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berth, even if she was also giving the brute an interested side eye when she thought he wasn’t paying attention. All the ladies in the bar seemed to think the caramel-skinned behemoth with his mixed ancestry and impenetrable dark gaze was easy on the eyes—not that he seemed to give a rat’s ass about the female attention.
    It was slow for a Monday night, so I had sent both of them home early and let Avett close down the kitchen. There was no sense in paying them to hang around when there was only one person at the bar. I knew Zeb Fuller pretty well. He was friends with my brother-in-law and the rest of the crew I spent most of my time with, and he was a regular at the Bar. He was another beast of a man that emanated a whole lot of don’t-fuck-with-me. It must be something about the clean mountain air that allowed the men in the state to grow into giants. I wasn’t small by any stretch of the imagination, but more often than not, I found myself eye to eye or having to look up at most of the guys that made up my social circle. It was just one more incentive to keep my ass in line. There were way too many guys around that were very capable of kicking my ass six ways to Sunday if I screwed up again.
    Zeb had a pensive look on his face and was absently stroking his beard. Since moving to Denver, I had learned quickly that the three B’s ruled all—beards, beer, and babes. The mile-high had a plethora of all those things, and when in doubt a conversation could always be started by picking one of the holy trinity. In a pinch, the Broncos always worked as a substitute B as well. Zeb had the beard, he didn’t drink beer, and I knew, since he was at the Bar spilling his guts all the time, that his current babe situation was stuck in neutral because the girl he was hung up on seemed clueless to how he felt about her. She was also the older sister of one of his best friends, Rowdy, who wasn’t exactly thrilled with Zeb’s interest in his sibling.
    I was finishing wiping down the bar and restocking the cooler while Zeb sulked into his almost empty glass of Jack and Coke. I never thought I would be the guy that others went to with their problems. I wasn’t exactly sympathetic or patient with things that I thought were obvious, but ever since I stepped foot behind that bar, I felt more like a therapist than a drink slinger. What was even more shocking was that I liked it. I liked being able to see the situation from the outside and point out things from my own unique perspective. After all, I had screwed up enough for an entire army of people, so I figured I might as well put those hard lessons learned to good use.
    “Why don’t you just ask her out on a date?” I tossed the bar towel onto the dirty-rag pile and picked up the remote to turn off the TVs. I was going to shut it all down at midnight since Zeb was the only customer and I knew enough to know he just wanted to talk, not to drink.
    He looked up at me and frowned. “You’ve met Sayer. Does she strike you as the type to go on a date with a guy like me?”
    Sayer Cole was a bit of a mystery. She was a lawyer, beautiful in a really elegant and refined way, and she had surprised our little group of misfits by coming to Denver and claiming one of us as her own blood. Rowdy never knew he had a sister after growing up in foster care, so the reunion had been rocky at best. Only now she fit in seamlessly with the rest of the wayward souls that made up the tight-knit unit my little sister, Ayden, had been so fortunate to marry into. I was also lucky that they all took me into the fold based entirely on the fact that Ayden wasn’t going to give me up. She might not like me very much all of the time, but she loved me unconditionally, and that was enough for the rest of the group to welcome me with open arms.
    “She’s nice. She seems pretty cool with whatever comes her way.”
    Zeb pushed his empty glass at me and ran his hands through his unruly hair. The guy was a