One moment the guy was standing right over me. Then he wasn’t. Something—someone—pulled him away. Hauled him round. The dull smack of flesh against flesh. And two cries. Both pained and slightly shocked.
“Ow, my—”
“What the fuck—”
My date was staggering, clutching his face, blood squeezing from between his fingers. And behind him was Caspian Hart, looking stern and shadowy and unbelievably there. Cradling his own hand.
I should have been beyond humiliated. I was beyond humiliated. But it didn’t seem like anything that mattered when I was just so happy to see him.
“He was telling you no,” he said in his quietest, iciest, most implacable voice.
“He was offering, you deranged bender.” Sebastian-Miles-Crispin-Whoever dabbed at his mouth. “Shitting Christ, my tooth. You don’t just hit people.”
I was almost glad I couldn’t see much of Caspian’s face because whatever it was doing made the other guy take a hasty step back. “For every rule,” he murmured, “there is a necessary exception. I suggest you leave before you induce me to make it a second time.”
My ex-date squared his shoulders, his upper-class armor snapping back into place—impressive, in a way, considering he was drooling blood. “You’ll be hearing from my family…and my family’s lawyer…and probably the police as well.”
As threats went, even I could see it was trying to do too much at once. But if I’d been on my own, I would still have been fucking terrified. My family had mice in the basement. His family—whoever they were—had a lawyer.
Caspian just handed over his business card. “I shall await your call.”
Tarquin-Robert-Hugo stood there for a second or two longer, radiating dissatisfaction. Then he turned without another word and strode off.
I didn’t see where he went.
I didn’t care.
I pushed myself upright on shaky legs—thank you, friend wall—and ran, thoughtless, heedless, frantic, into Caspian’s arms.
I wasn’t sure what I was expecting. Maybe that he would push me into a puddle as I deserved. But he just held me tight, whispering into my hair, “Oh, Arden, my Arden.” And then in quite a different tone, giving me a little shake, “What the hell is wrong with you? How could you be so stupid?”
“I’m sorry,” I wailed. “I…I didn’t think you were coming.”
“Well neither did I. But that’s no reason to fuck someone in an alley.”
“It was oral sex.”
“I think you’ll find that’s semantics.”
I tried to surreptitiously wipe my eyes on my sleeve. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Please don’t be angry. I didn’t want to be with him, not really, but I’d been leading him on all evening and I didn’t think he was going to stop and—”
That was when the tears came. Couldn’t I have one encounter with Caspian Hart where I didn’t cry?
He made an exasperated sound. “Would you…please don’t do that.”
“S-sorry.”
He reached out a hand. Maybe he was trying to comfort me. Or intending to hold me.
If so, it would have been nice.
Unfortunately, my body chose that moment to register its disapproval of that night’s particular cocktail: Shitty Times Up Against The Wall With A Twist. Misery, anxiety, shame, and fear, muddled with far too much alcohol and served long.
It felt briefly like I was turning inside out.
And then I was wretchedly sick.
In that intense, interminable, helplessly disgusting drunken way. Sobbing and heaving and shaking with the force of it.
