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I had more pride than that.
CHAPTER 17
Kai
Awave of heat, alcohol, and noise slammed into me the minute I stepped into Verve.
In my defense, I truly hadn’t planned on visiting the club that night. I disliked packed spaces, drunken foolishness, and migraine-inducing remixes, all of which nightclubs possessed in spades.
However, as a Young Corporation executive and publisher ofMode de Vie, the world’s preeminent fashion and lifestyle magazine, it was my job to keep a pulse on the city’s hotspots. I wouldn’t be doing my due diligence if I didn’t experience Verve myself, would I?
The deep bass of the latest hit song rattled my bones as I pushed my way through the crowd. Everywhere I looked, I was assaulted with noise and people—women in tight dresses, men in tighter jeans, couples engaged in dancing that looked more like fornicating. No signs of Isab—of anyone I knew yet.
Not that I was looking for anyone in particular.
I made it halfway to the VIP lounge when one of the clubgoers bumped into me and nearly spilled her drink on my shoes.
“Oops! Sorry!” she squealed, her eyes bright in a manner that could only be attributed to drugs, alcohol, or both. She clutched my arm with her free hand and looked me over. “Oh, you’re cute. Do you have a girlfriend?”
“How about we find your girlfriends instead?” I suggested. I gently freed myself from her grip and steered her toward her friends at the bar (easily identifiable since they wore the same bachelorette party sashes as my erstwhile admirer). I flagged down the bartender. “A bottle of water for the lady, please.”
By the time he returned, she was already busy taking shots with some suit in an off-an-rack Armani.
I doubted she’d drink the water, but I left it there anyway. Being the only sober person in a club was like babysitting a room full of strangers.
I ordered a scotch for myself, already regretting my decision to come here when a familiar voice cut through the noise.
“Kai? Is that you?”
I turned, my gaze honing in on the brunette with glossy caramel hair and blue-gray eyes. My face relaxed into a smile.
“Alessandra, what a pleasant surprise. I didn’t take you for the clubbing type.”
Dominic’s wife returned my smile with a small one of her own. Objectively, she was one of the most beautiful women I’d ever met. She looked like a younger version of her mother, who’d been one of Brazil’s biggest supermodels in the nineties. But despite, or perhaps because of, her looks and marriage to one of the richest men on Wall Street, she always carried an air of melancholy around her.
Dominic was my friend, but I wasn’t blind to his faults. He was about as romantic as a rock.
“I’m not, but Dom is busy with work, and it’s been so long since I’ve had a girls’ night…” She shrugged, a brief flicker of sadness passing through her eyes. “I thought it would be nice to get out of the house. Lord knows I spend enough time there.”
Girls’ night. A seed of suspicion sprouted in my stomach, but I kept my tone as casual as possible. “You don’t have to explain. I understand.” A pause, then, “Who are you here with?”
“Vivian and her friends. We met at last year’s fall gala and stayed in touch. When she found out I didn’t have any plans tonight, she invited me to come out with them.” Alessandra tilted her head toward the elevator. “Do you want to join us? We have a table in the VIP lounge.”
Vivian and her friends. Meaning Isabella.
The knowledge lit a match in my blood, but I suppressed a visible reaction. “I don’t want to intrude on a girls’ night out.”
“You won’t be intruding. The whole point of the night is to meet the opposite sex. Well, not me and Vivian since we’re married,” Alessandra amended. She twisted her wedding ring around her finger. “But Sloane and Isabella have been fending off advances all night. Well, Sloane has been fending off and Isabella has been accepting.” She laughed. “She must’ve danced with half the single men here already.”
Something dark and unwanted flared in my chest.
“How lovely,” I said, my voice clipped. I forced an easy smile over the urge to demand the name of every single fucker who’d touched her. Normal me would’ve been appalled at the violent turn in my thoughts, but I hadn’t been normal since the moment I laid eyes on Isabella.
A burst of rich, creamy laughter spilled through the air, shattering my concentration.
I glanced up with a touch of annoyance. I’d been making decent progress on my translation ofThe Art of Warbefore I’d been rudely interrupted.
I scanned the bar, my eyes settling on the one person I’d never seen before. Purple-black hair, tanned skin, incredible curves poured into Valhalla’s signature black staff uniform. Silver earrings glinted in her ears, and when she lifted her hand to brush a lock of hair out of her eye, I spotted the dark swirls of a tattoo on her inner wrist.
