Wilder Mage by CD Coffelt Page A

pop sliced into the discussion at the bar, but it resumed, to Sable’s disgust.
    “Hey, cut the seriousness. What’s the problem, anyway?”
    Sable shrugged. “No problem.”
    She shoved the small notepad into her back pocket. Too many distractions with too little business made for an exasperating day. Besides, she needed to check the web site for orders and go through her little notebook scribbles. Genius ideas came at any time, and writing them down helped her remember. It also made her look too busy to care about the commotion at the bar.
    The thought of the vintage sundae glasses in the front window was on her mind. The variety of fluted and smooth cups was enough for an individual page on the website. She studiously ignored the loud feminine laugh and ambled to stand by the display to make a quick inventory of the glasses in her notebook, her back to the bar. Bert moved to stand beside her.
    “No problem, huh,” he said quietly. He seemed to study the glassware beside her. “Girls getting to you?”
    “No,” Sable said, too quickly.
    His mouth twitched, but he didn’t comment. Bert picked up one of the sundae glasses and held it to the light, watching the play of colors through the prisms.
    “How about you?” she asked.
    He turned pink, and she bit her lips to keep from laughing.
    “It is what it is, and those two are what I call subprime. And I don’t claim that cousin of mine as a relative.”
    She glanced over her shoulder at Bert’s cousin, Miss Red Tank Top. Justus seemed busy with dusting the glass shelving and mirror. Her voice low, she said, “It’s just that…”
    She stopped. Bert waited patiently, looking at her with his head tilted like a curious cat. Sable huffed irritably. Her words ran faster, like a Slinky tumbling down a staircase and just as graceful.
    “I feel like I’ve done something wrong, that he’s pissed at me, and I don’t know what I did. I tried to apologize for yelling. I wanted to hear his story, his side of the night at the concert, but he won’t say more than two words to me, and I don’t know what I did to…I don’t know what to do.”
    She didn’t see how anyone could make sense of that speech, but Bert nodded and sighed.
    “Hey, I know, but he’s had a tough few years, and there isn’t a lot of trust in him, okay? It’s not you…geez, that sounds like a bad relationship, doesn’t it? ‘It’s not you, it’s him.’” He laughed under his breath and flicked a glance at the bar. He spoke even lower. “His dad died when he was sixteen. That was the bad part. And he’s never hurt for money. I guess his dad left him and his mom pretty well off. He even has a college degree—MBA, I think. Anyway, he’s had some…problems, and it’s kinda been bad. For him.”
    It was the longest, most disjointed speech he’d made yet.
    Sable bit her bottom lip, wondering how much Justus had told Bert. “I’m not sure I completely understand his crabbiness, but I’ll try not to take it personally.”
    “He likes you, if that helps. I mean—damn, now I sound like a pimp—he likes havin’ you around. It’s just…complicated.”
    “Understood.”
    She really didn’t understand, but Bert wore a worried frown that made her pat his arm.
    “Maybe you’ll get the whole story from him sometime,” he said.
    She didn’t answer, but nodded.
    One of the tramps—girls—sitting at the bar said, “How about some music?”
    It was Bert’s cousin, the one wearing a red spaghetti-strap tank top. She flipped her long blond hair back over her shoulder. Probably, Sable thought acidly, because the locks of hair spoiled the view of her ample breasts. The other girl had her back to Sable. Her arm stretched out along the top of the bar. The girl had her cheek on her arm, looking up at the bar owner.
    Justus wasn’t paying attention. He scrubbed the top of the dark wooden bar with a white towel like Bert’s cloth. His head was turned away, giving her his profile, his mouth