“You don’t have to do that, you know.” He scowled at me.

I wrinkled my nose at him in response to his unhappy expression.

He mimicked me, until a smile cracked on his lips. “Thanks… Taryn.” Those piercing blue eyes of his quickened my pulse.

There were so many people at the bar, I had to tear myself away and wait on the next customer. People were shouting drink orders and waving money.

No sooner did I turn my eyes away when three women descended on him. They were giggling, gushing, flirting, and trying to get him to pose with them so they could capture their celebrity moment on their camera phones.

My lips curled in disgust. I was glad I made the decision that I did. There was too long of a line to get to that man. I attempted to ignore him again.

“What can I get you?” I asked the somewhat good-looking guy who was waiting for a drink. He mumbled something unintelligible; the music

mixed with the hum of people talking and yelling made it almost impossible to hear.

I heard Ryan sneeze a couple of times in a row. My attention automatically shifted back to him. I wonder if he’s catching a cold? I slid a few white cocktail napkins in front of him in case he needed a tissue. I wasn’t looking as I set them down near his hand; I smiled when I felt his warm fingertips brush over mine.

“Sorry, I didn’t get that.” I cupped my other hand around the back of my ear so my latest customer would get the point. “What would you like?” I asked again.

“You’re beautiful!” he shouted at me.

I grimaced at his words and his lame attempt to hit on me.

“Thanks,” I replied flatly. “What can I get you?” I was getting impatient.

“How about your phone number?” he yelled back to me as he was almost lifting his body onto the bar. I noticed that after he spoke he looked back at his buddies so they could acknowledge his bravery.

I looked down and smiled as the embarrassment made me blush. My golden rule was not to date random customers, especially the ones who were assholes.

“Thanks. I’m very flattered,” I replied with a half-hearted smile. “But sorry, the only thing you’re going to get from this side of the bar is alcohol.”

My eyes flickered back to Ryan, who was sitting there staring at me with a smug grin on his face.

“Oh, come on!” the young man pleaded with me. I just shook my head no.

A few men sitting at the bar teased the poor guy. “Ooh, shot down in flames! Ouch!”

I gave them a disapproving look.

“What do you want to drink?” I asked again, trying to be more cordial. In reality, he had ten seconds to reply before I was going to move on to the next customer.

“Three lagers,” he finally yelled back.

Ten drink orders later, I was making a whiskey sour for a female customer when I noticed one of the actresses, Francesca LeRoux, descend upon Ryan. Francesca was young, leggy, super thin, with straight, long brown hair. She looked like a model. She was leaning on Ryan’s shoulder with her arm around him, whispering in his ear.

I happened to be looking when she ran her fingers over Ryan’s hair. He winced and tilted his head away from her touch. I could tell it bothered him. Why does that bother me? There was something about the way she touched him that irritated me.

A few moments later Ryan moved back to the table with her to rejoin their group. He sat down in one of the side booths, but there were so many people around them that my view of him was obscured.

“What did he say to you?” Marie asked. She was going out of her mind with curiosity.

“I gave him a beer. He said thanks.” I shrugged. “That’s it.”

“You had Ryan freakin’ Christensen at your bar and you didn’t talk to him?”

“Marie, what was I supposed to say?” I was not into having this conversation with her, so I walked away.

Ryan stayed at the table with his group, although I was trying not to keep tabs on his whereabouts. Three bulky security guards hovered around them, keeping the general population at bay. I saw a few women manage to squeak through and get an autograph, and I wished that they would just leave him alone.

I wondered if the way he ran his finger back and forth underneath his nose to scratch was another nervous tick, but he started to sneeze again.

He must be getting a cold.

As I was filling another drink order, my mind contemplated over what the big deal was to get someone’s signature on a piece of paper. Was it simply the act of stopping him from whatever he was doing to make him acknowledge another human being’s presence?

I signed my name several times a day – mostly on checks to pay the bills – but it wasn’t like the Power Company was on my doorstep flirting or screaming my name to get me to sign the check.

I watched as he scribbled his name on the bottom of some girl’s shirt. What would possess these girls to want him to write on their clothes with permanent marker?

I did notice one thing though; some of the girls that stepped up to bug him ranged from quite pretty to very attractive, but they all seemed to be forms without faces to him. He didn’t even really look at them. It was like he too was in business mode.

“Hi!” shouted a male voice that snapped me out of my private thoughts.

I looked up to see a nice looking man wearing a suit jacket over a nicely pressed button-down shirt. Thick, dark hair… slight dimples in his cheeks… no wedding ring on the hand that rested on the bar.

“Hi. What can I get you?” My eyes adjusted to this new handsome man.

“What do you have on tap?” he asked, flashing an alluring smile at me.

I listed the ten different drafts that I had on tap and handed him a menu of available bottled beer just in case.

“Hmm, you’ve given me too many options. What do you recommend?”

“Well that depends,” I responded, “on whether you prefer a darker, full bodied beer or a lighter, pale ale.”

He leaned further onto the bar. “You’re not making this easy for me. Why don’t you pick one? I’m sure I’ll like anything you choose.”

I walked away smiling and grabbed a new glass along my way. I tapped one of the more popular ales and slid the glass across the bar to him.

“Mmm, that’s good!” He grinned and winked at me. “You have excellent taste!”

His compliment made me laugh. He wasn’t the first man to tell me that.

“My name is Mark. What’s yours?”

“Taryn,” I replied, wondering if he was going to pay for the beer I just served him.