One More Try

The microphone squealed just as Claire set a glass of beer beneath the tap.

Every head in the Cordova Karaoke Bar turned toward the stage. The sound cut through the room’s heat, through the smell of fried halibut and spilled lager, through the sharp salt carried in every time someone opened the door from the bright Alaskan evening.

Claire winced. “And that,” she called, “is why we don’t sing directly into the microphone unless we’re trying to wake the fish.”

Laughter rolled across the crowded room. The singer onstage, a deckhand with a red face and worse pitch, lowered the microphone.

Claire reached beneath the bar and killed the feedback. The speakers settled into a low hum. Around her, people shifted closer together, shoulders brushing, summer jackets shoved over the backs of chairs. Cordova had only one karaoke bar, which meant every bad breakup, successful fishing run, birthday, and grudge eventually made its way through her doors.

She preferred the grudges. They were easier to pour.

“Another whiskey,” someone called.

“After you finish the one in your hand.”

“That sounds like judgment.”

“That sounds like inventory.”

More laughter. Claire slid the glass across the bar, then looked toward the stage.

Doc Ryan stood near the edge of it, one hand resting on the back of a chair he hadn’t sat in. At forty-two, he had the kind of face Cordova had apparently agreed to admire on sight: sun-browned skin, dark hair damp from the evening mist, broad shoulders beneath a faded blue shirt. Women found reasons to pass his table. Men found reasons to clap him on the back.

Claire had spent two years watching people make room for him.

Tonight, he was watching her.

Not casually. Not the way a man watched the bartender when he wanted another drink. His attention followed each movement of her hands, lingered when she bent to reach a bottle, returned when she straightened.

She caught him at it.

Doc’s mouth tipped at one corner.

Claire pointed at him with the bar towel. “If you need something, use words.”

“I need something.”

“Then you’re ahead of most men in this room.”

His gaze dropped briefly to her mouth before lifting again. “Put my name on the list.”

“For karaoke?”

“For one song.”

“You don’t sing.”

“I do tonight.”

The request landed strangely. Doc Ryan had never volunteered for the stage. He came in after work, ordered coffee or beer, and sat with the quiet patience of someone who had no interest in being entertained. Until recently, he hadn’t seemed to have much interest in Claire either.

That had changed in small, inconvenient ways.

A cup of coffee appeared beside her elbow when she worked a double. A broken latch on the back door had been repaired before she could call anyone. Three nights ago, Doc had taken a rain-soaked delivery from her hands and carried the boxes inside without asking.

None of it meant anything, Claire had told herself.

Men could be helpful without being dangerous.

She wrote his name on the clipboard. “You get one song.”

His smile deepened. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

“Don’t make me regret being generous.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“That’s exactly what worries me.”

The next singer stumbled through a love song while Claire kept the room moving. She poured, cleared, took money, settled an argument over whose name came next. Every time she glanced toward the stage, Doc was still there.

When his turn came, the room reacted before he touched the microphone.

A cheer rose from the tables. Someone whistled. One of the women near the window shouted, “Finally!”

Claire felt the old irritation tighten beneath her ribs. This was what happened when a man like Doc decided to be charming in public. The whole town leaned toward him. His attention became a spectacle, and she became part of it whether she wanted to or not.

He climbed the two steps to the stage and took the microphone from the previous singer.

“What are you singing?” Claire called.

Doc looked at her. “You’ll see.”

“That is not how the system works.”

“You’re the system.”

“I’m the bartender.”

“Same thing tonight.”

The opening notes filled the room.

Claire recognized the song immediately. An old country ballad about a man asking for one more chance after ruining the first one. The kind of song people chose when they wanted to confess without having to use their own words.

Her fingers tightened around the towel.

Doc sang better than he had any right to. His voice wasn’t polished, but it was low and rough around the edges, carrying something that made the room quiet. He kept his eyes on Claire through the first verse.

She looked away.

The bar needed her. A glass needed wiping. A customer needed change. The ice bin needed filling. She moved through each task with deliberate efficiency, refusing to let the song reach her.

But his voice followed.

At the chorus, Doc stepped down from the stage. He didn’t come all the way to the bar....