Eli lifts his beer. “To terrible decisions!”
“Speak for yourself.” Drew laughs, then yells at the couple, “What chapel?”
The guy points vaguely toward the door like all roads lead to neon love. “Our buddy’s got a couple of limos. We’re going now!”
The circle expands, bodies jostling, people clapping them on the back and tossing bills for more shots. I look at Ollie. He looks at me. His eyes are glassy in the lights but clear underneath—alive, reckless in a way he never lets himself be.
I lean in, mouth near his ear. “Want to crash a wedding?”
He huffs a laugh that I feel in my teeth. “That sounds like chaos.”
“Yeah,” I say, and let the word mean everything. “Come be chaotic with me.”
Before he can answer, the newly engaged couple is making a sweep, collecting whoever’s in screaming distance. The groom points at our wall of band idiots. “You guys! Come on! It’s happening. We got extra seats. Bring your friends.” And then—because Vegas—someone else shouts, “Chapel Royale has space open!” which might be true or invented; it doesn’t matter. Three people yell for limos, despite them already waiting.
“Wedding field trip!” Eli crows. “Let’s corrupt some holy ground.”
Miles checks his watch, then me. It’s the smallest nod, but I understand it immediately—not a question so much as a cue:Now or never. Keep the night alive, or call it.
Fuck yes I want to keep the night going.
“Let’s go,” I say.
The band moves as one organism through the press of bodies. Hands thump our backs, someone kisses my cheek,someone else tries to put a feather boa on Ollie (he dodges, mortified), and then we’re spilling into the warm night, the desert air soft after the club’s conditioned bite.
Two limos idle at the curb like fate got us a casino high-roller’s comp ride. People pour into the first one—bride, groom, three friends, two more who might be celebrities or just rich. The second limo door opens like a mouth. Miles ushers us in with a little bow.
It’s ridiculous inside: leather that probably has a name, lights like a spaceship, a bar with tiny bottles and limes sliced to surgical precision. Eli whoops and takes the corner. Drew sprawls like a cat as a bunch of others join us. Miles slides in last and shuts the door. The city tilts as we peel away from the curb.
Ollie is beside me, thigh pressed to mine on purpose now. His cap’s gone—somehow he lost it in the tide of congratulations—and his hair’s a mess from the heat. He looks twenty-one in the way that counts: young but not naive; old enough to know he’ll remember this forever.
I don’t know who called the limo, where they chose, which chapel really has a slot, or what time it is. I just know that the moment the tinted world goes dark and our faces are lit in blue pulses, he turns to me like he’s been waiting for a door to shut all night.
“You—” he starts, then stops, shakes his head, tries again. “Tonight. Onstage. I keep replaying it.”
I smirk because I’m an asshole, but my chest is molten. “Which part?”
“All of it?” His mouth goes shy, then braver. “You looked like you’d been waiting for the room your whole life and finally found it. You looked so… free.”
The word hits like a hand on my sternum. I don’t say thanks. I lean in and kiss him, quick, like a promise I mean to keep. Thelimo’s loud—music from someone’s phone, our crew yelling back and forth—so we’re a quiet pocket in the middle of chaos.
“Say it again,” I murmur.
“Free,” he says against my mouth, and then he does something that short-circuits me: he adds, “I was so fucking proud and couldn’t believe you were mine.”
I’m not a blusher, but my body tries to make me one. I swallow it down and kiss him deeper, slow enough to make time behave. We’re not tucked into an alley or hiding behind a tree. We’re in a moving box with six other people, and still we manage a private moment because the world can go to hell for sixty seconds if I want it to.
When we break, he drops his forehead to mine. The limo bumps a pothole; his hand finds my knee like it’s reflex. “I just had to come tonight. It seems like forever that we really spent time together.”
I drag my thumb across his lower lip and watch his eyes go dark. Despite having breakfast together this morning, it wasn’t enough. Fuck knows if it ever will be.
“I missed you.”
“Yeah?” I ask, my lips curling high.
“Don’t make me repeat it.”
“Never,” I reply, then lie, saying, “Always.”
