Cam felt at the back of her waist. “Damn, it must have fallen off. It’s probably kicking around under some table,” she muttered, heading to the heat lamps to pick up her order. “Or more likely in some four-year-old’s pocket.”
“I’ll help you look for it,” Fiona said, abandoning her cart to follow her into the dining room. “I’ll start searching the floor while you take Luke his food.”
“Luke?” Cam repeated, weaving her way through the crowded pub.
“The big dreamy guy at table ten,” Fiona explained, stepping around her to run interference when a young child bolted past them, waving a plastic sword and wearing an eye patch. She redirected the toddler back to his parents, then looked at Cam. “You don’t think he’s dreamy? His eyes are a really deep navy blue, and his hair’s almost long enough to tie back. I love long hair on a man, don’t you?”
Cam glanced toward table ten. “He’s old enough to be your father.”
The girl made an exasperated sound. “I don’t think he’s dreamy for me,silly, I think he’s perfect for you. But he’s only going to be in town a short while because he’s on sabbatical, so you need to work fast. You should give him your phone number when you bring him his bill.”
Camry nearly dropped the heavy tray she was holding. “What?”
Apparently thinking that was a rhetorical question, Fiona started running interference again, occasionally bending over to search under the tables. Deciding she better have a talk with her roommate on their ride home from work, Cam followed her toward the sidewall of booths. But just as Fiona walked past table ten, a hand suddenly snaked out from table nine, grabbed the young girl’s arm, and pulled her into the booth of drunken men.
Fiona’s yelp of surprise was also laced with pain when she hit the corner of the table. Without skipping a beat, Cam rushed forward with every intention of cleaning the jerk’s clock. Only it was at that exact moment that table ten’s Dream Guy shot out of his own booth and also launched himself at the jerk—his shoulder knocking the tray full of food out of Camry’s hands and sending it crashing to the floor.
Pandemonium ensued when two of the jerk’s drunken buddies scrambled out to go after Dream Guy at the same time that Camry also headed into the fray. Only her damn heels got tangled up in the broken dishes and food, and she ended up fallinginto the fight instead.
Her head exploded in pain when her cheek slammed into one man’s elbow, which was cocked back to take a swing at Dream Guy. The force of the backward punch threw her into a nearby table, scattering dishes and food over people trying to scramble out of the way.
Camry straightened and spun around, frantically searching for Fiona in the tangle of bodies. She spotted the girl preparing to drive a fork into the arm of the jerk who was trying to pull her out from under the table by her hair. Cam screamed the girl’s name at the top of her lungs, hoping Fiona could hear her over the sound of crashing dishes and the growls and grunts of the fighting men.
But it was too late. Even though Fiona tried to halt her downward swing as her eyes snapped to Camry, the fork still found its target. The ensuing shout of pain came just as another one of the drunken men flew backward, sending Camry to the floor with her own cry of pain as her ankle twisted under the weight of his landing on top of her.
Almost as quickly as it had begun, the pandemonium ceased when Dave, along with several of the grill’s regular male patrons, started grabbing men by the scruffs of their necks and pulling them off Dream Guy and Camry.
Fiona immediately crawled over and lifted Cam into a sitting position, wrapping her arms around her protectively. Cam snatched the fork out of her fist just as Dave came over and crouched down in front of them.
“Damn, are you girls okay?” he asked, brushing hair back off Camry’s face.
Cam jerked away when his fingers touched her throbbing cheek. “I just want to sit here a minute, okay?” she said shakily, carefully straightening her right leg.
“I’ve been stabbed!” a man shouted. “I’m bleeding! That bitch stabbed me!”
Dave looked down at the fork in her hand, which Camry immediately tossed under a nearby table. “You stay put until the ambulance gets here,” he said, getting to his feet and going over to the loudly complaining victim.
Fiona knelt behind Camry and pulled her against her for support. “Other than that shiner that’s already starting to swell,” Fiona said, “what else hurts?”
“My ankle is throbbing like hell,” Camry whispered. She turned to look up at Fiona. “Mind telling me what possessed you to stab that guy with a fork? You don’t think that was a little . . . extreme?”
Fiona shrugged. “My dad always told me that if I’m ever accosted, I’m supposed to see everything as a weapon, and not hesitate to use it.”
“Your father actually said that?”
She nodded soberly. “He said that I better not think like a woman, but like a warrior.” She suddenly smiled. “And that a woman’s greatest weapon is surprise, because men don’t expect us to fight back.”
Camry blinked up at her. “Your dad and my dad must have read the same book on raising daughters. Oh, God, I can’t breathe,” she groaned, twisting to face forward, trying to get air in her lungs as she frantically tugged on the laces of her bustier. “Help me get this stupid thing off.”
Fiona tried to untie the lacing on the front but couldn’t work the knotted bow free. “Luke,” she cried as he sat down next to them, holding a napkin up to his temple. “Help me. Camry can’t breathe.”
“Cut this damn thing off,” Cam panted, trying to find a position that allowed her to breathe. “Ow! My ankle!”
“Stop thrashing around. You’re making it worse,” Luke said. He dropped the napkin so he could hold her down, then unsnapped a pouch on his belt with his other hand. He pulled out a multitool and opened it to expose the blade. “Help me, Fiona,” he instructed, tugging on the knotted bow. “Hold her chest out of the way.”
Camry covered her own breasts. “You can’t see what you’re doing with blood in your eye,” she said, worried he might cut more than just the laces.
While she covered her precious anatomy with her hands, Fiona used her own hands to block Cam’s view of what he was doing. “He won’t cut you, I promise,” the girl said with all the bravado of someone whose boobs weren’t inches from a sharp blade.
Camry felt several tugs on her torso, a very welcome release of pressure, and all of a sudden she could breathe again! She tried to roll to her side, but discovered that Luke was straddling her hips. His weight suddenly disappeared, but instead of standing up, he rolled to lie flat on the floor beside her.
“Slow down your breathing or you’ll hyperventilate,” he instructed, also taking labored breaths. “Damn, I think I have a couple of cracked ribs.”
Fiona lifted Camry into a sitting position again, wedging herself behind her for support as Luke rolled toward her with a groan, then rose to his knees.
“Where else are you hurt?” he asked.
“She twisted her ankle,” Fiona answered for her.
Luke sidled down to her legs and very gently slid her shoe off her right foot. It was as he went to look up at her that his gaze suddenly stopped, and Camry realized he could look right down her unconfined blouse! But when she slapped her hand to her chest and his gaze lowered, she realized he could also look right up her skirt! She started wiggling as she tugged on the hem, trying to pull her skirt down as she also tried to hold up the front of her blouse.
“What isyour problem?” he snapped, falling back when her flailing left foot kicked his thigh—apparently quite close to his groin.
“Nothing!”
“I’m pressing charges against whoever stabbed me,” Fiona’s victim cried from three tables down.
Still holding her blouse to her chest, Camry dropped her head to her knees with a groan. “Honest to God, I am neverstepping foot in another bar,” she muttered, remembering the last time someone had wanted to press charges against her, after a barroom brawl in Pine Creek last summer.