Chase pokes at her chicken with her fork. “Yeah. I wanted to go and visit her after graduation, but…” She trails off, shrugging.
“Your dad still doesn’t want you to come to Europe?”
“No. He doesn’t think it’s safe.”
I’m sure the fact that Chase’s father knows his daughter was recently in the hospital with two slit wrists has nothing to do with his reluctance to let her travel through Europe. No, nothing at all.
“Maybe he’d change his mind if he knew Pax was going to be there to protect you.” Elodie looks directly at me as she says this.
Wren laughs. “Hah! Pax is banned from most of Germany. They won’t let him back into the entire eastern side of the country.”
Chase chuckles, like this might be some kind of joke. Elodie’s eyes double in size, though. “What did you do?”
“That’s still a mystery,” Wren sighs. “And the bastard isn’t telling.”
The girls both look at me, as if they’re waiting for me to cave under the pressure of their expectant gazes and spill the whole story from start to finish. Of course, I do not. I don’t fritter away my secrets that easily.
The waiter delivers the desert we’ve ordered. I grab an Old Fashioned, as does Wren, while the girls settle on some more wine. By the time Wren’s footed the astronomical bill and we leave Le Bernadin, my mild buzz has developed quite nicely. I feel numb. Loose in my joints. Happy, almost.
It's ten twenty. I should be getting back to the hotel. I have a very pressing engagement at midnight. One I will not miss. But just as I predicted, Wren has other plans. “Come on. You’re going the wrong way.” He goes behind me and plants his palms against my shoulder blades, turning me and pushing me in the opposite direction. Both physically and vocally, I dig my heels in.
“No. No, no, no, no, no. I told you—”
“And I ignored you. Come on. Are you seriously going to go back to the hotel and pass out before eleven o’clock? What the fuck’s wrong with you? Don’t be a bitch.”
I’ve copped a lot of goading from Jacobi since I moved into Riot House. If he thinks a stupid comment like that is going to make me change my mind, he has another thing coming.
“I don’t want to go back just yet,” Elodie says. “I bet Chase doesn’t want to either.”
“None of you are sleeping in my fucking room, so it doesn’t matter what any of you do. You, Jacobi and Chase can stay up until dawn for all I fucking care.”
Wren gives me another shove, toward the direction of the river. “Come on. I got us on the list to this club. It’s supposed to be a lot of fun. If you ruin my night any more than you already have, I’ll never let you borrow The Contessa again. Oh wait, that’s right, you sank my father’s boat, and you owe me massively since I didn’t fucking kill you when I found out what you did. Hurray. It’s decided. Let’s do this.”
“How many times? It wasn’t my fault!”
But it’s too late. He’s got some momentum behind him and he’s managed to get me moving. I shoot off a text as I’m led toward the mystery club.
* * *
Me: Change of plan. We need to meet in the city.
* * *
Msg rcvd 10:36 pm
310 648 1010: Send me the address. I’ll be there.
The club isn’t some under twenty-ones bullshit venue. It’s a full-blown nightclub, complete with bouncers who look like they’d rip your face off as soon as look at you. Wren leads us past the huge line of people waiting to get in, straight up to said bouncers. The largest of the three men holds a hand up, already shaking his head, but then Wren shows him a black card that he pulls from his wallet, he unclips the velvet rope in front of the doorway and we’re being ushered quickly past them, down a steep flight of stairs and into a cavernous underground…warehouse?
Music pulses, bouncing off the walls. A huge dance floor packed with writhing bodies greets us, and Elodie claps her hands together. “Holy shit! I’ve been wanting to dance forever!” she shouts over the driving bass line.
Next to me, Chase surveys the knot of people before us, swallowing hard. “I’m going to get a drink.”
One of the bouncers fastened bright orange paper bracelets around our wrists before cutting us loose. The bands read, ‘ID VERIFIED – OVER 21’, which means we shouldn’t have any issue at all getting served. Chase takes off, beelining for the closest bar, and I follow after her. I need alcohol more than I need to be a dick and avoid her right now. And anyway, I’ve recently discovered that being a dick and hanging around her is far more entertaining. When she looks up and finds me right there, by her shoulder, she scowls darkly, sighing out a massive breath of air. “What do you want, Pax?”
“Rum and coke. Double’d be nice.”
“No. What do you want? You get mad at me for coming here and checking in on you, and yet I turn around and you’re right freaking behind me. There are plenty of other bars in this club. Go and get a drink at one of them.”
“True.” I look around, making a show of squinting at the other bars. At the people working behind them. “This chick’s got the nicest tits, though. I was thinking about getting her number.”
PRES
* * *
Oh, my fucking god. He is such a dick. The worst part is, the bartender with the giant, perky tits has already noticed him and she’s making a beeline straight for him. “You’re a fucking prick, you know that? Don’t worry. I’ll go to another bar. Maybe the guy with the ink over there will give me his number.”
I shove away from the bar, forging ahead into the crowd, leaving him to flirt to his heart’s content. Crossing the dance floor isn’t so easy, though. It takes too long to navigate the welter of sweaty, writhing bodies, and I’m exhausted by the time I reach the other side of the club. The bartender looks up and sees me, grins, flashing a row of perfect white teeth, but then his smile fades. He pivots and disappears down the other end of the bar before I can even order. What the hell?
“That fucker’s ink is even lamer than your brother’s.” Pax leans against the bar next to me, elbows resting on top of the sticky, lacquered wood.
I glare at him, open-mouthed. “What…why are you doing this?” The question comes out exasperated, and rightly so.
He looks up, as if he’s pondering his response to the question. And then: “I’m here against my will, and I have nothing better to do.”
“You guys know what you want?” The bartender is back, though looking a little wary of Pax.
“Margarita, please. Patron if you have it. Salt rim. And don’t worry about him. He doesn’t want anything.”
“Double rum and coke,” Pax barks, scowling sideways at me. Once the bartender’s gone to make our drinks, Pax rounds on me, stooping down so that our eyes are at the same level for once. “The path of least resistance doesn’t just mean the easiest route. Butthead.”
“Hah! Butthead? What are you, five?”