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“Oh, no—”
“—it has been months,” she continues, over my complaining and shifting around, keeping me grounded with her hand on my wrist. “Tonight, you’re moving on. I’m not gonna have your twenty-fourth birthday ruined by the past. Not on my watch. That man, and I will not speak his godforsaken name here, he took a year of your life, and I’ll be damned if you give him another day of it.”
I grimace at the mention of the past and my not-so-recent ex, James. The man who was almost the man of my dreams but turned out to be the man of my nightmares. Not even Kay knows the whole ugly story, and she still hates him. Kay shakes me back to attention.
“This is your birthday, Tessa. You’re hot enough to fuck any dude in this place, including the married ones—”
Sleeping with married men isn’t my style, but I’m flattered by the point she’s trying to make.
“—so, go get one. Fuck him tonight and throw him away in the morning or get hitched in Las Vegas over the weekend. Whatever. I don’t care. Just take a chance on somebody. Whenever I think about how dry your dating life has been, it makes my pussy hurt. Think of my pussy, Tess.”
“Jesus Christ, Kay,” I squeak, trying to silence the yelling about her pussy. At least the music is louder than her insanity. “Is this a birthday party or an intervention?”
“Think of it like the only intervention you get to drink at,” Cole says, “And it happens to be on your birthday. Come on.”
I don’t know how any of them expect me to score with some dude out here when they’re watching me like I’m the next best thing to National Geographic. I can already hear Attenborough narrating my futile attempts to find a mate during the peak of the season. But Kay’s right. I’ve been hung up on my past too long…and avoiding the future, as if it won’t happen anyway.
But I will not think about her pussy, no matter how much she begs me.
Our Birthday-Party-Intervention spills into the club, and like the pull of the ocean tide, we are washed into the crowd of drinking and dancing. Tonight, I hit the alcohol straight away. I need it to flush the fear out of my system, and then, at Lindy and Kay’s insistence, I am dragged onto the sweltering dance floor. Men love putting their hands on me. They love grinding against me, pretending the crowd has crushed us together. I used to get excited about that part of the club—imagining how thrilling it would be to give in, and let instinct and raw, physical attraction do the talking. Then he happened. Now I just feel awkward, pushed around, leered at by career clubbers and frat boys.
Kaydence goes to get more drinks. I’m going to need them if she’s going to convince me any of this is a good idea.
By my next rum and coke, my mood is higher and my standards lower. I’ve caught the attention of a tall 20-something, young and hot-blooded, with his shirt ripped open at the collar. He grinds against me through the beat, mumbling half-heard questions in my ear. I don’t answer him. The crowd is too noisy, too frantic.
A voice in my head tells me this is a bad idea, but it has my father’s tone, and my days of listening to him are long gone. I slipped his leash at eighteen, fled from my tiny, elite private school where everyone knew my name and pedigree, to a massive university, where I could hide away from my father’s many rules and codes.
My first year out on my own, I met Kay, Lindy. Normal people. They didn’t want favors from my father, they weren’t sworn to be loyal. Like these dozens of silhouettes swaying all around us, I was just another face in the crowd. For the first time, I was around people who chose to be around me because they liked me, and not because of the opportunities they saw when they looked at me.
They were the first real friendships I’d ever really had.
Then, with my guard down and my heart wide open, James happened.
My body has just started to warm again, as if I have been cold for months. The thought of him brings back the numb chill. I push him out of my thoughts again, let the drink and the alcohol and the dancing keep the past at bay. I tentatively dare to feel something for the first time—even if that something is just drunk and indifferent. My nameless dance partner starts pulling me away.
“Where are we going?” I complain, my friends lost in the chaos of the crowd.
“I have a room.” My mystery man waves a key from his pocket and draws me toward a narrow, dark hallway labeled “Staff Only”.
“You work here?” I ask, still half-shouting over the music.
“Something like that,” he smiles crookedly. The music muffles behind us as the doors swing shut.
Another man passes us through the staff area, not looking twice at us. They share the same dark hair, dark eyes, and signature olive skin. The same dark hair and dark eyes that I have. I realize, in one blazing moment of terror—Kay never said what nightclub we were in.
This is the kind of mistake I was warned against growing up. Always be vigilant, always know your enemy’s territories. There are whole sections of the city where I simply cannot go—and for all I know, I am standing in one of them.
My handsy dance partner stops in front of another doorway, the plaque on the front faded and illegible. He tries to draw me in. My feet root to the spot. Like an animal, I sense danger.
“In here. They won’t mind.”
My urge to be polite fights my urge to not be murdered in the back of a shady club.
“I think I just want to dance,” I insist, smiling but pulling back on his firm grip. Our eyes lock and I know, immediately, my ‘no’ has fallen on deaf ears.
“Come on, pretty girl. You dance like you want to fuck,” he croons. He’s too close. He pushes me up against the wall, wedging his leg between mine. Panic springs up at the back of my mind. Do I go along with it to keep things quiet, just between us, before this can get any worse? Do I try to cause a scene, and risk attracting the wrong attention? I’m frozen in a moment of paralyzing indecision.
“Don’t you want to fuck?” He says, a question that doesn’t need an answer. The alcohol-fueled desire in my belly shrivels up and dies immediately. He’s all over me. My hands wedge against his chest as he tries to convince me with wet kisses at my neck.
