Cam puts two beers in front of us.
Liam picks up a menu and hands it to me. I scan it and decide on a burger and fries, or chips as they call them here.
“I’ll have the same,” Liam tells me. “Cam, can you have Nancy rustle us up some burger and chips?”
“Will do.” Cam disappears into the back.
“Nancy’s the cook here. Makes the best homemade burgers you’ve ever tasted in your life,” Liam tells me.
I take a sip of my beer.
“Hey! Hunter’s here, and he is not alone.”
I turn to the voice approaching. A guy with chestnut-brown hair, who is about the same height but not as built as Liam and more lithe than muscular, is walking toward us.
Liam gets up from his seat. “Eddie, mate.”
They do the handshake-and-half-hug man thing.
“Where the fuck have you been hiding?” Liam says to him. “Feels like ages since I last saw you.”
“I’ve been busy at the hospital. You missed me, you soppy bastard?”
“With all my heart.” Liam chuckles, slapping a hand to his chest.
Eddie’s eyes come to me. “And who is this beauty you’ve brought with you?”
Liam puts his arm around Eddie’s shoulder and looks at me. “Eddie, this is Taylor Shaw from Boston. Boston, this is Eddie, one of my oldest mates. Ugly as fuck, but someone’s gotta love him.”
“Fuck you very much, Hunter. And Boston, eh? What is someone like you doing with this degenerate?” Eddie flicks his thumb in Liam’s direction.
“He sat next to me on the plane, and I haven’t been able to get rid of him since.” I grin.
“Sounds like Hunter. He was like that in school. First day I met him, I just couldn’t shake him off. He’s like a bad smell. He’s been following me around ever since.”
“So, you guys met at school?” I ask.
“Yeah, first day at Eton. I met Eddie and that tosser.” Liam nods at Cam, who’s just appeared from behind the bar.
“Wow, you guys all went to Eton? Isn’t that a really elite school?” It comes out sounding like surprise, which I totally didn’t mean. I just didn’t figure Liam was a private school boy.
Liam laughs loudly, and so do Eddie and Cam.
“Yes. We are from rich families, and we went to the posh boys’ school,” Eddie says in a preppy voice, laughing.
“But you own a bar?” I say to Cam. I slap my hand over my mouth, realizing how bad that sounded. “God, I didn’t mean it like that. I just thought that people who went to Eton became, like, royalty or something.”
Cam chuckles. “No offense taken.” He waves me off. “I was supposed to become royalty, but it didn’t quite work out that way. The call of the bar life was just too strong for me to ignore. Much to my parents’ chagrin.”
“I, on the other hand, did not disappoint my parents,” Eddie says smugly.
Cam gives him the middle finger.
“Eddie’s a doctor,” Liam tells me.
“Cardiovascular surgeon, fuck you very much.” He leans in, telling me, “And I’m the best heart surgeon in England. Probably the world.”
“Wow. That’s amazing. It must have taken you years to become a doctor.”
“It took a while, but it was worth it. Still, after all those years, I don’t make near a scratch of what Hunter makes in a year. What is your net worth nowadays, Hunter? You hit the billion pound mark yet?”
Liam smirks but doesn’t say anything.
“Liam doesn’t like to talk about how much money he has,” Eddie tells me. “Because he has so much of it.”
“I think he probably doesn’t like to talk about his money—not because he of how much he has, but because it’s not what’s important to him. I think Liam’s business achievements are what he cares about most,” I say, staring into Liam’s eyes.
His gaze softens on me.
“Oh God, she’s your soul mate. Marry her, Liam. Immediately.” Eddie laughs.
Liam looks at Eddie, chuckling, as he shakes his head.
“I bet your parents are really proud of what you’ve achieved,” I say to Liam.
I instantly know I’ve said the wrong thing when the tenderness in his eyes disappears, and a dark shadow falls there instead.
“I wouldn’t know.” His voice is sharp, surprising me. “I need to go talk to Lee.”
I watch him go as he walks off, his whole body rigid and tense.
I feel like crap because I know I hit a raw nerve.
“Don’t worry about it.” Eddie’s voice comes in my ear. “Liam’s touchy about his family. I won’t go into his personal business because it’s his shit. He’ll tell you if he wants you to know. All I will say is that Liam’s dad is a walking waste of good oxygen.”
“Oh. He never said anything.” But I never asked because I didn’t want to talk about my family.
I glance back at Liam, who is now talking to Lee.
Eddie follows my stare. “Liam was raised by his grandpa, Bernie. Top bloke. You’ll love him.”
He was raised by his grandpa. What about his mom and dad?
I want to ask Eddie more, but I know he won’t tell me. So, I’ll just have to wait until Liam is ready to tell me—if that ever comes.
But would I ever tell him about my family?
I already know the answer to that one, and it’s a solid no.
Cam puts a plate of burger and fries in front of me, bringing my attention to it. I didn’t even realize he’d gone to get them.
“Is that one Liam’s?” Eddie points to the plate with a burger and overflowing fries next to mine.
“Yeah,” I answer.
“He won’t miss some chips.” Eddie leans over and grabs a handful of fries from Liam’s plate, taking nearly half of them.
I chuckle.
Eddie then quickly eats them, and he’s just finishing them off when Liam comes back and sits on his stool next to me.
“All right?” I carefully ask him.
“Yeah, I’m good.” He smiles and gives my thigh a squeeze.
I immediately feel better.
He looks down at his plate and frowns. “Hey, Cam, are you skimping on the chips to save money, you tight bastard?”
I glance at Eddie, and we both start laughing.
We’ve finished eating. I’m on my third beer, and the bar has filled up with people.
“Okay, Boston, it’s time. You’re up.” Liam nudges me.
“What? Sing now?”
“Um-hum.”
I start to feel sick, and it’s not from the food or beer. “I don’t know, Hunter.”
“Come on.” He gets to his feet. Taking me by the hands, he pulls me off my stool.
“Go on, Taylor,” Eddie encourages.
Liam told Eddie and Cam all about the list of things I wanted to do—except for the sex stuff. Thankfully, he didn’t tell them that. And he didn’t go into the details of why I have the list either, which was another thing I was thankful for.
“You’ve got this, Boston.”
I stare up into Liam’s beautiful green eyes. “No recording this, and no laughing, promise?”
I hold my little finger up to him for a pinkie swear.
He laughs and wraps his little finger around mine. “I promise. Now, go get ’em, tiger.” He smacks me on the ass.
Shaking my head at him, I turn, and on wobbly legs, I walk toward the stage where the band is waiting for me.
The lead singer, Lee, holds out a hand, helping me up onto the stage.
“Hey, I’m Lee. You’re Taylor, right?”
“Yeah. It’s nice to meet you.”
“You, too. So, you want to sing with us tonight, huh? Just one song?”
“Definitely one song.” I laugh.
“Okay, so do you know the words to ‘I Touch Myself’ by Divinyls?”
“Um…” I roll through my mental song list. Isn’t that song about sex? “I’m not sure if I know the lyrics.”
“Don’t
worry. I have the sheet music. Liam chose it for you. He was very insistent that you sing it.”
“Oh, he was, was he?” I meet Liam’s eyes across the bar and watch as a massive grin spreads across his face.
“Here are the words.” Lee hands me a sheet of paper with the lyrics on it.
I let my eyes scan the words. Holy shit.
This song is about a woman making herself come while she’s thinking of the man she wants.
Bastard.
I glare at Liam across the room.
The smile on his handsome face gets bigger. I have the sudden urge to wipe it off.
I can’t sing this.
“And here’s your mic.” Lee hands me a microphone.
“Thank you.”
“You ready to do this?”
Nope. “I guess…”
Liam is so going to pay for this later. He can forget hair-pulling and fucking later. At this rate, dude is going to be sleeping alone with only his hand for company.
I blow out a breath and put the microphone to my lips.
“I’ll count us in, and then we’ll start playing. You count to sixteen in your head and then start singing. Okay?”
“Sixteen. Okay.”
My heart starts pounding, and nerves are swimming in my belly. My palms start to sweat around the microphone.
You can do this, Taylor. No fear.
The band starts to play. I shut my eyes and begin counting. When I reach sixteen, I flick my eyes open, stare down at the first words, and then I start to sing.
Oh my God, I’m singing. In a bar filled with people.
I’m singing in a bar full of people, and…I’m actually not that bad.
Hell yeah. I’ve got this.
By the time we reach the chorus, I’m totally into it, shaking my hips and ass on stage and belting out the words. Liam, Eddie, and Cam are all cheering me on. People in the audience are singing along. Some are even getting up from their seats and dancing.
My confidence is soaring.
Maybe Liam was actually onto something with this song.
I feel awesome!
He’s totally getting a blow job later.
And then we’re on the last chorus, and the song is over way too quickly for my liking.
People are clapping and cheering. I see Liam standing up on his stool, whistling.
I give a little bow.
I have never felt so amazing in all my life as I do now—well, apart from when I’m in Liam’s bed.
“You were great.” Lee smiles at me.
I hand him back the microphone and sheet music. “Thanks.” I beam. “And thank you for letting me sing with you guys.”
“Anytime. You can sing with us anytime.”
My smile gets even bigger.
Heart pumping with adrenaline, I turn to leave the stage, and Liam is there. He puts his hands on my waist, lifting me down. My body slides against his, and he pauses me when our faces are close. His lips meet mine in a soft kiss.
“That was fucking amazing, Boston. I’m so proud of you.”
“I’m proud of me, too.” I smile.
“One more thing crossed off your list.”
“It is.”
Liam puts me on my feet, and holding my hand, he leads us back to our seats at the bar.
“That was really great, Taylor.” Cam smiles at me.
“She was better than great, fuckwit. She was hot as fuck up there,” Eddie says to him.
Liam reaches over and slaps Eddie on the back of the head.
“Oi!” Eddie complains, rubbing his head where Liam just smacked him.
“Don’t call her hot.”
“I was giving her a compliment.”
“You can give her compliments without calling her hot, dickface.” Liam gives him a stern look.
“You did really great,” Cam tells me again. “Let me get you a drink on the house.”
“I still have my beer left, but thanks.”
“I’ll take Taylor’s free beer,” Eddie says.
“You can pay for yours, you cheap bastard,” Cam tells him. He grabs a bottle and pops the cap, putting it on the bar in front of Eddie.
“What about me?” Liam says. “Don’t I get offered a drink around here?” He waves his empty beer bottle around.
“I’ll have a beer waiting for you when you’re done.”
“When I’m done?” Liam’s brows draw together, puzzled.
“You’re up to sing. I thought you’d want to show off your killer serenading skills to Taylor. Because we all know how you want it that way.” Cam chuckles, a shit-eating grin on his face.
Liam looks confused for a moment. He glances at Eddie, who is also wearing a huge grin.
Then, something dawns on Liam, and his expression drops. “You didn’t?”
“Ye-ah,” Eddie sings from behind us.
“You are…” Cam sing-laughs.
“You set of cunts,” Liam growls.
“Aw, don’t be like that. You’re my fire!” Eddie bursts out laughing.
“I fucking hate you both. Why the hell am I still mates with you?”
“Tell me why!” Cam barely gets the words out because he’s laughing so hard.
I can’t help but laugh. I have no clue what I’m laughing about, but I have a feeling I’m about to find out.
“Hardy-fucking-har. I hope you both fuck hookers, and your dicks fall off.”
“You do realize that’s medically impossible, right?” Eddie smirks at him.
Liam looks murderous, which only makes Eddie and Cam laugh harder.
He sighs and gets up from his stool. He turns to me, cupping my chin in his hand, staring deep into my eyes. “Whatever they tell you, it’s a lie.” He lifts his eyes over my head, leveling them both with a harsh glare. “And if I were you two, I’d sleep with your eyes open from now on.” His eyes come back to me. “Remember, Boston, all lies.”
“All lies. I got it.”
He kisses me firmly on the lips and then leaves me. Walking in the direction of the stage, he looks defeated, like a man heading for execution.
Liam climbs up onto the stage and takes the microphone that Lee was holding out for him.
The next thing I hear is the intro for “I Want It That Way” by the Backstreet Boys, and Liam starts to sing. Rather badly.
Okay…
I turn back to Cam and Eddie, barely able to control my laughter. “So, which one of you is going to tell me the story behind this song and why Liam looks like he wants to kill you both?”
Cam grins and rests his arms on top of the bar while Eddie moves his stool closer.
Leaning forward, Cam says, “Okay, so we were sixteen years old. We were in an all-boys boarding school, and girls were like gold dust to us. So, when you got a girl…well, it was like Christmas. Anyway, Liam was seeing this girl, Sophie Forester, from a neighboring school. And she dumped him because she’d heard that he’d shagged another girl.”
“Had he?” I ask.
“Oh, yeah, totally,” Eddie says.
“But Liam was all cut up because he realized that he’d made this huge mistake by sleeping with this other girl.” Cam slaps a hand to his chest, feigning drama. “He was down and driving us fucking nuts, so we snuck out of school and took him to the off-license to buy some booze. We thought if we got him drunk, he’d shut the fuck up about Sophie. Only it didn’t quite work out that way.”
Eddie tells me, “We were sitting at the park, getting hammered on cheap cider, when Liam gets to his feet and suddenly announces that he has this amazing”—he emphasizes with his hands, laughing—“idea and that Sophie will forgive him and get back together with him.”
Cam laughs. “Of course, we encouraged this line of thinking because…well, we thought it would be funny to watch Liam do whatever he was going to do to win this chick back.”
“So, we walked to Sophie’s house,” Eddie continues, “which wasn’t that far from the park. When we got there, all the lights were on
. I thought that Liam was just going to go up and knock on her front door, so he could talk to her. But, oh, no, that wasn’t what Liam had in mind at all. He was planning something…bigger. So, he staggered across her front garden, trampling all over her mother’s flowers in the process, and he stood beneath Sophie’s bedroom window, which faced out onto the main street. Then, he just started…singing—loudly.”
“Oh my God!” I cover my mouth with my hands. “‘I Want It That Way.’”
“The very song.” Eddie fist-bumps me. “Sophie was a massive Backstreet Boys fan. So, dickhead over there thought he could win her back by serenading her with her favorite song.”
“And the best part was, not only was he a fucking terrible singer—as you can currently hear—but Sophie wasn’t even home,” Cam tells me. “She was out at a party with her family. So, the silly cunt was singing to an empty house.”
I’m laughing harder now, clutching my stomach.
“It was fucking brilliant!” Eddie laughs.
“So, what happened when he realized that Sophie wasn’t home?” I ask.
“He didn’t. He thought she was holding out on him, so he just kept on singing—until the cops arrived, that is.”
“The police came?” I gasp.
“Oh, yeah,” Eddie tells me. “Sophie’s next-door neighbor had rung the police. Next thing we knew, Liam was arrested for underage drinking and disturbing the peace. They rang his granddad, and he had to go down and bail Liam out.”
“It was the single greatest moment of my life.” Cam grins. “And one we’ve never let him live down.”
“Oh my God!” I’m laughing so hard, imagining a sixteen-year-old Liam serenading his girl to win her back. “So, did he get back together with Sophie?” I ask, wiping tears of laughter from my eyes.
“Nope.” Eddie chuckles, shaking his head. “The neighbor who had called the cops told her and her folks what had happened when they got home. Sophie wouldn’t even look in his direction after that.”
“Aw, poor Liam.”
“Don’t feel too bad for him. He had a line of chicks waiting to shag him after they’d heard what he had done. For some reason, they all thought it was really romantic, putting his heart out there and singing to Sophie. Hunter got laid a lot that year,” Cam tells me.
“He always was a lucky bastard when it came to women. Present company included,” Eddie says, making me blush.