Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Walking around downtown wasn’t exactly Ava’s idea of a good time, but Henry, Eleanor, and Zach were determined to celebrate their first year as doctors with plenty of alcohol and dancing.
Ava had agreed to join them, mostly because she really did need to get out more, and they’d already rescheduled the anniversary celebration three times due to conflicting schedules.
“Love that skirt, by the way, Ava!” Eleanor shouted over a passing pedal tavern. “You look hot!”
Ava glanced back and caught Eleanor pretending to grab her butt. Laughing, she tossed her hair over her shoulder. “Thanks! It’s new.”
She was wearing dark tights, a mauve sweater tucked into a black mini skirt, and heeled boots. The rhythmic clack of her steps against the sidewalk provided a steady beat of confidence she didn’t usually feel in her scrubs.
“Mediterranean or bar food?” Zach asked, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk. A group of bachelorettes protested their sudden pause and forced their way around them, giving their group a side-eye from beneath their matching hot pink cowboy hats.
Eleanor looped her arm through Zach’s. “Bar food. Live music!”
“You got it,” Zach said, dragging her forward as she whooped with laughter.
Henry and Ava exchanged a glance before following them to Gil’s Pub, where a bouncer stood guard in front of a narrow entrance that reeked of sweat and alcohol.
Henry moved to Ava’s side, his arm brushing hers as he reached for his wallet. When the bouncer nodded them in, Henry let his hand linger on the small of her back with a possessive weight that made Ava’s skin prickle. She stepped forward naturally, breaking the contact without making it a thing.
It was the third time he’d done that since they’d left the first bar. She’d been counting.
The group made their way to a booth, Henry and Ava the last to slide in.
Henry immediately put his hand on her thigh, but his eyes remained focused on the menu in front of him as if he didn’t notice what he was doing.
Ava crossed her leg over the other, making him adjust awkwardly and eventually move his hand away.
Pleased with the outcome, she looked over the menu and wondered if the loaded french fries were worth the price tag.
It wasn’t that she no longer found him attractive.
Henry was handsome in a conventional way—tall, his brown hair curling in an unkempt yet intentional way, dressed in a sweater and jeans that fit his muscular frame.
He had the kind of face that made women do a double take, especially when he wore those olive green glasses.
“Did I tell y’all about the girl with the claw clip who was in a car crash?” Eleanor was staring at a woman dancing by the stage. Said claw clip held up her long blonde hair. “That thing embedded in her skull like shrapnel. Took three of us to find the hinge.”
Zach gagged. “I don’t know how you guys survive the ER.”
At this point, Ava had seen her share of bones sticking through skin and weird things lodged inside people. The claw clip comment didn’t faze her, but she made a mental note never to wear one in the car again.
Henry laughed, his arm now draping over Ava’s shoulders. “They don’t teach you that in med school.” His thumb moved in a small circle against her upper arm, and she reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, deftly dislodging his arm in the process.
Eleanor caught her eye from across the table before going back to laughing at whatever else Zach said.
“God, okay. I definitely need a drink after that.” Zach slid out of the booth, looking toward the bar. “Tequila shots?”
“Again?” Eleanor whined.
Ava smiled. “I’ll do a tequila shot with you, Zach.”
“That’s my girl!” He thumped his chest and headed to the bar.
Eleanor huffed out a breath and stood up. “I don’t trust him to be able to hold four shot glasses right now…” She glanced back at Ava—long enough to silently ask, You good? without saying it. Ava gave her a small nod to go after the man she’d been pining over for months now.
The booth shrank the second Eleanor disappeared even though Henry hadn’t moved. Ava just felt him differently now, familiar in a way that didn’t quite fit anymore. She kept her eyes on the stage where the band had launched into something up-tempo.
“Having fun?” Henry asked.
“Yeah.” She nodded, eyes remaining on the stage. “It’s a good night.”
“It really is.” He leaned back, his arm now resting along the back of the booth behind her without quite touching. “I forgot how much I liked hanging out with you.”
“We always had fun,” she agreed, because it was true. That part had never been the problem.
“We did.” She could feel him looking at her without turning to meet his eyes. “I’ve missed this. Missed you.”
She frowned. “Henry...”
“I know, I know. I’m just saying. Just—it’s nice. Being here with you.”
She looked at him then, and she understood why she’d said yes to him the first time, and each time after that. He was easy to be around. Easy to like. Some nights that felt like enough.
Tonight it didn’t.
“I’ve gotta pee,” she muttered, sliding out of the booth before he could say anything else.
She spotted a sign pointing toward the restrooms and made her way through the tables and bodies. When she finally closed the door behind her, she let her shoulders droop. The air in here smelled like hand soap and someone’s too-sweet perfume, which was at least not Henry’s cologne.
Since she didn’t actually need the restroom, she washed her hands, stalling. The mirror gave her back a version of herself that looked more put together than she felt.
She thought about Jay—couldn’t help it. Her brain had been drifting back to him all week, and being around Henry wasn’t helping. Henry was supposed to be the glue that mended what Jay had shattered, but that had never really been fair to either of them.
Some cracks were structural. Henry couldn’t fix what he hadn’t broken.
She dried her hands, stepping back into the hallway and directly into someone moving too fast, dark hood pulled low.
“Watch it,” the man snapped.
His hazel eyes flared with anger, and she moved back instinctively. He looked like Riley Thorne, only thinner—more skeletal. There was a fresh scratch on his cheek, the skin swollen and angry.
“Sorry, I—”
His gaze met hers for a second before his jaw set and he looked away. He pulled his hood lower and pushed through the crowd. The bouncer barely had time to register him before he was through the door and gone.
She stood watching the entrance as if he might reappear. The bouncer had already moved on, uninterested.
She didn’t know why her hands felt slightly unsteady.
Riley had always made her uncomfortable, even back in high school when she’d spent countless hours in his garage watching the boys practice.
There was something about him that felt off.
She’d always felt it in the way he’d get when he drank, that edge of meanness that came out in his jokes, or how he’d shove the other guys a little too hard.
Whenever she’d mention it to Jay, he’d brush it off: “Riley’s just Riley. He’s intense, but he’s harmless.”
She’d never quite believed that.
But there was no reason for Riley to be in a place like this.
And if it had really been him, she’d have known immediately—she wouldn’t be standing here second-guessing herself.
It was just her brain conjuring old faces.
Jay showing back up in her life had apparently shaken something loose, and now she was seeing ghosts.
She took a breath and returned to the noise of the bar and Henry waiting at the table.
“Welcome back,” Henry sang, gesturing to two empty shot glasses in front of him. “I took yours. You were taking too long.”
“Ava!”
The voice didn’t come from the table. It came from somewhere in the crowd—a voice she’d have known anywhere.
Jay Wyler was moving toward her, shoulders hunched and hands shoved deep in his pockets like he was trying to take up less space.
She could tell he was attempting to go unnoticed with the beanie pulled low and his flannel buttoned up to the collar, but he couldn’t hide the sharp angles of his face, the piercings glinting in the bar lights, or the tattoos creeping up his neck and down his wrists.
There were even a few rebellious strands of blue escaping at his temples, giving him away entirely.
He looked like he’d walked off a stage and into the wrong room.
When their eyes met across the crowd, his shoulders dropped like he’d finally been given permission to breathe.
Ava didn’t know what to do with that. Didn’t know what to do with the way her chest had lifted the second she saw him either.
When he reached her, he placed his hand on her forearm and stepped in close. Instinctively, she placed her hand on top of his. It took her a second to realize they’d reached for each other like no time had passed at all.
“Mira texted me. Is she with you?”
His eyes frantically scanned the bar, and Ava’s pulse quickened. She didn’t need him to say anything else. Something was wrong. She could feel it in the tension radiating off him, the way his whole body was coiled tight beneath the flannel.
“Mira’s here?”
First the Riley lookalike. Now Jay and Mira? She’d gone years without seeing any of them, and suddenly they were all invading her one night out.
“Yeah. She was going to perform here tonight, but she called me and told me to come get her. She wouldn’t tell me what was wrong over the phone.”
“Ava! You gonna introduce us to your friend or what?!” Eleanor shouted.
Ava took a step back, the loss of his touch feeling like a sudden drop in temperature. Then she turned to see her friends’ curious stares. Henry’s jaw was set in a hard line as he sized Jay up.
“This is my old boy—” She caught herself. “Old friend. Jay. Didn’t know he’d be here.”