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“Derek, Jesus,” I groaned.
“And you are?” Camden asked Ash as he came to stand at Derek’s side.
“This is Ash Talmadge.”
Camden considered him for a moment. “Are you related to James Talmadge?”
“That’s my father,” Ash told him.
They didn’t shake hands. Ash hadn’t even offered, which was so unlike him.
“Ah, that makes sense. We’ve considered putting in a Percy Tower on River Street. I was working with your father on that, but it never panned out.”
“You can’t put a Tower on River Street,” I argued immediately.
Camden looked down at me, as if he’d forgotten I had opinions. “And why not?”
“Because you’d ruin the view,” Ash said as if it were obvious.
“And the history,” I added. “Big hotels go across the river.”
“Or on Bay Street,” Ash finished for me.
Derek shrugged. “Locals know that sort of thing.”
“I’m not used to people telling me no,” Camden said with a smile that could have meant anything.
Derek clapped him on the back. “It happens to us measly mortals.”
Camden arched an eyebrow at Derek, but whatever animosity had been between them at me dating Camden was gone. Camden gestured for us to come back to the booth. We followed Camden, and I met Fiona again. I’d been right about her name.
She kept giving me weird looks that I didn’t understand. Maybe she was jealous. Derek invited her out to dance at some point, and I followed with Camden, leaving Ash alone with the guys.
We were on the dance floor when Katherine Van Pelt showed up in a blood-red dress that made her tall model body look like she was literally wearing the liquid. Her dark hair was a cascade down her back, and she laughed with her friends. All people I recognized—Penn Kensington, Lark St. Vincent, Archibald Rowe, and Lewis Warren. They were maybe the most beautiful people I’d ever seen. As if being on the outside, looking in, was as close as anyone could get to their crew.
Camden grumbled something low under his breath. “I have to handle something.”
“I …”
But he was already gone. Leaving me alone on the dance floor without another word.
I turned in a circle before pushing my way back toward the booth. It was empty, and I took a shot of tequila to steady myself. I didn’t know what to think about Camden. I felt like I could chase him forever and never quite know him. Sometimes, it was as if I were on the outsider. Like I couldn’t figure out what someone like him saw in someone like me. And then I hated myself for feeling that way.
But when he disappeared like that without considering how I’d feel, it made it hard not to be frustrated.
I should have just stayed and danced with everyone else, but I didn’t have it in me. That was when I saw Ash Talmadge leaning against the edge of the rooftop bar, drinking whiskey.
I snagged another beer and headed toward him. “Hey.”
His eyes found mine and looked away. “Hey.”
“You’ve been quiet.”
He shrugged. “Have I?”
“Yeah. Do you want to dance?”
It was a bad idea. Camden wasn’t the sort of guy to handle me dancing with someone else. Not that he knew anything about Ash … or how I’d felt about him my whole life.
“I’m not in the mood,” he said, taking another sip of his drink.
“Okay,” I said.
I waited for him to say something else, but he didn’t. He brooded there, looking out across at the city below.
I couldn’t do this tonight. It was my graduation, and I had a boyfriend. I didn’t want to think about Ash Talmadge at all.
“Suit yourself,” I finally said and then went back in search of Camden.
But when I found him, my stomach flipped. He was in the back room with his buddies and Fiona. She had a little bottle filled with white powder, and they were passing it around. Plenty of people in my program had done cocaine. Enough of them that it became this design party where they’d all get high and try to make their outfit for the week in one night. I’d never joined in any of those parties.
And it wasn’t like I was upset with Camden for doing it here. I just … hadn’t known. Suddenly, I felt really young again. Twenty-two and utterly clueless in these matters.
I backed out of the room before any of them could see me. My heart wouldn’t calm down, and I felt unbalanced. Like a kid seeing their parents doing something wrong.
I returned to the balcony edge, downing the rest of my beer in one long gulp. Then, Ash was again next to me.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
I blinked at him in surprise. “What?”
“You seem upset.”
“It’s nothing. Why are you being so weird tonight?”
“I’m not being weird,” he said. “I just … don’t think you should be dating him.”
I snorted. “Okay, Derek.”
He huffed. “I said I wanted to meet him before forming an opinion.”
