The cluster of elves were cousins of the birthday girl, a cool-eyed nymph with expensive-looking hair extensions and designer shoes. The girl looked Silva over with a critical eye as Tate motioned in turn to her boyfriend, a leonine-looking man who crouched at her side, a tiefling couple, two men with flicking, forked tongues, and a leering satyr whose collar was open two buttons too many. Her breath sputtered and stalled as Tate completed the circle of people, his long fingers once more spanning her hip.Here it comes,she thought.My friend, Silva.The beginning of the end. She thought the restrooms were probably down the hallway past the shiny, stainless steel bar at the back of the main room, and prepared herself to flee.
"This is my Silva," Tate said simply, squeezing her hip lightly. The cat-eyed man smiled with a nod, as did one or two of the elves as she sucked in a shuddering breath, feeling suddenly coltish, as though her legs might not support her for another moment. She melted into his strong side and tried not to appear as though she were going to pass out, as he casually resumed his conversation with the djinn.His Silva. Not his friend, not his girlfriend . . . simply his.
Silva fisted the material of his shirt, scratching at his lower back, wanting to wrap her arms and legs around him, to cling to him the way she did in his bed . . .later, she thought, straightening. His friends seemed as cool and reserved as she’d imagined they would be, and right now she needed to pull herself together. This wasn’t a false skin she needed to wear, she reminded herself, a persona she needed to adopt . . . for all that she complained about her grandmother’s control over her life, Nana had left her well-prepared to smile brightly, converse charmingly, and serve up back-handed compliments with the pros. As the nymph continued to scowl, clearly not ready to be friendly with this stranger at her party, Silva gave Tate’s hand a final squeeze before releasing him to step away and offer her birthday wishes with a confident smile.
♥ ♥ ♥
If she'd left the housethat evening with the assumption that this party would be illuminating, she would've been disappointed. If she thought she would gain insight into Tate's friendships and social tendencies, perhaps a different facet of his smile, or a member of his inner circle with whom he was particularly close, she might have felt let down. The truth was, of course, she had been hoping for all of those things and more, so the sight of him slipping in and out of conversations like a darting snake, never staying in one spot for long, never revealing anything about himself or sharing with her anecdotes about his relationship with the guests around them left her feeling frustrated and more than just a bit annoyed. He didn't act any differently with this group of people who were his purported friends than he did with the strangers in his businesses. Silva had learned more about him watching his small interactions with his staff than she had in the past hour and a half, although she was still incredibly glad that he had invited her; that he had put his arm around her and called herhisbefore these beautiful strangers, but an hour and a half in and she couldn't help but feel thatstrangerswere all they were. Strangers to her and strangers to him. Or at least,hewas the stranger, a notion that left her feeling even more discomfited.
There was something about the way the birthday girl looked at her, her eyes remaining narrowed every time they slid in her direction, her scowl never softening. It left Silva with the distinct impression that she was an unwanted plus one at this little soirée, but rather than react with the eye-crossing jealousy that was, unfortunately, becoming her default state when it came to him, she felt buoyed. He had a history with the woman, that she was certain.And he brought you anyway!Brought her and flaunted her at his side, called her his, making it very clear where she stood . . . At least, before this nymph and her other guests. All she needed now, Silva thought, was for him to let her in fully, tell her the contents of his heart and all his secrets, display this sort of steadfastness on a weekly basis and eventually, in front of her family. A small ask, she thought. The bare minimum, even.
Silva found herself sliding in and out of the conversations taking place around her as well, flitting from cluster to cluster, sparkling and charming these lovely strangers who were his friends. When her circuit around the platform brought her back to the cluster of nymphs where the birthday girl held court, she decided it would only be polite to attempt to join their conversation as well. She had spent her entire life cloistered in Elvish society — private clubs, private schools, gated communities and vacation resorts, a breeding ground for petty rivalries and a social hierarchy she had learned to navigate shortly after she’d learned to walk. She knew, immediately upon her approach, when the hushed voices of the whispering elves and nymphs went silent, that she was the topic of their conversation. There was a particular smile she had, broad and beatific, the one her father had always told her would get her anything she wanted, and she pulled it from her arsenal then. She had nothing to feel insecure about before these lovely, lithe strangers. She beamed at the group of them, and beyond where they were sitting, on the other side of the platform, she could see Tate. His dark brows drew together, a slight look of alarm as she approached the circle of nymphs and elves, and her smile stretched wider. He didn't have anything to worry about, for this washerworld, and she could hold her own with ease.
"So how long have you known Tate?" One of the elves piped up after superficial pleasantries were exchanged, several of the girls giggling nervously and exchanging guarded looks.
"We've been together since the beginning of the summer," she simpered, tossing another smile in his direction, as if she couldn’t bear to be parted from his side for more than a few moments. It wasn't a lie, she decided, as the girls exchanged looks. They had never talked over the nature of their relationship, had never had a serious conversation about where they were going and what they were or what the future might hold, but she’d done enough planning for the two of them. Tate had marked her skin and marked her heart that very first weekend. That was more than six months ago now, more than half a year,morethan high time to assert herself as a fixture in his life. And what better place to start, Silva thought, than with this well-heeled group of his friends.
She continued to chat with the elves, embellishing her answers when necessary when their relationship was the topic, having no shortage of well-thought-out scenarios in which to bolster the truth. The birthday girl remained sullen and slit-eyed throughout, but Silva had decided she wasn't terribly important. Certainly not as important as the cluster of beautiful young women, each of them bearing the mark of professional gossips, none of them being from her own Elvish community, and the tales they took back to whatever social circles he moved in were far more important than this one nymph's personal feelings. Silva knew how to play this game, and she gave the girl her best smile again.
She continued to make her way around the platform, winding up back at his side at last. He gazed down archly, eyebrow raised, one corner of his mouth tugging into a smile.
"Making friends, dove?"
She hummed, grinning up at him. "I don't think I have any friends in that group, but that's okay. I don't get the impression the guest of honor likes me very much." The beautiful nymph was standing at the rail with her boyfriend, who bent nearly in half to speak in her ear. As Silva watched, the girl crossed her arms petulantly rolling her eyes and tossing her long extensions. "But it doesn’t seem that she likes much of anything, to be honest. You slept with her, right?" She was proud of how casual she managed to sound, how thoroughly unaffected and confident she seemed. It was all a façade of course, but he didn’t need to know that, not just then.
Tate chuckled. "Slept with both of them, actually. Before they were together, of course." She gasped, turning up to him with her mouth dropped open, dissolving into giggles at the sight of his sharp edged smile. "Her father is one of the biggest bottle distributors on the East Coast. I don't want to say that's the reason, because that doesn't make me sound very chivalrous . . . but I did manage to secure a very generous contract with him during our brief entanglement. I'm the one who introduced the two of them," he added. "I thought introducing her to Darvin was a good compromise on walking away."
"I think you're a bit of a rake," she accused primly, feeling a strange bubble of giddiness move through her. It was odd, this ease she felt, so unlike the gut churning jealousy that normally gripped her in all matters where he was concerned, but it was likely owed to the fact that it was evident to all that there was nothing between him and the birthday girlorher boyfriend. She thought she probably should have been appalled at the ease of his admission, but the knowledge only made her giggle again. After all, she had read enough books to know that even the most rakish rake could be reformed by the story's end. "You're an absolute cad."
His attention was caught then by a troll on the lower level who had paused at the base of the staircase leading up to the platform, his platinum white hair making his gray skin glow. The troll wore a lanyard identifying him as a part of the security staff. He and Tate seemed well-acquainted, and instantly began an animated conversation. They weren't speaking the common, she realized, leaving her out of being able to listen, but she took note of the way his smile brightened, his voice taking on a warmer tone, one that he hadn't possessed all evening., amongst these beautiful strangers. She wandered a few feet away, not wanting to hover at his side and impede his conversation, not when he actually seemed tolikethis troll. She stared out over the club's expansive main floor, long brightly lit bar at the back, the bottom level's dance floor visible from her vantage point.
It was then that she saw him. He was across the bar, standing at one of the hightops that ringed the open mouth of the dancefloor, a level below. Silva recognized the back of his white-blonde head easily, having miserably stared at it from the corner of his mattress, where she’d been banished for the three months they’d been together.
That first weekend after she’d called Wynn to end things, before blocking his number, when she’d gone back to the little orc resort town with Lurielle and had stood in the middle of the dining room of the bistro with Tate, invisible to the patrons and employees that buzzed around them as he kissed her, she’d decided she would be quite happy to never see her ex again.
They’d left the bistro that day and walked through the little downtown, and she’d sat sideways across his lap on a bench overlooking the fast-moving creek that ran under the bridge.
"Did-did you think about . . . " She’d trailed off, blushing at her blurted question, but still wanting to know,needingto know if he’d thought about her at all during those three months. Three months of being miserable with someone else, all the while thinking of him, of being a different person, a freer version of herself at his side.
"I think about a lot of things, Silva," he’d interrupted her thoughts. "What will happen to the girls if it's a bad enough winter that I have to put them on unemployment?" he murmured, his fingers tracing circles over her knees. "Will Cym be able to feed her kids? Is Thessa going to be able to hold on without looking for a new job? I wonder how long we’ll be able to get the dishwasher to hold out, or if today's the day she's going to groan her last groan and flood the back room. I wonder if I'm going to need to fly home this year to check on my mother, or if I can put that off for another decade. I think about a lot of things, Silva, so you're going to need to be a bit more specific. I told you you'd always have somewhere to come, dove, and so you do. And so you're here. If you're concerned about the length of time since last we spoke and things that were done or undone in the interim, that's between you and your calendar."
Her ears heated, neck flushing purple, and she’d been worried her voice would betray how close to tears she was. "You didn't exactly make it easy to contact you, you know. You didn't even give me your number."
His head had cocked, his askance look and knowing grin making it clear he put very little stock into her excuse. "Well, I didn't actually expect to see you again, if I'm being perfectly honest. But I'm very glad that you managed to call the publicly listed business number, and I'm very glad that you're here. Is that what you're asking, Silva? If I'm glad that you managed to find your way back? I am, if you were concerned."
She’d swallowed, feeling foolish, and lowered her eyes. She wanted to hear that he’d been thinking about her, that he’dmissedher even, that he’d spent a tenth of the time twisting over thoughts of her as she had over him. Tate was busy, had grown-up problems and responsibilities, and was too preoccupied to waste his precious little free time thinking about a weekend fling from several months earlier, she’d reminded herself, feeling herself shrink. She’d jumped when he’d pushed her hair behind her ear, pressing his nose into it and inhaling deeply. For a long, loaded moment, he'd said nothing, simply breathed against her.
"Every day, dove." His voice had been a whisper against her ear, followed by the press of his lips, warm against her skin, and her heart had lifted on beating wings. When they’d finally gone to bed that night, she’d quickly reclaimed her favorite spot from three months prior — pressed to his chest, skin-to-skin, the solid thump of his heartbeat beneath her cheek a percussive lullaby. When she’d woken the next morning to the sound of his too-early alarm, she’d still been spooned against him, his arms around her securely and his fingers tangled in her hair. Silva remembered thinking it had been a far cry from the cold nights she'd spent by herself on the edge of Wynndevar's bed, for three long months.
The sight of the back of his platinum-haired head now made her flush in indignation all over again. Shehatedhim. Hated the way he’d made her feel, hated howmeanhe’d been in such a short amount of time, time that should have been colored in the rosy wash of a new relationship, not filled with cutting remarks and barely concealed insults. She thought of the night he’d yanked her wrist as they were exiting a rideshare, annoyed that she was taking too long collecting her bag, hard enough that the aubergine outline of his fingers had been visible on her lavender skin, and of the night he’d shouldered her in the jaw, making her bite her cheek. Most of all, Silva thought, she hated herself for having wasted the time, three months of her life she’d never get back; three months she could have spent wrapped in Tate’s arms. She hated that she’d allowed herself to be treated so poorly for so long.
"What’s wrong?" Tate’s voice was an amused curl around her ear, and she realized how she must have been scowling. She turned from the railing to find his slim black brow arched expectantly, the three small, silver hoops there catching the colored light from the bar.
"Nothing. Just someone I don’t like." He followed her gaze, landing slightly short on a table of gnolls who were animatedly conversing with huge gesticulations.
"Do you have something personal against gnolls in general? Or one in particular? Do we need to avenge your family honor?"
"No!" she exclaimed with a laugh, tugging his hand as she turned back to his friends. "I don’t have a problem with gnolls." The satyr, she saw, was telling a story, surrounded by several of the giggling elves. Silva wondered if any of these girls knew Tate was Elvish; that he had more in common with them than he did with the orcs who patronized his businesses. She’d been testing her Elvish on him, and he’d laughingly proclaimed it ‘a wee bit rusty,’ but every time they were together they practiced. She'd never had a particularly strong appreciation for it in school, one of her harder classes, but then again, she'd never had a classroom opportunity to hear it spoken in his lilting accent while she laid against his chest, his fingers gently carding through her hair. She wondered if any of these giggling girls knew him that way at all.
