Chapter 41
The club is packed and very loud. Strobe lights flash to the pumping vibrations of the bassline and the dance floor seethes with writhing, energetic, purple-tinted people. The place has a fake palm trees and a tiki bar, like we’ve just stepped through a portal into a tropical dance party.
Sadie leads us to a booth, where Saskia and some of her friends are doing shots. A bottle of tequila sits half full on the table between them. Saskia introduces us to her friends but it’s hard to hear their names over the music.
I don’t know Saskia well. She’s three years older than Sadie. She was a senior in high school the year Sadie and I met as freshmen. After she graduated, she moved to Florida for a few years and she just recently moved to New York.
All five of the girls at the table are clearly already tipsy.
Sadie and I slide into the booth. She does a shot and hands the shot glass to me.
But I pass it to one of the other girls before anyone can fill it.
I’m already feeling kind of queasy. And I definitely don’t do tequila.
It sits squarely inside the circle I know to be devil’s poison.
I’ve watched far too many people get messy on it in a way I have zero desire to do.
It’s one of those things, like bourbon, that can destroy your life before you realize you’ve just stepped onto a very slippery slope with no ice pick.
My life is already in shambles. I hardly need to add more wreckage to my pile of rubble.
Especially now.
I do my best to listen to the conversation. But it’s loud in here and I’m distracted.
“Let’s dance!” one of the girls suggests.
I don’t really feel like dancing but I’m hardly going to sit at the table by myself.
And I refuse to wallow in self-pity.
Like Sadie said, Dallas and I had some fun.
More fun than I’ve ever had. There are plenty more fish in the sea.
Not that big of a fish, I think we can all agree on that.
It’s true that he was overly controlling.
Maybe because he cared about you—which you’re not used to, let’s face it, which turned out to be yet another ruse.
What is it with me? Do I have a sign taped to my forehead that says LIE TO ME?
And yes, I definitely cashed in my V-card with style and gusto.
A little too much style and way too much gusto.
And now you could be in very deep trouble.
I stay between Sadie and the edge of the dance floor in our little circle. The others are much more into it than I am but I do my best to enjoy myself.
I miss him so much.
How could he have bought my hotel and not told me that? All those opportunities to come clean, and never once did he even give a clue that he’s basically my nemesis.
Someone grabs my arm, hard, and I flinch.
I turn to see a man. He’s smiling but it comes across as more of a sneer. He has dirty-blond hair and he’s wearing a sleeveless black t-shirt. He has a few badly-drawn tattoos and they’re oily with sweat.
I pull away from him but he grabs me around the waist, leaning close to my ear. “Dance with me. You’re fucking hot.” He smells like stale beer. My stomach turns as I try to pull away from him. My head is spinning.
But the man is insistent. “Come on, girl,” he slurs in my ear. “Come closer. I could get you off right here on the dance floor. You know you want it.”
“Get your hands off me,” I yell, because it’s the only way he’ll hear me.
I don’t know if he does hear me. Either way, he ignores it. He grabs my ass and pulls me up against his body—the hardness there makes me jerk away from him. I feel like I’m going to be sick.
When he squeezes harder, I slap his face.
I think I’m as shocked as he is. I’ve never slapped anyone in my life.
“Bitch,” he hisses. He shoves me, hard.
I fall backwards and make impact with a few people behind me. Then I feel a hard, blunt pain at the back of my head.
The blackness starts at the periphery, rushing in to consume everything.
But before it does, one thought crosses my mind.
So this must be what it feels like to die before you even hit the floor.