“Woohoo!” Georgie sung out, “you go, girlfriend.”
I pulled myself up and laughed.
“I’m Jason,” he introduced himself, running his hands up my back, onto the top of my butt.
“Amy,” I answered and swung away.
He reached for my hand and pulled me back, and we moved a little closer. The dancing slowed. I lifted my arms high and swayed, wrapped in a hazy film of mind-altering alcohol. He ran his hand down my body, grazing the sides of my breasts, down over my stomach. My arms settled behind his neck, our eyes locked again, and I leaned in and kissed him. There were no fireworks, not even a sparkler was lit. Still, it was nice. Nice to be wanted by someone. I knew what I was doing was a multi-pronged attempt to somehow cover the pain that sat like a rock in my stomach, and also to stick it to Karson and Tom. Karson didn’t want me, fine, someone else did. Jason was the screen actor that would fill the role and the crater-sized indent in my self-esteem, if only for the night. It felt wrong, but I was going to do it anyway. Not only that, but I was willing to take it a step further, maybe three steps further.
I ran my fingers up his collar bone, neck, toying with his earlobe. “Do you want to get out of here?” I purred.
“I was hoping you might ask.” He smiled and took hold of my hand, pulling us toward the door.
A body blocked our exit. A voice snarled, “I’d let go of her right now, unless you want to find your hand removed from your body?”
It wasn’t Karson. It was Ethan. What the fuck is it with vampires threatening to remove body parts? I rolled my eyes.
Jason lifted his chin, he let go of my hand and placed his arm around my waist. He wasn’t letting me go. Not when the promise of sex was on the line. “I think Amy can decide who she wants to hold her hand.”
Ethan’s eyes darkened, into black beady marbles. “You will move away now, before I tear your hand, then your arm, and then your head clean off your stupid, shoulders.”
Jason’s eyes widened. His mouth dropped open. He dropped his arm and stepped back quickly. “I’ll be over by the pool table, Amy,” he muttered and almost ran off.
“What, are you my father now?” I hissed.
He threw me a look that could carve ice. But black faded in his eyes and the blue remerged like a night ocean. “I’m saving you from doing something you’re going to regret. You’re drunk, you’re hurt, and you’re making a mistake.”
I threw out my hands, which unbalanced my foothold, and I staggered. “It’s my mistake to make, Ethan, not yours to stop. If I wake up in the morning and regret it, so what. It wouldn’t be the only mistake I’ve made lately.”
A muscle on his jaw bunched. “You will wake up in the morning and feel degraded and a hell of a lot emptier than you do tonight.”
I snorted out my nose. “Right, ‘cause I’m a girl. You can go out every weekend and fuck half the town. But if it’s me, that’s not okay!”
Ethan sighed. “You’re being childish, it’s nothing to do with that. I know what you’re feeling.”
“What?” I stared at him incredulously, dismay found a place in my head. “Are you reading my mind?”
“You’re drunk, your guard is down, your ring is on. So yes, I can read your mind.”
I wasn’t sure whether to be angry, mortified, or embarrassed. Finally, I realized it was all three— because if he could read it . . . so could Karson.
I glanced at Karson.You’re such a dirt-bag fucking asshole,I shouted in my head,read that.
His lips curled up, but his eyes scorched through me like a hot brand.
I yanked the ring off my finger and tucked it into my pocket. Emotion rushed through my veins, heat and pain. Anger and despair.
My power thrummed though me, buzzing, burning, begging to be released. My palms curled into fists.
The bar lights above Karson’s head exploded.
Pop. Pop. Pop.
Glass fragments rained down, landing in their hair, glinting like rain drops.
Rebecca shrieked. I flicked out a hand and sent her drink flying into her lap. She gasped and jumped up, wiping madly at a dark stain over the groin of her beige skirt.
I smiled, with all the warmth of a shark.
