Charlie had been working with Miles and Bass for about a week and it was becoming increasingly obvious that Charlie was not planning on giving into Bass's flirtation anytime soon.
Bass and Miles were going out one night and that gave Bass an idea as he watched Miles and Charlie turn and go their separate ways towards their cars. He began to quickly walk after Charlie and just managed to catch up with her as she reached her car.
Charlie groaned a little to herself as she caught his reflection in the window of her car before she reluctantly turned around and crossed her arms over her chest.
"What do you want?"
"I was just going to offer that, since you're under drinking age, I could get you into the club that me and Miles are going to tonight," Bass offered in his best tone of sheer indifference.
"Yeah and I'm sure that you're so generously offering this at the low, low price of nothing at all, right?" Charlie challenged.
A grin spread on Bass's lips and a chuckle escaped his throat. He was used to dumb girls practically falling over and fainting at the sight of him and there was something about Charlie's refusal to fawn over him that made her oh so appealing.
"Well there might be a small price," he responded with a casual shrug as his hands remained stuffed in the pockets of his leather jacket.
"If you say that it's sleeping with you, then I will punch you… In your face," Charlie warned him. "And we both know how much you care about your appearance. Somehow a model with a black eye doesn't seem like it would go over well."
Bass's smile only grew in size. "Actually, the only stipulation is that you have to admit that you find me attractive."
"Ooh, stipulation. That's a big word for a model, I thought that you were all supposed to be dumb," she teased.
"I guess not," he agreed.
"So how exactly do you think that you're magically going to get me into a club?" Charlie questioned.
"They know me there. If you walk in with me, no one is going to question whether you're allowed in or not," Bass responded. "I'll help you get in and not hit on you for the rest of the night. But first you have to admit that you find me attractive. And, honestly, if you claim that you don't even find me a little bit attractive then, well you know what they say about ladies who protest too much."
She rolled her eyes at him and shook her head in disbelief for a second before she said, "Fine. I find you attractive. But there is absolutely no way that I'm going to become one of your brain-dead one night stands."
With that she turned and opened her car's driver door. She stepped with one foot into the car before she turned to look at him over her shoulder and asked, "What time are you picking me up?"
Bass shot her a beaming grin that was bright enough to be used as a signal flare. "Be ready at eight."
Charlie was glad that Bass actually showed up on time instead of fashionably late, since it meant that her mother and Danny were still out and she wouldn't have to explain to Rachel why Bass was picking her up or make Danny cover for her.
Bass was right; no one tried to ID Charlie as she entered the club with him.
She went to go walk away from him once they were a few steps into the bar, but he quickly reached out and grabbed her arm before she could get too far away.
"Hold on a second."
"What?" Charlie asked in a dreading tone that might have been just a little bit over-exaggerated as she turned and looked down at where his hand was lightly gripping her just above the elbow.
"I think that someone owes me a thank you," Bass teased as he released his hold on her arm.
"Thanks," she forced out before a sly grin formed on her lips, "but I'm still not sleeping with you."
He let out a small chuckle that was quickly cut off by Miles' voice as the other man approached them.
"Come on, Bass, you brought Charlie?" He complained. "She's nineteen."
"Calm down Miles, what happened to you being the cool uncle?" Charlie questioned with a wide smirk as she twisted his words against her.
"Well I guess I'm still your only uncle," he twisted her words back at her in return.
"Funny," Charlie commented sarcastically. "Besides, don't you think it's a little hypocritical to point out the fact that I'm nineteen now when you practically encourage me to drink the rest of the time?"
It wasn't so much the fact that Charlie was at a club that bothered Miles; it was more the fact that she had come with Bass.
"I practically encourage you to drink?" Miles questioned with a tilted smile. "Clearly I haven't been trying hard enough at my job as corrupting influence."
Charlie laughed a little and resisted the urge to roll her eyes at her uncle before she walked away in the direction of the bar.
Bass watched her go until Miles abruptly dragged his attention away.
"Come on, Bass," Miles complained. "You could at least try a little bit of subtlety for once in your life… That's my niece whose ass you're ogling at as she walks away."
"Relax, Miles. There's no harm in just looking," Bass assured his friend.
"If it's just looking does that mean that you're going to stop hitting on her?" Miles questioned. "Come on, man. She's my niece which makes her strictly off-limits. You're forbidden from sleeping with her."
"Calm down, it's just been a bit of playful flirting," Bass told his friend. "Nothing's going to happen, it's not like I'm hung up on her… Besides, I'm more interested in that pair of twins over there. Twenty bucks says that I can get them to both come home with me."
Although Charlie had drank before, that had always been when she was at Miles' apartment or when he snuck her sips of his drink at family functions, so she had no idea what to order when the bartender asked her what she would like.
Fortunately her deer-in-the-headlights reaction didn't last long before the guy standing next to her smiled at her and then leaned across to the bartender and told him something that she couldn't hear.
A few moments later, the bartender was handing her a drink which the guy who had ordered it immediately paid for.
"Thanks," she told him before trying the drink and discovering that it was shockingly good.
"Hey Miles, Nora's here," Bass commented. "I forget. You two are off again, right?"
Miles rolled his eyes, "Yeah."
"Which means that you're going to go over there and talk to her, aren't you?" Bass questioned. "And get back together with her for about five minutes total before you two break up again."
"Shut up," Miles muttered under his breath before standing up and leaving his friend alone with the set of twins.
About an hour later, Bass was just getting up to leave with the pair when one of the twins questioned, "What's wrong with that girl?"
The girl's sister laughed a little before responding with, "I don't know."
Bass was curious, so he looked over only to find that Charlie was dancing on top of the bar, laughing and kicking glasses off of the counter. Bass watched as a guy that he had seen buying her drinks earlier turned and said something to his friends before they all started laughing and headed towards the exit, effectively abandoning Charlie.
Bass sighed internally as he looked around in the hope of spotting Miles.
"Hey, have either of you seen my friend?" Bass questioned.
"What, you mean your manager?" One of them asked. "He left with that girl he was talking to about half an hour ago, why?"
"Come on. I thought we were going," the other complained.
Bass raked a hand through his hair before making a decision that he knew he would probably end up regretting in the very near future.
"You two should find someone else to go home with," he told the pair.
"What?"
"You're kidding me, right?"
Bass muttered a weak apology under his breath before he quickly turned and headed over to where a still dancing Charlie was getting yelled at by the bartender. Bass silently assured himself that the only reason that he was passing up the chance at sleeping with twins was because Charlie was Miles' niece, not because he had feelings for her or was going soft.
As he reached Charlie, she spotted him and turned quickly enough that she almost slid off the counter and began to laugh. Bass quickly reached to grab her waist, keeping her from toppling off the bar-top as the bartender continued shouting at Charlie.
"What the hell do you think that you're doing?" The bartender demanded angrily.
"Calm down, we're leaving," Bass said before turning his attention back to the drunk girl. "Come on, Charlie."
Bass helped Charlie down as the bartender demanded, "What about all of the damage?"
The model reached into his back pocket and pulled out a couple of bills which he tossed at the bartender before turning away again.
"Okay, let's go drunk girl," he said as he turned back to Charlie and helped her while she half-danced, half-stumbled out of the club.
They barely made it out of the door before Charlie tripped over a crack in the cement and stumbled to the ground. As she sat up, she began clutching at her ankle in pain.
Bass knelt down and picked her up, placing one arm under her knees and the other under her back to help support her.
"You are such a light-weight, Charlie," Bass commented under his breath as he carried her over to his car.
Once they reached the car, he set her down and leaned her against the side while he opened the door and then helped her into the passenger seat. After he had gotten her into the car, he knelt down outside of it and gently inspected her ankle.
"It should be fine," he told her. "It might be a bit bruised tomorrow, but nothing too serious."
When he stood back up, he noticed that Charlie was struggling to put her seatbelt on, so he reached past her to fasten it up.
"How much did you drink?" He questioned her in a mildly amused tone.
"I don't know what was in them, but not that much," she slurred out in response.
"Alright. Miles went home with Nora, so his place is a no go," Bass told her. "And if I take you home like this, then your mom would kill us both, so you can sleep at my place tonight."
"Thanks," Charlie told him as her eyelids began to droop.
By the time that they reached Bass's apartment building, Charlie was already half-asleep in the passenger seat, so Bass carried her over his shoulder up to his apartment.
As he carried her up the stairs, Charlie noticed the view from over his shoulder and thought to herself that they should call him Ass Monroe. That thought resulted in an immediate giggle fit.
"What are you laughing at?" Bass questioned, but Charlie provided no answer.
A minute or two later, they were in Bass's apartment and Charlie began to laugh a little once again as she slurred out, "I was expecting a mansion covered in pictures of you."
Bass laughed a little under his breath as he carried her to the bedroom. Once there, he pulled the covers back before setting her down.
Within seconds, Charlie had the covers up to her face and had fallen asleep.
Bass smiled a little to himself before he left the room to go sleep on his couch.
A/N: Please read and review! I hope that you liked the chapter and thanks for reading! :) Also, a special thanks to LemonSupreme, priya1008, IceonFire7, JM2788, cari, and the anonymous guest reviewer!