Estelle beamed, like I wasn’t talking nonsense. “Don’t worry, I can keep a dark secret.”
Yeesh, I hoped she could. I had a lot more dark secrets than I had eight hours ago. Helena smiled at me. “You’re not leaving already, are you?”
“Ah, well, uh…” I felt my face prickle. Was Helena Warrick actually asking me to stay longer? I would have loved nothing better than to stay with her all night long, except that, well, uh, I really couldn’t afford to be introduced tomorepeople as Cassandra. So I really needed to say no, which meant it was a problem when instead I said, “Are you going to stop me?”
Helena raised her eyebrows. “I might. Though I don’t know. I bet you could escape from handcuffs.”
She could… try… handcuffing me… I shook the thought away. “Didn’t realize you carried a set around with you. I’ll need to be more careful.”
“I come prepared.”
Estelle rolled her eyes dramatically with a smile. “Jeez, babe, you could have told me you were flirting with her, I’d have left you alone.”
Ah, shit. Did I start flirting with Helena by mistake? I wasn’t trying to but it washer.I couldn’t be blamed. My face burned, but Helena just gave her a wry look.
“I don’t flirt with married women, Stellie.”
Did that mean she flirted with single women? Jesus fucking Christ, if Helena Warrick was gay, my head was going to explode. Estelle gave me a knowing look. “You can ignore her, she’ll flirt with anyone,” she said, and I made a noise that I think humans sometimes made.
“Yeah,” I said. “I mean, I get that. If I looked like that, I’d probably do the same. I mean, when you know everyone’s going to be receptive, why not?”
Estelle snorted, turning to Helena. “Oh, god, you got a married woman flirting with you.”
“No!” I said. “I’m not flirting with her. Or anyone! I mean, not that she’s not worth flirting with. I mean, she’s very lovely. I’m just married. To my husband. He’s not here. Or I’d be flirting with him.” I wanted to rip my jaw off. The one-and-done solution to make sure I stopped saying stupid shit.
Helena smiled. “You’ve sobered up, I see.”
“Ah.” I put my face in my hands. “I really should go.”
“She’s nervous,” Helena said to Estelle, in a lowered voice but not lowered enough. “Getting out of her comfort zone, you know.”
“Aw, we all are, babe,” Estelle said. “Sure you don’t wanna join us? We’re doing shots.”
“Houdini already did her shots,” Helena laughed, and my face burned.
“Ugh, not fair. I still haven’t come up with an embarrassing nickname for you.”
“Still?” Helena raised her eyebrows. “Clock’s ticking.”
“It’s not my fault. You’re not embarrassing enough. Do something embarrassing and I’ll give you one.”
Helena laughed brightly. “Well, perfect. Come do shots then. Won’t take long to see me do something stupid.”
I had a pair of drop-dead gorgeous models asking me to come do shots with them at an exclusive rooftop party for founders. What the fuck had happened to my life? “Maybe… maybe just one,” I said. “I really should go, but… um… I’m a lightweight, I’ll be out quickly anyway.”
“Yes!” Estelle cheered, and she looped an arm around my back, guiding me towards the bar. “Oh my god, this is great. First round’s on me!”
Well, then I was having one round.
Chapter 7
Julie
Kingmaker asked me to meet him at the stupidforward baseagain when I told him we had to talk ASAP, and it was a hell of a switch going from the rooftop party at the waterfront to Tasty Slice. This place was shitty, dirty, dark, and felt so much more like home even though I’d only been here once. My rotten soul called out for rotten places, and I let my shoulders relax for the first time all evening as soon as I got in through the doors.
And then I stopped relaxing, because the moment I got inside, the staff cheered. “It’s Julie!” Mister Beer Belly said, and the other two from last time squeezed out to join him at the counter, the girl who told me I looked like shit last time practically falling over the counter to look at me.
“Aw, look at you, babe! I didn’t think Kingmaker had it in him!”
