Chapter One
Birthdays areawesome for reminding you that you’re getting old and your life is going nowhere. Shit. I forgot I was a melancholy drunk.
“Emily, what the fuck are you thinking about?” Andrea, my best friend, shouted at me from the other side of the table. We were sitting at a four-top on an outside patio, thankful it was early spring, so not yet like living in the infamous Vegas oven.
“Sorry, girl.” I raised my blueberry margarita. “To turning 30 and becoming an old maid.”
Andrea cackled with me as we clinked glasses. “Speak for yourself. I turned 30 two years ago, and I’m not a fucking old maid.”
“That’s because you snagged yourself one of the last good ones,” I lamented before swigging my drink and savoring the bright flavors and sharpness of alcohol.
“Eh, if you focused more on your personal life and less on your work.” Her eyes widened. “Oops.”
I waved my hand, dismissing Andrea’s faux pas. My one request tonight had been not to talk about the fact that I was getting fired tomorrow. But fuck it. “Yep,” I agreed. “Startingtomorrow, I can focus more on my personal life. Of course, I won’t be able to afford a personal life.”
“In all seriousness,” Andrea began, and now I wished I hadn’t allowed her faux pas to go unchallenged. “What are you gonna do next?”
I brushed my hand over my scalp, threading my fingers through my short brown hair, hesitating. Andrea wouldn’t like this next part, I knew. “I’ve been thinking about leaving Las Vegas,” I admitted.
“I think they already made that movie,” she joked. “What about your lease?”
“Break it if needed,” I answered with a shrug. Tears pricked the corners of my brown eyes, and I blinked rapidly. I would not cry in suburban Las Vegas. That was something only drunk tourists on the Strip did. “I don’t know.”
“You’ve seemed … dissatisfied,” Andrea said tentatively.
“Fuck, this conversation got deep,” I tried to joke. “Honestly? I want an adventure.”
Andrea belly laughed. “You’re probably the only one who finds Las Vegas boring and without adventure.”
I joined in her laughter but protested the sentiment. “You know what I mean. I moved here for work, and that’s all I’ve done since college. It’s time for something new.”
Before Andrea could continue ruining my thirtieth birthday with melancholic introspection, the waiter returned and we ordered another round of drinks.
“This is my last one,” she informed me solemnly, “and then I’ve got to go. Barry has to work tomorrow, so I promised that I’d be back to relieve him before the sun comes up.” Barry and Andrea had a toddler. They were the most adorable little family unit. And I wasn’t jealous at all.
“No problem,” I assured her, and we kept the conversation light until we received and finished that final round. It all trulyfelt final. Tomorrow, my boss would fire me. Okay, in reality, the company was laying me off because we merged with another, but that didn’t make it any better. Who knew where my life would go?
“My rideshare will be here in five minutes,” Andrea said after the waiter collected her signed credit card receipt—she’d treated me, of course.
“I’ll walk you out.” I didn’t need a ride anywhere because my apartment was only a few blocks away from Downtown Summerlin.
“Thanks, bestie,” she said as she stood.
I joined her, wobbling only slightly. My alcohol tolerance wasn’t super-high, so I’d definitely exceeded it tonight. But it was a special occasion. You only turned 30 once before your life turned to shit. I swallowed the sourness, pulled my sparkling green minidress further below my ass, and linked my arm into hers. We crossed the Italian restaurant to the exit.
“Perfect timing.” Andrea pointed to an arriving sedan, the rideshare name glowing in the front windshield. She waved at the man behind the wheel, then turned to hug me goodbye. My arms encircled her, tightening with an odd sensation that I’d never see her again. “Whoa,” she murmured into my ear. “I think you’re breaking my ribs.”
I released her and offered a crooked grin. “Guess I don’t like getting old.”
She paused in opening the back door of the car. “I’m not old. Therefore, you’re not old,” she said with a wink.
“Touché.” I waved goodbye and watched the car drive off. With only a minor stumble, I walked down the sidewalk, toward my apartment building and away from the lights of our suburb’s downtown. The dark lit up now and then with closed-store signs, like the city was done with me. Approaching the last parking lot before reaching my complex, angry voices slowed my stroll.
Two of the biggest men I’d ever seen stood nose to nose, illuminated by the parking lot light above them. They both likely approached seven feet tall, and their muscles had muscles. I strained to hear what they were saying, trying to decipher the language that clearly wasn’t English.
The first man wore a hat and sunglasses at night. “Douchebag,” I mumbled to myself. D-Bag complemented the hat and sunglasses with a dark-colored jogging suit. Mafia? Did we even have them in Las Vegas anymore? He held the second man’s collar with one meaty hand, pulling him off the ground, such that the other man stood on the balls of his feet.
The second man pressed his hands against D-Bag’s chest, almost in desperation. A lock of his otherwise slicked-back dark hair fell over his forehead. He wore a black mesh top that molded to every noticeable muscle—a real gym bro—and tight black jeans. Gym Bro’s mouth ran nonstop as I crept closer, curiosity outweighing caution.
