His gaze flicks toward Diablo, then back. “Lady?”
“Don’t.”
He nods.
That is why Vice is useful. He knows when not to shove a knife deeper.
A club girl I recognize from the bar slides close, Bunni, with an I. Blonde like me, blue eyes, all perfume, pink nails, and deliberate cleavage. “Shady, baby, you look like you need company.”
“No.”
Her smile falters. “You sure?”
“Unless you’re carrying a time machine, yeah.”
Magic coughs into his fist.
The girl pouts. “You used to be more fun.”
“I used to be dumber.”
“That’s arguable,” Vice mutters.
I drink again.
Another girl tries twenty minutes later. Then another. One curls her hand around my arm and tells me she can make me forget whatever woman put that look on my face.
I look down at her hand until she removes it.
“Nothing personal,” I say. “I’m in love and apparently taking it badly.”
She blinks.
Magic, who has not stopped listening because he is a messy bitch in a cut, lets out a hoot. “Put that on a greeting card.”
“Put your face in a blender.”
“That’s the spirit.”
The party gets worse.
Or better.
Hard to tell.
Someone starts a wet T-shirt contest in the side hall. Six shuts it down, not because of morality, but because the water is getting near the electrical cords. Dune loses a bet and has to let Disco sit on his shoulder for an entire song. Disco bites his ear and screams in Spanish while Dune tries not to cry in front of women.
Darling laughs so hard Diablo looks at her like she hung the moon with one hand and robbed him with the other.
I drink more.
Tequila. Whiskey. Something in a mason jar that Crypt says is Cuban rum and Magic says is engine cleaner. I don’t care. I want the sharp edges blurred. I want Lady’s door out of my head. I want the way she looked at me when she said criminal to stop landing like she saw all the way through me and decided the city was right.
By one in the morning, Vice Ink looks like a crime scene with music.
By one-thirty, I see Alpha in the corner near the old confessionals.
Not alone.
