Liam: Branded Brothers by Raen Smith

Charla said to the
bartender.
    Charla froze, still grasping the glass. She’d recognize that
voice anywhere. After all, she’d heard it every day for three years. She closed
her eyes and thought of the last vision she’d seen of him. It was with the
blonde. The blonde . That’s where she knew the stripper. Rex was here
watching his girlfriend or whoever she was. She swiveled in her seat to see Rex
sitting a few feet from her. His eyes met hers.
    “Charla?” He sputtered with a shocked look on his face.
    “Rex,” she replied, looking back at the second most hated
person in her life. Both him and my mother in the same damn day. She
slid her glass across the counter, but this time, she didn’t try to force a
smile. She didn’t have anything to say to him. She wasn’t about to kill this
asshole with kindness. She learned her lesson this morning.
    “I didn’t expect to see you here,” he said.
    “That’s what you said the last time I saw you,” she
muttered, wondering what future employers would think of his stripper
girlfriend. She thought about all the “late night” study sessions he complained
about. They had become more frequent right before she had caught him. She
guessed studying the blonde at Paradise Club must have been grueling. Charla
wanted to lay into him, but he wasn’t worth the energy.
    “How are you, Charla?” Rex asked.
    “Good. Real good.” She nodded her head and clenched her
fists beneath the counter. She hated that seeing Rex made her feel this way.
    “You move back to Hudson?”
    “No,” she replied shortly. “You done with medical school?”
    “Dropped out.”
    Satisfaction curled around her body. At least there wasn’t
going to be a Dr. Rex anymore. She unclenched her fists. “That’s too bad.”
    “Yeah, things didn’t exactly work out how I thought they would.”
Rex’s words hung in the air as the naked blonde grinded on the stage behind
him.
    “That’s too bad,” Charla said to Rex before turning to Liam.
“Let’s go.”
    “That’s him? That’s your ex-fiancé?” Liam whispered.
    “Yes,” she whispered back. “Like I said, let’s go.”
    Liam threw some bills on the counter and jumped out of the
stool, wrapping his arm around Charla. He lifted her gently out of the stool
and turned her chin toward him. He leaned in and suddenly pressed his lips
against hers in a hot, passionate kiss. He held the back of her neck and leaned
her against the stool. Charla melted into his arms, feeling a surge through her
body. Just as he was about to pull away, he gently squeezed her ass, making a
soft moan release from her lips.
    “You’re driving me crazy, babe. Let’s get out of here,” he
said loudly as he grabbed Charla’s hand. “This place is filthy.”
    “See ya, Rex,” Charla said, passing one last look at Rex and
his open mouth. The bouncer stepped aside as they walked through the doors,
Liam guiding Charla again, but this time with his hand much lower.
    “You okay?” Liam asked as they stepped out onto the
sidewalk.
    “Your hand is still on my ass,” Charla replied. He pulled it
off and shot her a crooked smile.
    “So, that was Rex, huh? The guy you were going to marry.” He
looked back at the Paradise Club before turning to her, staring intently into
her eyes. “The guy you were going to spend the rest of your life with.”
    “Yeah,” she replied, pointing to the building. “It kills me
to think that asshole spent his late night study sessions here. What was I
thinking?”
    “With a name like Sexy Rexy, I don’t know,” Liam joked.
Charla hit him on the arm and his face fell more serious. He took her hand
gently and squeezed it. “Not everyone is who they say they are, Charla. It’s a
hard one to swallow. Believe me, it’s been eight years, and I still ask myself
what happened. At the end of the day, my ex-wife isn’t who I thought she was. I
had to fall out of love with the woman I thought I knew.”
    “Does it still hurt? Because I