I already know this outfit is perfection, because there is nowhere to keep my phone. Unless you aren't opposed to some less than savory areas, which I'm definitely opposed to. Becky would be so disappointed in me for that, but it's the truth. I'm not sticking my phone there.

So it's still in my hand when I arrive, shivering in all my skin-tight-dress glory at the door to Stalwart. Tyrone is working the door, so I don't even wait in line, just slipping him a hug and a smile on the way by, despite the protests of the shivering patrons waiting in line.

What can I say? People here are paying for the big city experience and I'm just doing my part to help them receive it.

You really can't pay enough to receive that authentic lack of meritocracy.

My red dress clings to every part of me, tight and just long enough that I'm confident no one will see anything illegal, but not a millimeter more. It took me several hours this afternoon to get my hair just right and I'm ready to show that asshole of an ex everything he's missing.

So far, he hasn't banned me from the bar, but I'm looking to change that.

"Hey, Jack!" Jessica shouts from across the room. "I can't believe you're back!"

"Can't let a man keep me away from my girls, now can I? I'm here for a little fun." I strike a pose for a selfie and she sticks out her tongue. Because we are classy.

"Can you please put 'hashtag my friend is the best ever' on that post?"

"Are you actually an eighty-year old man in disguise?"

"Yes," she says simply, squeezing me in one more hug before returning behind the bar to serve at least three angry balding men who had to wait more than thirteen seconds for a drink. Could have had your drink faster if it weren't for a vindictive asshole who fired me. But you're not going to be mad at him. No, you gotta take it out on the girl controlling what ends up in your drink. Honestly, these people are lucky Jessica has morals.

I'm busy envisioning all the ways I could get myself kicked out of the bar while Jessica races around doing the job of at least three people all by herself. It's going well, all things considered, until a crowd of at least twenty rambunctious city folks bursts into the bar from behind me.

The pervasive smell of too much cologne wafts in on the breeze and I don't need to turn around to know who it is. I can already feel the poison he lets off leaching into my skin. Luther Bellsworth just graced us with his sickening presence. And judging by the noise level, we are about to be graced by a lot more than just his presence.

The fact that any other party acting this way wouldn't have even made it through the door is not lost on me. But maybe I can work with this. Drunk people tend to make some excellent blackmail fodder and have less than ideal grips on their personal belongings. So if a phone or maybe a keycard were to go missing, a person might not even notice.

I sip back the messed up Daiquiri I bought so Jessica wouldn't have to throw it out. Even on a night like this I know what it's like to explain losses to our wonderful accommodating and very helpful manager. Or, I guess only Jessica's manager now. Because I got fired.

Regardless, I still like Jessica, so I'm sipping on raspberries that should be limes and gin that should be rum. And to distract myself, I count thirteen instances of girls putting their hands on the man who, the whole time we were together, swore up and down that he wasn't interested in that kind of life.

From this we can conclude that my breaking up with him did one of two things. Maybe I messed him up so bad he dove off the deep end into a pool of women. Wouldn't be the first time someone did that on a rebound.

The other option, of course, is that I made a very good call trusting my gut and breaking up with him. Probably I'll never know.

What I do know is a girl should be able to break up with her boyfriend without him buying her place of work and firing her. But Luther did that.

Now it's time to get even.

I take a big swig of whatever it is I'm drinking—I can't even call it a messed up daiquiri anymore—and almost cough it back up. Find me a person who loves raspberries and gin and I'll give them a whole drink, gratis.

I manage to stop my coughing and sink further into my dark corner, watching and waiting for a moment to grab something I shouldn't. My phone is open to the camera app on my lap, poised and ready to jump into action as soon as someone does something I really think the whole town needs to see.

I'm not about to get in trouble with Mrs. Fendershan just to protect these loud, obnoxious patrons making life awful for the rest of us.

But even my dark corner doesn't protect me from the bullet gaze of Luther Bellsworth. He finds me from across the room and his pupils narrow to slits. Maybe he's not as drunk as I thought.

Finally, I have to blink, breaking our dangerous connection, and he reaches over to the nearest woman, pulling her under his arm and kissing the top of her hair like he owns her.

Like he owns everything else.

I stare right into his eyes as she shrugs out from under his arm and pushes him away.

It seems I'm not the only one who's not enamoured with Luther Bellsworth. Comforting. After tonight maybe we'll need to form a support group for all of his exes like that one movie where they band together to get back at him for all the cheating and lying.

"You really dodged a bullet with that one," Jessica says, hiding behind a nearby plant to stay out of Luther's view. Or maybe she's hiding from the patrons.

"Who are you dodging? Luther, or your new boyfriends?"

"New—? Oh, very funny. Old guy is getting handsy and Tyrone just went for his break. I have to survive ten more minutes."

"Ah, well then. Step into my office. I'm plotting ways to get back at Luther. Current strategy involves watching him get exceptionally wasted and then stealing his ID card so I can get into his office."

"He never has the card on him," she says simply, as though it's something so obvious.

"How do you know? Maybe he has it tonight."

"Never takes his wallet with him anywhere. We have his tab on file here and now that he owns the place we don't even charge his card, it's just a line in his books."

"How do I not know any of this?"

Raucous laughter joins electronic pop music as two of the girls with Luther's party climb up onto a table and begin swirling their... where did they get cowboy hats?

Jessica clears her throat and I turn to see her staring me down, hands propped on her hips.

"What? I don't work here anymore. I'm not dealing with that."

A casual wave of her hand tells me she's not dealing with it either.

"Just another line in his books?"

"Yeah, if something breaks, it's his money on the line."

"But you'll have to clean it up."

"And I'll make it take as long as possible. Two hours of pay for sweeping up glass never hurt anyone's bank account."

"Still can't believe I never knew he didn't pay."

"Well, he always made sure you didn't have to do anything."

"That's not true." I turn and knock the glass over as I do, and I'm powerless to act as I watch it spiral toward the floor.

The whole room slows down and I'm left to watch my own folly plummet toward the earth along with my plan to steal Luther's ID card.

"It is true. I love you, and you were an excellent friend and co-bartender, but Luther never let you lift a finger. He was always making me do extra work while he was around so you had time to..."

"Be his girlfriend while on the job." I sigh as my drink seeps out of its cracked glass onto the sleek polished floor of Stalwart. "Maybe it's for the best that I got fired."

She scoops up the glass with one hand, placing it on a tray she materializes out of thin air, and wipes up the spill with a rag she's always kept in her apron. "Hey! Where's that feisty girl who walked in here an hour ago? It is not for the best you got fired and Luther is a jerk. He's the one we hate, remember?" She sets the tray down and takes my head in both her hands, turning me to face him. "He had you so wound up you couldn't even see what he was doing to us. But look at you today, drinking my messed up drink and not even complaining."

"You're doing more jobs than you should have to. And it's my fault."

"It's Luther's fault," she presses.

"If you insist. It's Luther's fault."

"There she is." She squeals and jumps behind the plant once again. "Is he looking?"

"Luther?"

"No, not Luther!"

"Well, then you're going to have to be more specific, Jessica. There's like fifty guys in this bar."

"Green shirt, purple tie, tiny wisp of hair masquerading as a moustache."

It takes me less than a second to peg the guy she's talking about and burst out laughing. He's comically average in almost every way. His height, weight, hair colour, build, eyes—all so indistinguishable and uninteresting. But perched on his little red stool next to the bar, his green shirt, purple polka-dot tie, and tiny ghost of a moustache are truly a sight to behold. "No. He's not looking," I report once he turns away, craning his neck to look into the staff hallway. "But I think his moustache is going to dress up as a ghost for Halloween."

"Because it's barely there?" she asks.

My laughter threatens to spill out, and the room is eerily quiet as someone switches out the music, so I bite my lip to keep the sound in.

Which doesn't work at all, resulting in a bark of laughter cracking through the almost silence and drawing the attention of the table dancing girls whose cowboy hats have since disappeared along with their button-down shirts. They now look like they walked straight off the set of Dukes of Hazard and honestly, I'm here for it.

Between my attempts to keep the laughter in, watching the girls twirl their shirts like they're in a greasy dive-bar, and trying not to laugh even harder at Mr. Purple Tie's appalled face, I manage to lose track of Luther. And Jessica.

So when Luther's voice worms its way into my ear, and I turn to Jessica for support I'm instead met with a perfect row of sparkly white teeth that serve only to prove that, at least in Luther's case, the outside needn't match the inside.

"Hello, Jaqueline." His outward smile a sneer as he speaks. "I wasn't expecting to see you here."

"Not after you fired me, you mean?" I admit to leaning forward to give him a little taste of what he's missing out on. "Because I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to buy a drink here."

And a small piece of Jack is cheering in victory at his momentary stunned face, eyes wide and mouth dropped open. I wonder what he's going to do and whether I'll manage to achieve either of my goals this evening.

But I don't get the answer. Instead, all we get is a huge crash as one of the glass tabletops shatters under the weight of two small women and all four grown men who climbed up there after them.

You can bring a classy bar to Heartsbrook, but you can't take the Heartsbrook out of the guys.