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I clearly didn’t mumble incoherently enough. “What was Georgia right about?” She put a hand to her hip as she stared back at me with annoyance.
Facing her head on, I raised my voice and skewered her with the truth. “She warned me that I shouldn’t let you pick out my Halloween costume. She pretty much predicted something like this would happen.”
She smirked and started to head for the hallway, unfazed by me and my declarations. “Georgia is just pissed that I won’t tell her what my costume is. She’s been berating me about it for the past month.”
I still wasn’t completely used to these people, to how wild at heart they were—how unafraid they were of living. I wanted to be, though. I want it for myself.
“What is your costume?” I called behind her, shaking off my thoughts and dreams and steeling myself for the things to come.
“You’ll see,” she responded on a nearly evil laugh, shutting the bedroom door on her way out. I stared down at my attire for the next few hours and tried to prepare myself to face it. To own it. I had a feeling confidence was the only thing that would ensure my survival, and I had to survive. I had a daughter to go home to.
“Get your hot little ass ready, Win!” Cassie shrieked through the door, startling me into motion. I snatched the fabric and hugged it to my chest while I took one last breath. “Thatch says we need to leave here in about a thirty minutes!”
This is it, I told myself. Chest out, head up, be the woman…Ah, fuck.
I boosted my brain with a little dose of reality, and my vagina rejoiced. Hopefully, this gets me laid.
About an hour later, with strobe lights twirling and an eclectic mix of psychopaths and sexy animals gyrating on the dance floor in front of me, I came to a stop just inside the entrance of one of the giant ballrooms of The Metro beside a pregnant nun and Mr. Rogers.
I honestly had no idea what in the hell Cassie’s and Thatch’s costumes were supposed to mean, but it didn’t matter—because I looked more ridiculous than both of them combined. Covered by nothing more than fishnet stockings, booty shorts, a tight half-shirt that said Daddy’s Little Slugger across my boobs, knee-high black stiletto boots, and pink and blue pigtails accentuated with glitter eye shadow, I was a few beats away from a mental breakdown. If I was honest, I’d been this way for a while. From the moment I put the whole ensemble on, my little bedroom pep talk had been nothing but a memory.
Thatch and Cassie had tried to assure me that I didn’t look like a complete disaster, but with the way those two liked to express things…let’s just say it fell on some pretty deaf ears.
And yet, here I was—some awful part of me hoping Wes would find the ridiculous getup irresistible.
Is this what you were going for with that whole living wild thing? my subconscious mocked.
Shut up, I told it.
As Thatch and Cassie started to move, I walked with them and tried to get myself out of my head. It wasn’t going all that well.
Mildly disgusted with myself, I was happy we were headed toward the bar. Kline and Georgia were standing off to the side, sharing a private smile and laugh, and all I could think was, Where’s Wes?
Kline put his arm around his wife’s shoulder and tucked her into his side, kissing her forehead softly, and smiling like he knew he was the luckiest man in the world. Jealousy pounded like a hammer in my gut. I hated that something so vile was one of the most powerful emotions I’d ever experienced. I wanted to give that influence to positivity and good thoughts, but I wasn’t in charge.
But all that jealousy slid away, morphing in midair to hilarity when their costumes finally hit me. I glanced at Cassie and Thatch, and then back at Georgia and Kline, and then burst out into laughter.
“What in the fudging heck are you guys?” Cassie questioned once we reached them, the haze of pregnancy slowing her normally acute detective skills.
Georgia giggled for a moment until her eyes moved up and down Cassie’s naughty nun costume, and then over to Thatch’s cardigan sweater, nerd glasses, khakis, and loafers.
“What the fuck are you guys?” Georgia asked back as she slid out from under Kline’s arm and moved closer to Cassie.
“We’re Kline and Georgia,” Thatch chimed in, a smug smile etched across his mouth.
A slow rumble of laughter rolled from Kline at that, and I joined him, trying to at least keep the volume low enough that I wouldn’t anger the beast…cough…pregnant woman.
“Who the hell are you guys supposed to be?” Thatch asked.
“We’re you guys,” Georgia explained, and it wasn’t without exasperation. She’d had the winning idea in her fucking grasp, but Thatch and Cassie, having done the exact same thing, snatched it away.
Thatch’s face morphed into confusion as he surveyed their costumes with new insight. “Why the fuck are your pants too short?” he asked Kline. “And why do you look like you’re ready to Hulk right the fuck out of your clothes?”
Kline didn’t respond to that, merely smirking at his much larger best friend.
Thatch bristled immediately. “Dude, that’s not how I wear my clothes.”
Kline’s smirk never faded, not only unfazed by Thatch’s irritation, but fueled by it.
Meanwhile, the girls were seconds away from dissolving into an all-out cat fight. “You guys stole our idea!” Georgia shouted with an angry, accusatory finger in Cassie’s face. “You say you’re dressed like me, but all I see is a pregnant nun who’s ready to give lap dances at a bachelor party!”
Cassie raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, well, you look like an actual hooker.”
Georgia shrugged. “I was just trying to get the costume right, and I know how much you love Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman.”
Cassie’s eyes narrowed, and her hip cocked. “Okay…I’ll give you the hooker—”
Thatch held up his hand for high fives. No one obliged.
“—but explain to me what the fluff is going on with your teeth?”
“I’m you, pre-pregnancy,” Georgia retorted. “One glass of red wine and you’ve got immediate True Blood mouth.”
Thatch laughed, but it didn’t last long as Cassie whipped her head around to glare at him.
“What?” he questioned with both hands held out. “She’s not wrong on this one, honey. One fucking sip of Merlot and you look like you just got done feeding ten seconds ago.”
“I will bite your dick off.”
“That’s not gonna help with the True Blood mouth,” I muttered to myself. Kline smiled.
“Later,” Thatch said with a smirk and a wink. “We can’t leave the party before it even starts.”
“You guys’ foreplay is so weird,” Georgia announced.
Cassie was undeterred. “Or awesome.”
“No. Weird. It’s almost creepy. I feel like I’m watching the porno version of the Saw movies.”
“Have you been peeking in our bedroom windows at night, you little freak?” Cassie asked with a grin. “Because we just did—”
Georgia interrupted, holding up one hand in Cassie’s face. “Nope. Stop right there. I don’t want to be disturbed by the weird shit you two get off on.”
Cassie just laughed and slapped her hand away. “Like you should talk. You and Big-dick have boxes full of sex toys.”
“From my mother.”
“And using sex toys your mother sends you isn’t weird?”
“We don’t use them!”
“Uh-huh…sure you don’t.”
“We don’t.” Georgia looked at Kline. “Right, baby?”
Kline smirked. “Am I supposed to lie or tell the truth here?”
Georgia groaned, and he immediately wrapped his arm around her shoulder, pulling her in close.
“I think it’s awesome Big-dick was able to open Georgia’s Pandora’s box of freak.”
Pandora.
The memory of Wes inside me on his desk hit me so hard, I nearly took a step back. Looking around, I searched for him almost desperately while the conversation of the fierce foursome continued all around me.
“Me too,” Kline agreed.
“Kline!”
He grinned down at her. “What? You know I love it when you—”
Georgia slapped her hand over his mouth. “That’s enough oversharing for one evening, thank you very much.”
Everyone laughed at that, even Georgia.
“What do you want to drink, Winnie?” Thatch asked, but before I could answer, Wes finally made an appearance.
Always arriving last to the party, but never failing to look like sex-on-a-stick.
He gained the attention of many a woman as he stood in the entrance of the room in a dashing black suit, crisp white shirt, no tie, and jacket open, with aviators adorning his handsome face covered in a few days’ worth of lick-worthy scruff, surveying the room. And if I said I wasn’t one of them, I’d be lying. He was just so handsome.
When his eyes found mine, a smile curved the corner of his mouth—not a little one—fucking huge.
One point for Cassie’s costume skills.
His strides were long and smooth as he wove his way over to us, his piercing eyes shining like beacons directly at mine the whole time.
“Winnie?” Thatch called. I struggled, almost twitching with the effort, but I finally broke the connection just as Wes made it to the group.
