Chapter 7
Weston
I need to fuck someone tonight.
I drag a mop through a puddle of pink-tinged vodka on Saturday night, surrounded by the pulsing, reverberating bass of loud music, and the thought that shoots through my mind is unwelcome.
That’s not the kind of person I usually am.
I’m not like Sevan, going around and fucking whoever passes my way.
But after this week, I need something.
I’m in the kitchen at Onyx House as the party rages on in the living room, cleaning a giant spill of liquor that I told Noah I’d take care of. Honestly, I’m glad for a break from the party, because luckily the kitchen is empty right now other than me, and I have a second to collect my thoughts.
And one thought is louder than the others.
I need someone to be with tonight.
Or I’m about to fucking blow.
I never usually want casual hookups. The other guys would say I’m lame for it, but what I really want is a relationship, and I was just on the precipice of being comfortable trying to date men for the first time.
I want love, even though it feels impossible to find and ridiculous to hope for.
But I’ll lose my mind if I don’t get off.
Blow off steam.
Just fuck any human being who isn’t Sevan Berlant so that I’ll get him out of my head.
I feel pressure like someone’s been tightening a wrench around me all week, bit by bit, and this party is adding a metric ton of pressure to the mix.
Everything at tonight’s party is too uncontrolled. Unpredictable.
Like this Jackson Pollock ink-splash of a liquor puddle that’s currently fanned out across the kitchen floor, waiting for some drunk partygoer to come break their tailbone on it.
“Hey. Stay back,” I call out in a deep warning tone, holding out my hand as two drunk girls stumble into the kitchen.
“Hi, cutie,” the blonde girl says, pausing at the edge of the tile.
“There’s half a bottle’s worth of broken glass and liquor on the floor. Let me clean this up,” I tell them.
“Why’s it pink? I like it.”
I pull in a long breath as I switch to the broom and sweep over some more of the glass shards.
“Noah thought it would be fun to add food coloring to the vodka, then he turned to kiss someone and dropped it on the floor. I’d make him clean it up if he wasn’t already practically blacking out.”
“I can help you,” the blonde says again. “If you promise to fuck me afterward.”
“God, Lara, shut up!” the other girl says, laughing and covering her friend’s mouth with her hand.
The blonde pushes her hand away. “She’s jealous. Fine. You have to fuck us both.”
I keep my eyes downcast on the floor. “Not tonight. Sorry.”
They each reach over to grab cans of tinned hard seltzer and wave me off. As they’re walking out, I hear them talking in a hushed tone. “Yeah. He never really wants anybody.”
I glance up and my chest goes cold for a moment as I catch a glimpse down the long hallway.
Sev is there.
He’s in a black shirt halfway down the hall, illuminated by a red party light and talking with a few people, including Niko. Niko raises his phone up and snaps a picture of the group, and Sev poses for the camera, raising a middle finger with one hand while blowing a kiss with the other.
He looks so good it almost makes me angry.
Sevan makes me feel like I just took a drink of a 140-proof cocktail that was lit on fucking fire, like he’s the human embodiment of a wrong decision.
“Hot,” one of the girls in his group tells him as she looks at the picture afterward, like she’s reading my internal thoughts.
He gives her a squeeze on the shoulder. “I know.”
Cocky fuck.
He glances down the hall a moment later and catches me looking. I frown and turn away, going back to cleaning the mess on the tile. Their group passes through the dining area across from me, and I feel Sev’s eyes on me as the group makes its way out into the backyard.
And then they’re gone.
And I’m alone again. Feeling like my body’s still on fire. Like something very bad is going to happen tonight.
What the fuck is that feeling?
It’s not as if I have a crush on him.
The moment that word flashes through my mind I hate it.
No.
Not a crush.
I clutch the mop in my hands, cleaning and trying to push him from my mind. I’m halfway done with cleaning when another figure comes through the kitchen archway.
“Give me another five minutes, please,” I say, my voice coming out clipped.
“Chill, Wes.”
I crane my neck upward to see my brother.
“Hunter. Hey.”
Hunter is one of a very small number of people who wouldn’t piss me off right now. My brother and I are on good terms these days, and I’m relieved to see him.
He steps over the last remnants of pink on the ground and pulls out some red plastic cups to mix drinks.
“I’d offer to help you clean,” he says after a minute, “but I already know you’ll tell me you’re fine.”
“Correct.”
“Frat Dad,” he teases.
“Still don’t know why that’s an insult.”
“It’s not. We say it lovingly.”
I finish cleaning up and give the floor one last look with my cell phone flashlight to ensure there aren’t any glass shards. More people are starting to stream through the dining area beyond the kitchen, moving back and forth between the backyard and the house.
Hunter gives them each a nod. He’s only been in Onyx House for a handful of months, but already I feel like he’s making it his home even better than I have.
My brother was always better at parties.
He could thrive in chaos, even back when we were in high school.
I didn’t thrive in it.
Chaos tended to swallow me whole, actually.
Pressure was something that followed me everywhere, whether I was at home, at school, or at a party where I felt like I might explode.
“Margarita?” Hunter asks me, circling around the counter and holding one of the plastic cups toward me.
“No thanks.”
He stares at me. “You sure? I used the zero-sugar lime mix for your health-freak ass.”
I let out a long breath, stretching my neck and back after mopping. “Fine. Give me that thing.”
“You okay?”
“Do you consider wishing I could be on an island alone for the next six months okay?”
I’d been trying to make a joke, but Hunter frowns. “If there’s something on your mind, say it, Wes. I mean that. don’t want things between us to ever get as bad as they used to be.”
I shake my head. “They’ll never be that bad again.”
“Damn,” Hunter says, watching as I tip back the cup and chug half of the tart, sweet margarita in one go. “Classes rough today, or something?”
I drink a little more and then wipe my mouth with my hand. “Maybe you just make mixed drinks too weak.”
“I pour heavy. That tequila is about to go straight to your head.”
“Good.”
He laughs and I manage to give him a quick smile before it falls away from my mouth.
Even if I’m on okay terms with Hunter now, everything that went down last semester was clear confirmation of something ugly that I’d always suspected:
Hunter is the lucky one, between the two of us.
The luckier brother.
Hunter gives my sleeve a tug. “Some of the guys are doing plunges in the pool out back. Let’s go.”
“The pool is still frigid at this time of year. No way.”
“That’s why we’re just doing plunges. We’re seeing who can stay in the cold the longest.”
I groan. “Not safe at all, Hunter.”
“People do cold plunges in icy lakes in Alaska, Weston. No one is going to get hurt,” he protests. “Come hang out with Niko and Rayne. Please.”
Hunter’s being nicer than usual.
And I’m a sucker for that, even after a week like this.
“Fine. But I’m not jumping in cold water.”
I head out into the backyard, every nerve ending in my body already on high alert looking for Sevan.
I know where Sev is outside before I even see his face.
Like that very bad thing is about to happen.
After what I’ve been through, I can spot trouble like it’s a fucking neon, flashing sign. And Sev’s always lit up like a fucking Christmas tree.
His tall, broad frame is right at the edge of the fire pit out back, and within a moment after stepping outside, I see him raise his fist at someone for a punch.
I flash back instantly to the other times he’s tried to start fights at my parties. He isn’t fucking getting away with it now.
My heartbeat skips into a high rhythm instantly.
“Don’t you dare—”
It’s already happening before I can intervene.
Sev throws a cleaner punch than anyone I’ve ever seen, and the guy he’s hitting falls back onto his ass on the lawn, groaning in pain.
My chest clenches.
No. Not here.
Not here in Onyx House. That’s a line I don’t let anyone cross.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I call out as I cut across the lawn, catching Sev off guard.
My hands are at the top of his shirt, gripping it tight before he can react. The fire pit is on the lawn right by the deep end of the pool, and the shimmering water sparkles behind him, casting him in a silhouette.
“I was here to see you, Sheriff,” he tells me. “Then something else needed my attention.”
His head comes up just a little further and his eyes catch the glint of the light from the fire, illuminating them.
I can smell whiskey on him and it mixes with the scent of his skin, pulling me back to last Saturday like a magnet.
His scent.
His body.
His cock, pushing inside me.
The guy he punched is taking off across the lawn.
I don’t let myself think for another second. I shove Sevan backward hard and he teeters at the sudden movement. At first he doesn’t fall, but then he stumbles, losing his footing for just long enough. The people on the shallow side of the pool gasp, their eyes glued to me, now.
Sev falls backward into the deep end of the cold water.
And then I see it: the small, jutting stone at the edge of the pool that isn’t as smooth as the others.
The stone that Sev must have fallen against as he tipped into the water.
The stone that’s now streaked with something dark.
My heart drops like a broken elevator, falling fast in my chest and going cold.
“Fuck,” I say, the word coming out barely louder than a breath.
Then all I see is red.
Dark, blooming red on the water, pooling out from Sev as he swims to the top.