Patrick’s mouth goes to war with mine, one forearm braced on the mattress next to my head while his other hand slips under my knee to press my thigh up against my torso. The shift in angle causes him to hit that intoxicating spot over and over and over again, and I loudly moan my total ecstasy. His hips slam against me, and he suddenly rips his mouth from mine with a guttural groan.
“Fucking come for me, Ava,” Patrick growls. “Come for me. Come for me. I want to feel you come.”
Don’t disappoint me now, Ava, Lucky’s voice echoes in my mind.
I climax on command. My fingers dig into the taut muscles of Patrick’s back, and I bury my lips against his neck to muffle a moan that’s way too loud for a house full of people.
His cock twitches inside of me, and he presses himself as deep as he can go as he groans again.
Our bodies go still, save for our deep, heavy, rapid breathing. We cling to each other for a long time, and I search for a semblance of regret at what I just did with this glorified stranger but find none.
Eight
Ava
The elusive regretarrives with a vengeance alongside the blinding, head-throbbing light of the next day. I have no idea what time it is, but that’s the least of my worries right now. Vague recollections of the night before combined with an elevated heart rate, a sick stomach, and remnants of alcohol in my bloodstream cause me to be gripped with intense anxiety.
The room is empty—which is a plus, Iguess—but my disheveled state only adds to the dread of realizing what I did. The bottle of rum and empty glass are still on the floor next to the chair. My purse and phone are still not in here. The gold, beaded dress I borrowed from Piper is draped over the back of the chair, but I don’t remember taking it off. Which means I don’t remember exactly how long Patrick was in here, anything I might have said to him, or anything else we did beyond the first round of extremely sordid sex. I don’t even know if we had sex more than once. I don’t know anything except that I did a whole lot of things I shouldn’t have.
And now I have to deal with leaving this room at some point and facing Patrick.
Oh, and I also have to faceLucky, whom I not only spied on while he was having a threesome, but with whom I also traded barbs with as a result of tipsiness combined with my own stupid insecurities.
I need to just leave.
I had a feeling this was all too good to be true, and I was right. And I’m right because I managed to ruin it on the very first day.
After another stretch of minutes spent suffering in the bed, I crawl out and stumble to the en-suite bathroom. Blessedly, there’s a giant, vintage, clawfoot tub. I haven’t been hungover like this often, but I know a super hot bath that forces me to sweat out the remnants of alcohol can help.
After soaking so long that the piping hot water turns lukewarm, I get out, blow dry my hair, and then apply makeup that conceals the dark circles under my eyes and the lingering hangover flush on my cheeks.
When I’m finally dressed, I glance at the clock on the dresser and see that it’s well past four in the afternoon. Way to waste the entire day. But that doesn’t matter. I have three things on my agenda: go get my purse, pack my shit, and flee to the airport.
I don’t even care if I slip out without seeing a single person here. When I get home, I’m cutting ties with all of Lucky’s social media, and this nightmare can just fade away.
Unfortunately, Lucky’s band-slash-entourage, Pearl, Meyer, Lucky himself,andPatrick have all congregated in the big room where I left my purse. And if there was a way for me to get a cab, pay the fees to switch my flight, and actually get on a plane without all the things in that purse, I would just leave without it.
But I can’t. So I just have to try to slip in and out unnoticed.
No such luck.
Patrick spies me immediately and marches across the room with a look on his face that indicates something is wrong. There also seems to be a current of stress ricocheting through the room in the form of conversation I can’t really decipher. Lucky’s at the far end of the room, pacing and chain-smoking, while he verbally spars with Meyer about something that appears to be intense, both of them gesturing emphatically in that native New Yorker way of theirs. Pearl is seated stiffly on one of the sofas with Piper and one of the other dancers, who are patting her while she talks on her phone and twists a handkerchief in her free hand.
It’s Pearl’s sudden, sharp shift from her jovial mood that makes me realize something’s really wrong. I also don’t see Stephen. I don’t know what any of that means.
Despite whatever is wrong, I still need to get the hell out of here, and I’m almost to the bar when Patrick reaches me.
“Ava. You all right?”
His hand is bracing the side of my arm, and I not only don’t want him touching me, I also can’t look at him. “I’m fine. I just need to grab my purse.”
“Hey. Look at me for a second.”
I tilt my face lower. “I’d really rather not.”
I sense him leaning closer to me, and then he lowers his voice. “Listen, you don’t need to feel weird about last night. From the looks of things, this is probably gonna be hard enough without any awkwardness from that, so let’s just try to let it lie to keep things as simple as possible.” He pauses. “Orif you want to talk about it, I’ll totally—”
“I actuallydon’twant to talk about it. At all. Any of it,” I snap, managing to force my gaze up to meet his. “I’m getting my purse and going to the airport.”
