As Bad As Can Be (17 page)

“I didn't know if she wanted people to know. Things are delicate with Colin in the picture.”

“Yeah?” An edge entered his voice. “Well, I'd say things are pretty damned delicate between you and me right now.”

“Why, because you lost one of your people to me?” she flared.

“Because you didn't trust me enough to tell me what was going on. It's an important little word, trust.” He gave her a hard look. “Without it, you don't have a hell of a lot of anything.”

“Fiona was trusting me to keep confidence,” she floundered.

“I guess you've got your priorities, then, don't you?” He scanned the room. “Look, we can talk about this later. Tell Col I'm sorry I missed the show. I have to get back to O'Connor's.”

“Don't go away angry, Shay,” she said, despising herself for pleading. This was what love did to you, she thought, reducing you to begging the one who was walking out the door.

“I'm not angry,” he said shortly. “I'm disappointed. I'll get over it. Good night, Mallory.”

She wouldn't feel guilty over it, Mallory told herself
as she watched him walk out the door. She turned to go back to the bar and suddenly uproar broke out.

“Don' tell me I can't get a fuckin' drink, bitch,” a beefy blonde at the bar bellowed. He made a move to whirl around and she caught a glimpse of a knotted forehead and a nose that had been rearranged sometime in the past, before he stumbled into a group of young men.

“Watch where you're going, asshole!” the scrappy redhead yelled. It was the frat boys again, she realized, kicking herself for getting distracted from calling in the bouncer earlier. Too much partying and weight-lifting had made the frat boys foolishly cocky, she realized as she muscled her way toward them. They were burly, but the drunk outweighed the redhead by an easy forty or fifty pounds.

“Stop it,” Mallory shouted as they pushed and shoved. Just as she neared them, she saw a fist float through the air toward the drunk. Drunk he might have been, but he obviously knew how to fight, his battered features notwithstanding. He ducked the fist and responded with a punch that split the kid's eye open. Something warm and wet splattered over Mallory's face. She didn't want to think too much about what it might be.

What she wanted was to stop the fight in its tracks. Where were her damned bouncers? She looked wildly around to see Benny and Randy trying to reach her but blocked by the eager surge of the crowd, avidly watching the fight crash toward the bar. It was just a matter of time before someone really got hurt.

“Stop it,” Mallory shouted, her words swallowed up in the roars and curses. “We've called the cops.” She launched herself at the drunk, trying to get to the
pressure point in his neck before he could do any more damage. Instead, the spilled beer on the floor sent her slipping and falling against him. Someone screamed out her name.

“You trying to hit me?” the drunk snarled, grabbing her by the hair. He dragged her around in front of him and clamped a hand around her neck. Mallory fought, clawing at him, but her vision began to fog. When she saw him draw an arm back, she kicked at him, struggling to get loose.

Then he spun abruptly away and his face exploded into a fountain of blood as Shay rammed a fist into his face. Spots splattered onto Mallory as the drunk shook his head blindly and staggered.

“Goddammit, what are you doing in the middle of this?” Shay shouted and shoved her toward the bar. “Go.” When he turned back, the drunk was waiting for him with a looping roundhouse punch. Shay managed to duck most of it, but even the partial contact made him see stars. Get back and below the punch, he thought, and danced around his opponent, who punched at thin air, looking increasingly befuddled. When the drunk dropped his guard just a little, Shay saw his moment and stepped in with a sharp uppercut.

The man's head snapped back and his teeth clacked sharply together. Then, with a surprisingly graceful turn, he dropped to the floor and began snoring.

“A
RE YOU ALL RIGHT
?” Mallory stood in front of Shay, blood splattered over her face and soaking into the white of her shirt.

“Jesus, where are you hurt?” he demanded, afraid to touch her. “What did he do to you?” And why had he stood by all these days while she continued to tempt fate, teasing and goading the roomful of men until one of them decided not to take no for an answer?

“I'm all right, Shay.” She put her hands on his shoulders. “It's not my blood,” she repeated until he finally registered what the pattern of sounds meant.

It still ran through his head in an endless loop, the shouts that had brought him back to the bar, the sound of someone screaming Mallory's name, the sight of the enormous tank of a man aiming his fist at her face.

The adrenaline-charged panic of not knowing whether he could reach her in time.

The sick fear still rolled in Shay's gut. Just the glancing blow he'd taken from the man's fist was enough to have the entire side of his head throbbing. Who knew what a straight-on punch might have done to her?

“Come on, everybody, we're supposed to be having fun here,” Belinda shouted into the thinned-out crowd. Someone turned the jukebox up and Shay stared around the bar in exasperation. Night after night, they
pushed the wild party atmosphere. Was it any wonder it had finally gotten out of control? The only thing he was sure of was that it had to stop, now, before someone got seriously hurt. Before anything happened to Mallory.

And if it took him stepping in and playing the heavy to make it happen, that was just too bad.

“Your poor face,” Mallory murmured, touching the already puffy cheekbone with her fingertips.

Shay moved his head away. “Leave it.”

“And your hand, too.” His breath hissed in when she lifted it to examine his split and bruised knuckles. “We should wash and bandage that,” she said.

“Later,” he said brusquely, trying to ignore the smear of blood on her cheekbone.

“It's got to be hurting,” she protested.

“Forget it,” he snapped. In actual fact, it was throbbing like a mother, but it was inconsequential. “We need to have a serious talk. Now.”

She blinked, finally registering his irritation. “Fine,” she said curtly, matching his tone. “Let's go in the back.”

On her way through the bar, she filled a clean cloth with ice and slapped it into his good hand with unnecessary force. “Put it against your cheek.”

He gave her a stormy look, but obeyed.

In the back bar, Mallory leaned against the counter by the door and crossed her arms. “You mind telling me what the problem is?”

“You really don't know?”

“Don't waste time getting cute, Shay,” she said impatiently. “If you want an apology, fine. I'm sorry you got hurt, truly, and I'm grateful you got me out
of a jam, but we have bouncers for that. I've got people I pay to get hurt. You didn't need to do it.”

The throbbing pain and residual fear catalyzed into fury. “Goddammit, Mallory,” he exploded, “I don't care about getting hurt. I came back in here tonight and found you covered in blood and about a second away from getting your lights punched out by a six-foot-five gorilla.”

She stayed toe to toe with him. “It wasn't my blood.”

“What does it matter? Are you just willfully not seeing this? If that guy had hit you, he could have fractured your jaw or your cheekbone, or worse. You're asking for it with the atmosphere and with the way you're running this bar. That guy was hammered and your bartenders had no business serving him, no business at all.”

“My bartenders know better than to serve drunks,” she said hotly.

“Yeah, well maybe you were all too busy teasing the crowd to notice.”

“Teasing?” she repeated slowly, something flickering in her eyes.

“What did he do, was he watching you? Did he try something, is that what got all of this started?”

“Watch it, Shay,” she warned him. “You don't know what you're talking about.”

He knew, all right. Hadn't he imagined it? Hadn't he seen her lying broken in the seconds it took him to trample over everyone in his way so he could get to her? “I'm not the one who doesn't have sense enough to realize you don't tease idiots until they're fighting to get to you.”

Her voice was like ice, frigid and emotionless. “You've got it all wrong.”

If ice ran through Mallory, fire ran through Shay. “No, you've got it all wrong,” he said, raising his voice again. “When are you going to wake up and realize that every single night you're up there getting cute, you've got yourself a room full of TNT? Sooner or later someone's going to get stupid enough to come after you, like that idiot did tonight. Do you love it so much, being the bad girl, that you're willing to risk people's safety?”

“I'm not risking anyone,” she protested.

“Yes, you are. It's my fault, too. Your brother sent me in here to look after you, and instead I've been standing around letting this go on.”

Time stopped for an instant. “What did you say? Letting this go on? What, letting me run my business?”

“I meant—”

“I don't give a damn what you meant,” she said furiously. “I run my business my way.”

“Sure, and we all sit and watch you up there.”

It was like a fist suddenly tightening around her chest, making it hard to breathe. “What, are you ashamed, Shay? I seem to remember you out there watching not so long ago, or were you just slumming it?” She tried to swallow the bitter taste at the back of her throat. It didn't matter what he said, she told herself fiercely.

“That was between you and I. This is between you and everyone.” His eyes burned at her. “Wasn't tonight enough to make you realize you're not just risking yourself, you're risking other people? I should have put my foot down a long time ago.”

“Like hell. You don't put your foot down here. This isn't O'Connor's. Bad Reputation is
mine.
”

“Jesus, Mallory, clue in. I'm not talking about territory. I'm talking about taking care of the people who work here, which is what a responsible boss does.” His words were scathing. “I thought that was important to you, but it apparently doesn't even register on your list of priorities.”

“My priority is running a business.”

“You're doing this to make a point, and maybe because you enjoy rubbing everyone's nose in it. Does it really mean that much to you to laugh at them all, to be Mallory the bad girl, who never bows to convention?”

Let me in, he'd said, and she had. And now she had nothing to protect her from the bolts he hurled. “I'm trying to take care of people, including Dev,” she managed to say.

“Dev doesn't expect you to put yourself up there like a piece of meat to bring in customers. You're doing this for your own ego. Except that now you're risking yourself and everyone else to be able to say you've won.”

“It's making the bar work,” she said over the roaring in her ears.

“It's shortsighted and irresponsible. When you've got people working for you, you've got to think of them first and foremost. If you don't, then you're no good, not as a manager, anyway. You're just being selfish.”

It was like being sliced with a razor sharp knife, so quickly that she didn't feel the pain, just looked down to find blood streaming from a fatal wound.
You're a selfish girl, just like your no-good mother,
she heard
her aunt's voice. Shay's words shivered through her and anger condensed into a choking cloud of hurt.

How could she have been fool enough to think he'd accept her and care for her?

“It's got to end,” Shay said. “Now.”

She looked at him suddenly, her eyes blazing in a pale face. “I'll tell you what's ending,” she flung at him. “You and me. Now get the hell out of my bar.”

She whirled and slammed out of the back room, making Fiona jump where she was pouring drinks. “God, Mallory, you're white as a ghost. What's happened?”

Don't think about it, Mallory told herself, ignoring Fiona to duck under the walkthrough. She had to get out before Shay came after her. Before she broke down completely.

She stopped Belinda on her way back to the bar with a load of empty glasses. “Can you close up tonight? I have to leave.”

“On a Saturday night?” Belinda's voice was rich with surprise. “You never leave on a Saturday night.”

“Something's come up. Can you do it?”

“Yeah, sure.” Belinda took a closer look at her. “Are you okay? That bruiser muscled you around some.”

Not nearly as much as Shay just had. “I'm fine. Just take care of things.” The less she said, the better.

“Okay. See you tomorrow.”

Mallory didn't answer, just walked away. The thing to do was to concentrate. If she concentrated on getting up the stairs and into her apartment, she could keep it together. She wouldn't crumble until she was in her private space where no one could see her. A breath of cool air whisked through the front door and
her grip on her control slipped a notch. She opened the door to her stairs and put her foot on the bottom tread.

“Mallory!” The voice came from behind her.

She turned to see Fiona.

“Are you okay? Where are you going?”

“I'm fine,” Mallory said, looking beyond her to see Shay walking out of the back room. Her voice felt unsteady and she pitched it lower. “Belinda's going to handle closing up.”

“What's wrong?” Fiona stepped closer.

“Nothing,” she said, and to her horror her voice shook. She whirled and ran to the stairs that led to her apartment, leaving Fiona behind her.

Fiona stood for a moment in shock. It took more than the sight of blood to rattle a woman like Mallory, more than getting shoved around a little.

It took a man.

Fiona turned and saw Colin standing near the bar, holding on to Shay's arm to keep him from coming toward her. Toward Mallory.

Temper began to drum through her. She'd heard only snatches of their fight from the back room, but it didn't take much to put two and two together. She stalked toward them.

“Fee.”

Colin started reaching out for her and she whirled on him furiously. “You keep your hands off me, Colin O'Connor. You've no right to me, none at all. And you, Shay,” she said, glaring at him. “What did you say to Mallory to upset her?”

“That's between her and me.”

“Well, you were yelling at her loud enough to include a few more of us. You pulled out all the stops,
didn't you? What is it with you O'Connors?” She stared from one to the other furiously. “What, did you think that lummox was trying to hit Mallory because she wouldn't go along with him?”

The tightening of Shay's jaw told her she'd hit the mark. “Bloody hell, both of you, you just decide who you want people to be without even taking a look. Did you ever ask Mallory what happened? Did you ever think to?”

“I already know—”

“You don't know anything,” she said grimly. “It might interest you to know that you're dead wrong. That big lug wasn't trying to paw her. You didn't barge in and save her virtue in spite of her reckless ways. It was a bar fight, plain and simple. It had nothing to do with Mallory.”

“He had his hands on her,” Shay insisted stubbornly.

“Too right, he did. And in case you hadn't noticed when he collapsed on you, he's blind drunk. Blurs, that's all he's seeing.” She threw Shay a furious look. “I was up on the bar dancing, I saw the whole thing. The drunk jerk bumped into the college boys. They were in a mood and one of them took a swing.”

“Big mistake.” Shay flexed his battered hand and winced. “He knew how to fight, even as drunk as he was.”

“Mallory saw it, too. She tried to get him in a comealong but he was too tall for her and then he just had her.”

He shook his head, trying to ward off the image.

Fiona saw him and softened just a bit. “It could have happened anywhere. Mallory was just trying to
break it up. It didn't matter about the dancing. It'd be a miracle if he even realized she was a woman.”

All the fury bled out of him. He'd wanted it to be the dancing. He'd wanted a reason to end it, he thought, staring around the half-empty bar. He was afraid for her. It was the one thing he hadn't said, he realized, the most important thing of all. He hadn't told her that his heart had practically stopped during the fight. He hadn't said that she was all that mattered to him. He'd never told her he loved her.

“Where did she go?” he asked softly.

Fiona gave him a disdainful look. “Oh, now you're asking questions,” she said, but she saw the lines of strain in his face and relented. “I think she went up to her apartment to change. She was headed toward her stairs, anyway, when I saw her last.”

Shay turned and walked toward Mallory's stairs without a word.

“Remind me never to make you mad,” Colin said as she started to pass him.

“What makes you think you haven't already,” she said tartly, stopping to look at him.

“Me? What have I done?”

She stepped in front of him. “You're as big a fool as your brother, making your assumptions, sticking people into little boxes.”

“Like who?”

“Like me,” she retorted, then cut him off before he could say a word. “And if you value your family jewels, don't you dare tell me I'm like a sister to you,” she said, her voice low and venomous.

He stared at her and then, to her infinite surprise, he began to chuckle. “No, Fee, after tonight I'm never going to think of you like a sister again.”

“Don't laugh at me,” she ordered him, but her mouth softened.

“Ah, Fee, I can understand why Shay flew off the handle tonight,” he said soberly. “He was scared as hell, and I understand because I was too. When I saw that fight move toward the bar, I just knew that some idiot was going to knock you off in the middle of everything.”