Chapter 2 Valentina
VALENTINA
The music hits like a physical force the second we step inside, a wall of bass that rattles all the way down to my bones.
It’s so loud my teeth feel it, my ribs feel it, like the whole place is trying to shake me apart from the inside out.
For a second, I honestly don’t get it. Why do people come here, cram themselves into a dark, sweaty box just to be deafened and crushed?
Four drinks later, I get it.
The edges blur, just a little. The music doesn’t feel like an assault anymore—it feels like something alive, something pulsing through the floorboards and into my body.
My head swims pleasantly as neon strobes catch on sequins and jewelry, painting everyone in flashes of color that make the whole club look like a fever dream.
Johnny is, as always, at the center of it all.
The ‘birthday boy’ sash glints against his emerald blazer as he holds court in the middle of the dance floor, his plastic crown tipped sideways from how hard he’s moving.
Beautiful women orbit him like planets around a star, each one trying to catch his attention while he throws his head back, laughing, completely unbothered.
If the club has a gravitational pull, it’s him.
Lexi and I stick to the edge for a while, hip to hip, leaning against a high-top table as if that flimsy piece of furniture can hold us in place against the chaos.
We talk, half-shouting over the music, and it turns into laughter every time Johnny does something ridiculous—like trying to pull off a spin in those boots or gesturing for his little fan club to attempt some kind of synchronized move with him. He’s a disaster, and he loves it.
I catch myself smiling more than I expect to. There’s a looseness in my chest I haven’t felt in months, something that almost feels like freedom. Maybe it’s the drinks, maybe it’s the dress, maybe it’s just Johnny—always so bright and impossible to ignore. For once, I let myself enjoy it.
“Let’s get more drinks!” Lexi essentially screams. Even then, I find myself reading her lips more than actually hearing her over the pounding bass. I nod enthusiastically, because if I’m going to let go enough to brave that dance floor, this is the last bump of courage I need.
Lexi leads the way, and I follow in her wake like a shadow.
For her small frame and delicate arms, she moves through the crowd like a blade, slicing straight through without ever slowing down.
It’s not force—it’s presence. She looks at people and they just move.
I don’t know if it’s her timing, her outfit, or the lethal combination of both, but somehow we’re at the bar faster than seems fair.
The bartender clocks us instantly. Tattoos cover his arms all the way up his neck, a story in ink, and the scent of Drakkar Noir hits me as soon as he leans over. He’s got that effortless kind of grin—lazy and just this side of dangerous. It’s hard not to look.
“What’ll it be this time?” he asks, voice pitched low enough that I have to lean in to catch it.
Lexi doesn’t hesitate, tapping her nails against the counter. “Two shots of tequila and something pink for my girl. Surprise her,” she says, tilting her head toward me.
I shoot her a look, one brow raised. “Pink?”
“You’re wearing black,” she yells back, like that explains everything. “Contrast.”
The bartender’s grin widens. He turns away to make it, moving fast, practiced, while I rest my elbows on the sticky bar top and glance back over the crowd.
From here, I can still see Johnny—his crown is bobbing like a buoy in a neon sea, arms thrown around two girls who are laughing like he’s the funniest man alive.
For a moment, I just watch. The drinks, the music, the heat of the room—it all swirls together into something electric, and I can almost forget the weight I’ve been carrying. Almost.
The bartender slides the shots and a tall, martini glass toward us, condensation running in quick rivulets down the sides.
I grin despite myself, clink my glass against Lexi’s, and down the shot.
The burn ignites all the way down to my stomach, a slow fire that makes me laugh out loud when I slam the glass back onto the counter.
Lexi produces a card to pay, but the bartender declines. “That man paid for your drinks.”
At the far end of the bar, a man leans against the counter like he has nowhere to be and nothing to prove.
All black—shirt, jeans, boots—his presence carves out a quiet space amid the chaos.
Long blond hair, tied back into a knot at the back of his head, gleams every time the strobe lights flash, catching on the shaved sides of his skull.
His posture is deceptively loose, broad shoulders relaxed, but there’s a tenseness to him, a stiffness that lacks the carefree nature of twenty-somethings breaking loose after a week of school, or work.
He looks strangely empty. Strangely robotic and that makes my pulse hitch.
Those eyes—clear, sharp grey, like the center of an hurrican—slide over the crowd and land on me. I swear I feel it in my stomach, an instinct screaming to run. My body betrays me, twisting that warning into heat, into a thrill that coils low as if danger itself has teeth and I want to bite back.
“He’s hot!” Lexi shouts over the music, twisting toward me, eyes wide and mischievous. Her elbow jabs into my ribs in sharp little bursts that have me flinching. “You should go talk to him.”
I tip my chin toward the far end of the bar and raise my glass, a silent toast aimed at the man who has been standing there like he owns every shadow in this place.
He doesn’t move. Doesn’t even blink. Those grey eyes stay locked, cutting through the haze of strobe lights and heat as if the rest of the club doesn’t exist. Cold.
Unreadable. Like I’m a number he’s already calculated down to zero.
“Why don’t you talk to him? He bought drinks for the both of us,” I shoot back, my tone light but my pulse betrays me. Attractive? Absolutely. But there’s no warmth in him, no spark. Just something coiled and patient. And I don’t do patient. “Too cold, too… methodical. He’s not my type.”
Lexi smirks, leaning in close so I can hear her over the beat. “One, I doubt you’ll be getting into any fights near him. And two—” she glances toward him, then back at me with a grin “—I’m not the one he’s been eye-fucking.”
My gaze jerks back to him on instinct, locking with his in a collision I feel in my gut.
There’s no smirk waiting for me. No heat.
No flicker of expression to tell me I’ve gotten under his skin.
He just looks steady and unrelenting, and I feel it—the same instinct that warns you when a predator has you marked.
My stomach tightens, and to my own disgust, it’s not fear that blooms there. It’s heat. A dangerous little thrill.
I drag my tongue across my lips just to do something with my mouth, then look away and laugh low to cover it. “Sorry, Lexi-bear,” I say, pushing my empty glass onto the bar. “That guy is all yours.”
I slide my glass across the bar towards the bartender. “Besides, I have to piss.”
“Do you need me to come with you?”
“Nope,” I answer, pointing through the crush of bodies to where Johnny is in the middle of doing unspeakable things to a man who vaguely resembles his ex. “Just make sure Johnny doesn’t break that guy’s groin. And make sure that’s not his ex, Thomas.”
“What?” Lexi turns just as Johnny launches into a handstand, his legs locking like a vice around the man’s waist. And—of course—it’s Thomas. “Johnny! Thomas! Get away from him, you fucking toad!”
I snort, the laugh bubbling up before I can stop it, and take my chance to slip off my barstool.
The air gets hotter and thicker as I push through the bodies on the dance floor, lights strobing over sweat-slick skin, bass thundering hard enough to rattle my teeth.
Every few feet someone brushes against me—a sticky arm, a hip, the edge of someone’s drink sloshing over the rim.
By the time I make it to the back hall where the bathrooms are, I’m already swearing under my breath.
The line for the women’s room snakes out into the hall, at least fifteen deep, and every girl in it looks ready to claw someone’s eyes out.
My bladder protests so hard I fold a little at the waist, squeezing my thighs together.
There is absolutely no way I’m waiting through this circus.
I glance once at the door marked with a crooked little stick-figure man. Empty. Well—empty enough.
The bass swallows my laugh as I slip inside.
It hits me like a wall: the smell of bleach and beer and boy. The room is colder, echoing with the drip of a faucet that someone didn’t turn all the way off. There’s graffiti on the stalls, a faint smear of something I don’t want to identify on the tiled wall, and the urinals along one side.
A couple of guys stand at the sinks, one bent over and rinsing his face, the other texting with a cigarette dangling from his lips like he owns the world. They both pause when they see me.
“Wrong bathroom,” the one with the cigarette mutters, but he doesn’t sound mad. More… amused.
“Right bladder,” I shoot back, already shouldering past him toward the last stall. “Relax, I’m not here to look at your dicks.”
One of them laughs, low and surprised, as I slam the stall shut behind me and lock it. My back hits the door and I breathe out a shaky, relieved sound. The bass from the club is muted here, more a pulse I can feel in my feet than hear with my ears.
I hike up my dress and finally sit, head falling back against the flimsy metal wall. Relief is instant, dizzying. My whole body unspools like a knot coming loose.
And then—because of course—just as I reach for the toilet paper, my hand closes on nothing but air. Bare roll. Cardboard tube. Perfect.
“You have got to be kidding me,” I mutter, tilting my head back and squeezing my eyes shut.