pulling my best friend into a bear hug and ushering him inside.

“Hey, brother,” Nick Watson said, “do you have a few minutes?”

“Yeah, man, come on in,” I said, guiding him to a booth near the bar. “You want a drink?”

“Just a beer, if that’s alright. I still have to drive.”

“No problem.” I poured us both a glass of our favorite local porter. Something about the way Nick was acting said he might need more than one of these. Nick was a great guy and had been my best friend since grade school. Recently, with the death of our father and his recent divorce, we had been leaning on each other pretty hard.

“Thanks, man,” Nick said as I pushed the beer over and sat down across from him.

“How are you, buddy?” I asked. In my periphery, I saw Mason come out into the main area, see us, and nod.

“Not that great, honestly,” he said.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said, taking a long pull of my beer. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah,” he said, taking a big sip of his own. “I’ll be alright. I just have a hard time understanding what went wrong, you know? I feel like I did everything right, and it just fell apart anyway.”

“Sometimes people just aren’t meant to be together,” I offered. “It’s not anyone’s fault. But hey, you’re young still.”

“I’m thirty-seven, Tyler,” he replied.

“So am I, remember. And I refuse to consider myself old, and so should you. You’re a good-looking dude. Not as good-looking as me, but hey, you can’t win them all.” A smile cracked across Nick’s face, and I laughed. “There we go. Smile. Life might suck once in a while, but you have me, you have us,” I said, gesturing at the rest of the bar and my brothers putting up decorations. “You aren’t alone. You will get through this.”

Nick’s smile faded a little as he turned his drink in his hand. Then he emptied it in one pull and sat it down, turning his gaze back to me.

“Thank you,” he said. “You’re a good friend.”

“So are you. Do you want another?”

“No, like I said, I want to be able to drive tonight. Plus, I want to help you guys set up. I know it’s going to be a big night,” he said.

“Packed,” Mason said over my shoulder. He had just stepped up behind our booth to hang a sign above us that stretched from one side of the room to the other. “Sorry, didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but figured I’d chime in. It’s going to be a long, busy night.”

“Ava outdid herself again?” Nick asked.

“As usual,” Mason said, finishing hanging the sign and moving to another part of the bar.

“I might stick around a bit after you open, actually,” Nick said.

“Good.” I smiled. “That’d be good for you. Maybe meet someone here?”

“Maybe. What about you. Maybe you should be looking for someone,” he said.

“After what happened to you? No thanks,” I said, and we both laughed. It sounded like a jerk thing to say,