Ava bit her cup, trying to hide a smile as she gently kicked me. Thank God I was wearing a layer of white makeup. No one could see me blush.
‘Anyway, my little cousin Amelia gets to be the vampire now.’ Gabe’s eyes went wide again as he looked behind us. ‘Oh! Babe! Come meet my friends from work!’
Babe.
My heart stopped racing, and the excitement in my belly evaporated – like a vampire bursting to ashes in the sunlight. I followed Gabe’s eyes as a guy pushed between Ava and me and put his arm around Gabe’s shoulders. ‘Guys, this is my boyfriend, Victor.’
‘We’ve met, actually,’ the pirate said.
Gabe gave us a confused look. Ava put out her hand. ‘Not officially. Ava.’
‘Vic, nice to meet you.’ He shook her hand and then put one out to me, finally cordial.
‘Tommy,’ I said, fully numb. Morgan introduced herself, but I barely heard any of it.
Vic tried on a charming smile. ‘Sorry about before. You know how these parties get.’
‘No problem,’ Ava said.
‘He wassupposedto be the Dread Pirate Roberts, but he misunderstood the assignment,’ said Gabe.
‘No,’ Vic said, his fake smile dropping. ‘You didn’t tell me it was a specific pirate from a specific movie.’
‘Princess Bride!’ Morgan pointed.
‘Yes!’ Gabe said. ‘Thank you! And I was going to be Inigo Montoya, but … he showed up like this.’ He motioned to Vic, who, in addition to the eye patch that was now on his forehead – above his eye – wore a white shirt, raggedy vest and cutoff khakis. He also had stubble that I was pretty sure wasn’t makeup. ‘Thank God I had this backup astronaut costume.’
Ava groaned. ‘That would have been so good. Way to suck, Vic.’ Ava does this thing where she says what she really means but makes it sound like a joke. I love my friends.
Vic actually smiled, probably not even realizing Ava would pluck his eyes out if I asked her to. ‘Well, I think you look cuter as an astronaut anyway.’ He took Gabe’s chin between his thumb and forefinger and kissed him.
‘Shit,’ Ava said, turning to me and coming up with an excuse on the fly. ‘We were supposed to go find that girl we were talking to. Would you boys excuse us real quick? Can we get you a drink?’
Gabe held up his cup. ‘I’m good, thanks.’
‘We’ll come find you,’ she said, pulling me away from them as they kissed again. When we were halfway to the carriage house, she asked, ‘You good?’
‘Fine.’
She slung her arm around my shoulder. ‘Finish that. We need to get you another drink.’
I did as she said.
I had been speaking to Gabe’s friend Kevin for the better part of an hour. Despite my original dislike for him, Ava seemed to enjoy him, so while she and Morgan used the bathroom and mingled, I was stuck entertaining him.
‘Where even are his parents?’ I asked over the loud music, which was still playing well after midnight. Though since we were so far from the closest house, there wasn’t anyone to call the cops.
‘Apparently,’ Kevin said, ‘his dad had some work thing in Miami this week and his mom went down last night to make it a short weekend getaway. They’ll fly back up Sunday morning for the whole House of Horrors thing they do.’
‘Who bought the alcohol?’
‘That would be me.’
I turned to match a face to the voice behind me. It was the Dreadful Pirate Vic. I took a sip of my drink to hide my lack of desire to talk to him.
Vic moved past Kevin to the bar to make another drink. Kevin gave me a wide-eyedbetter you than melook and left.
‘Thanks. What do I owe you?’
