Z pouted and let Levi go. “Fine, fine. See you around.” She caught my eye and started singing about the railroad again before taking off toward the dance floor.
The temperature in the room rose by a dozen degrees the second I was alone with Levi. Looking for a reprieve, I pressed the cold glass to my neck and smiled at him.
“Thanks for the drink. I mean, even though I said I didn’t want one.”
He rolled one massive shoulder. “What can I say? I’m persistent.” A cool stream of sweat from the glass rolled down my neck and into my cleavage, and he watched it all the way down before catching himself. His gaze shifted to the crowd. “You really come to all of these?”
“Ever since I got my first invitation.” I didn’t mention that I’d sent it to myself.
“New Year’s Eve, right? The White Party?”
My lips quirked with a smile. “Just like the original Bright Young Things. It was unseasonably warm, and we drove upstate, danced all night in an orchard on a white dance floor. Raced champagne corks in a stream. The whole deal.”
“I’ve heard the stories.” He looked over the crowd. “These parties are a national treasure, and you’re all American royalty. Guess nobody should be surprised you caught the negative attention too.”
“Like what?”
“Warren, for starters.”
My lip curled at the mention of the commissioner’s name. “He needs to get real problems. You’d think he’d be worried about actual crime in the city instead of busting perfectly legal themed parties.”
“That’s everybody’s question, isn’t it? I figured something personal happened, something to get him fired up. Out for revenge maybe.”
They were the same questions all the new people asked. Everyone wanted to know about the scandal, even though I didn’t have any more of a clue than they did.
So, unfazed, I answered, “I think he’s just angry about his lost youth or bitter about his years as a beat cop—who knows? I do know he’s a big fan of being a pain in everyone’s ass.”
“Well, I know you don’t know who Cecelia Beaton is, but I bet if you figured it out and served her up, he’d shut up.”
A laugh shot out of me, and I looked over to find him unamused. “Oh, you’re serious.” And then I laughed again. “You really are new, aren’t you? None of us knows who Cecelia is, and even if we did, none of us would tell.”
“Not even to save your own necks?”
I frowned at him. “We’re not doing anything dangerous. No one needs saving. But in your hypothetical, no, we wouldn’t do it. It might seem like we’re nothing but lushes and degenerates, we’re here for more than just what you see. It runs deeper than dancing and booze and costumes.”
“Does it?”
“It does. I … it’s hard to explain.”
“Try.”
I thought about it for a second. “Have you ever felt alone in the world? Like you don’t belong anywhere? To anyone?”
Something flashed behind his eyes, a certain sadness or regret. “I have.”
“So have we. So has everyone. These parties are proof positive that we have a place to belong and people to belong to. It’s not … it’s not purpose—that’s too productive a word. More like family.” I looked over the crowd, greeted with faces I knew so well. “And we’re just like any family. There are squabbles and scandals, but in the end, we always have each other’s backs. Most of us don’t have anyone else.”
When I met his eyes again, they were sharp with cynicism even though his smile was light.
“A sad pack of poor little rich kids? Must be tough.” He took a drink.
“Probably looks like that from the outside. But not all of us are rich. And money doesn’t solve anyone’s problems.”
“But it sure can’t hurt.”
I cut him a look, not bothering to hide the offense. “Shows how much you know.”
But then he laughed, his face softening. “That’s fair enough. I’m sorry. As an orphan raised by a cop and someone who went to college on an academic scholarship, seems like money is the answer to just about everything. All of this”—he gestured to the crowd—“is the exact opposite of what I know.”
“Then maybe it’s time to visit the other side and discover its merits,” I challenged with a smile. “Keep coming and you’ll see for yourself that it’s not so simple.”
“And duke it out with Ash’s dates?” he scoffed. “That’s no easy task, and the odds of me landing an invitation of my own is pretty slim. I don’t exactly fit in, do I?” There was the slightest bite in his voice, and I hated the sound of it.
“I figured you were cynical, but I didn’t take you for a snob.”
Unaffected, he shrugged again. “It’s all right—I don’t feel the need to fit in. But the divide between your kind and mine seems a little deeper in a place like this.”
“Maybe it only feels deeper because you dug it that way.”
A chuckle. “Maybe. It makes me wonder.”
“Wonder what?”
“If there’s any merit to that. Especially since you’re so adamant that I’m wrong. I’m not usually wrong. I wonder if you could change my mind.” He turned his molten gaze on me, and it weighed a thousand pounds, not at all lightened by that crooked smile of his. “I have to say, this is not how I thought tonight would go down.”
“No?”
He shook his head, casting a glance toward the bar. “I figured I’d come once or twice, see what it was about, and that’d be that. But I find myself surprised.”
“These parties will do that,” I said on a laugh.
Once again, he looked straight at me, into me, through me until I was hot and cold all over. “It’s not the party. It’s you.”
Something pulled at me, some wicked desire that lived on his lips, in his mouth. I took an unknowing step closer, close enough to feel the heat of his body even though he was still feet away. “You’re not like the rest of them.”
“Neither are you.”
I laughed, not knowing how I’d gotten closer or even when his hand had first cupped my hip. “Where did you come from?”
“Hell’s Kitchen,” he answered with an uptick of his smile.
“Do you ever take anything seriously?” I asked with a smile of my own.
“Not if I can help it.”
My hand rested on his chest, a solid plane of muscle. I stood between his legs, felt the bulk of his thighs outside mine. When I leaned into him, pressed the length of my body to the long stretch of his, another bulk greeted me.
“I came to find out about the party,” he said as his hands charted the curves of my hips, the words brushing my lips. “But now I have another intention entirely.”
“Oh? And what’s that?” I breathed.
“To find out how you taste.”
A hot shudder slid through me. I inched closer. “Then shut up and find out.”
For a heartbeat, he savored the anticipation.
And then I saw stars.
Utter blackness and flashes of light and his lips against mine. Hands, hands on my face, my neck. His noisy breath, or maybe it was mine, the sound of his stubble rasping my palms, louder than the music or the crowd. But those lips, demanding and insistent, devouring, consuming, swallowing me up as if part of me belonged to him and he wanted it back.