Celeste glances over at me. “You okay with drinking during our meeting? We don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

I mull it over. I do want to keep things relatively professional. But it is a Friday night, and I’m going to need a drink by the time Celeste and I are done talking about everything. “Sure, why not?”

“Fabulous.” Celeste turns her attention back to the server. “I’ll have a Guinness, and she’ll have a Blue Moon.” She turns back to me. “You still like those, right?”

“Yeah,” I say begrudgingly, before it hits me. “Wait, who said I was okay with you buying me a drink?”

She winks at me. “It’s the least I can do for crashing your work project.”

Celeste ordering me a drink and winking at me takes us dangerously close to the “date” category. When the server comes back with our beers, I take a small sip of mine. Celeste can get drunk and sloppy, for all I care. I’ll gladly be the one to keep things professional.

The music starts, rendering all conversation impossible as everyone claps and stomps along to the dancers, who prance around the stage to the bright and cheery music. Some sound like traditional Irish songs, while others are classical renditions of holiday tunes.

The performance goes on for much longer than I expected it to, and even though it was my idea to come here in the first place, I start to regret it. I want to keep Celeste at arm’s length, but we still have a lot of things we need to talk about. Namely, our past. Which won’t be an easy conversation in the slightest.

I’m about to suggest to Celeste that we go somewhere else when I notice she’s not at our table anymore. Somehow, she’s linked arms with the guys at the table next to us. I watch as they dance in a circle and joyfully slosh their beer around.

Celeste’s cheeks are bright pink, and my eyes almost instinctively drop down to her red-painted lips. When our gazes meet again, the corner of her mouth lifts. That small movement is enough to make me swallow.

The moment thankfully passes, and she turns around to laugh at something one of the guys said. The music is too loud for me to make out any words, but she replies, and suddenly the whole group is cracking up like she said the funniest joke in the world. One guy even slaps his knees and almost falls backward, which makes everyone laugh harder.

Somehow, she’s already all buddy-buddy with these strangers, something I could never do. And that’s when it hits me. Besides her technical skills, there’s another reason why Celeste is absolutely perfect for this project.