Better Than You (The Walker Family Series Book 3) Read Online Free Page B

have to tell him he’s full of it. Just nod and smile and try not to hurt his little feelings.”
    “Thanks,” Jordan said, dead-faced. “Thanks for making me feel all grown up and validated.”
    “For what it’s worth, I agree with you,” Tam said and accepted the beer that was passed across the bar top to him. “But Captain Optimism over there thinks the chase is fun.”
    Jordan snorted. “Chasing’s not fun. Chasing’s for back of the pack losers who can’t win.”
    Tam nodded. “See?” H e glanced over at Mike. “He’s a runner; he knows these things.”
    “He’s also a bartender. I think I’ll get my life advice somewhere else.”
    “I might gag on all this flattery,” Jordan said, and picked up the rag he’d left on the bar. “I’ll check on you losers in a minute.”
    Of all the coed party bars in midtown – full of drunken barely legal girls sipping bubblegum colored umbrella drinks – Jordan worked at one of the few dark and depressing, good old fashioned grown up bars. Double Down was busy even for a Friday; the long, dark, high-gloss bar that ran the whole length of the main room’s longest wall was packed shoulder-to-shoulder with middle aged men and couples watching the game up on the flat screen behind the bar. With the economy in the shitter, Jordan had moved back in with Mom and Dad (and their little sister Jo) and was holding down two part-time jobs, his degree totally useless. He was one of two bartenders – the other a thirty-something bottle blonde with a big rack and a knowing smile – and even if Mike gave his little brother hell about it, Jordan’s flat-faced cynicism was exactly the sort of personality most patrons expected out of a bartender in a place like this.
    “So, hey. ” Mike leaned over on his stool so he could get closer to Tam, close enough to be heard above the din of voices and TVs around them. “I went back to Nordstrom today.”
    Tam sipped his beer and stared at the back wall, but Mike thought his eyes might have rolled, the light striking off their convex profiles. “Why? Were they having a sale on bath salts, Nancy?”
    “Uh, no . I went to see Delta.”
    “And lived to tell me about it?”
    “Dude, get over yourself.”
    Tam sighed and turned to face him, his expression disinterested under the black razor slashes of his hair. “Fine,” he said robotically. “How’d it go?”
    “It - ”
    His phone rang.
    “Hold on a sec.”
    “Yeah. ” Tam’s gaze went back to the TV, shaking his head like he thought Mike was an idiot.
    Whatever . Mike dug his cell out of his pants pocket and read the ID display; he didn’t recognize the number. “Yeah?” he answered and reached for the bowl of peanuts he and Tam were sharing.
    “Is this Michael?” a female voice asked and his hand froze. “Michael Walker?”
    For one shameful moment, he was as excited and jittery as a high school girl. “Yes it is.” He levered a healthy dose of brightness into his voice, regretting his earlier “yeah.”
    He knew who it was; the little sigh on the other end of the line was all too familiar by this point. He envisioned her red lips pressed together, dark eyes rolling like she couldn’t believe her own stupidity. “This is…um, this is Delta Brooks.” There was a noise like she’d swallowed. “From Nordstrom.”
    Score! He pumped a fist in the air in silent triumph and Tam was forced to grin, even if it was reluctant. He kept it cool on the phone, though. “Hey, dollface.”
    “Doll – oh,” she groaned. “You know, I can’t believe I – ”
    Mike’s confidence fell out through the soles of his feet. “Wait, wait. Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” Tam sniggered into his beer . “Are you still there?”
    She huffed an aggravated breath across the receiver. “ Yes . I’m still here, though I don’t know why .”
    Mike’s brain spun for a furious handful of silent seconds, his pulse thumping in his ears. He had a serious tightrope to walk