The idea of consuming more alcohol made her want to cry. But he was right, she definitely wouldn’t be working. And without a TV in this room—or maybe anywhere in the city—she’d just be staring at the ceiling.
Then again, if she did go, she’d have to brave being sober with people who’d seen the absolute mess she’d been.
Hazy recollections of John catching her from falling trickled in. Of him pulling her off the wall, where it had felt like vines held her there, and then stabilizing her to keep her from falling back into the wall again. That was in the second bar. By the third, all she had were flashes of memories. Fever dreams, almost, accompanied by black holes.
Whose great idea was it to do a shot drinking contest?
Tristan had shown up, she remembered, tall, dark and insanely gorgeous in his perfectly fitting suit and flashing amber eyes. His body was cut from the mold of a Greek god, hard everywhere and perfectly sculpted.
And then the horror of that meeting bled through.
She groaned.
“I think I slapped Tristan.” She threw her arm over her face, wanting to shrivel up and turn to dust. “I have no idea why, either. Was it a joke? Was he pissed, and I reacted?”
But if it was a joke, slapping someone was certainly going too far. If he hadn’t been mad before, he surely must’ve been mad after. She would’ve been.Anyonewould’ve.
Maybe hehadbeen pissed. She’d been a mess when she was supposed to be acting like the mate of the most dashing gargoyle in the city, the beta to the queen of the gargoyles, the man every woman wanted. She should’ve been the model of decorum and grace, of beauty and elegance, to fit on his arm.
Instead, she’d thrown around obscenities like some sort of deranged sailor, cackled like a Halloween rendition of a witch, and kissed everyone in sight. With tongue!
Wait, did she kiss everyone?
She palmed her head as she willed her brain to dredge out the fuzzy memories. Jasper? Ulric? Aurora? She’d hugged them, hung on Jasper before they both went tumbling into John’s lap, but she couldn’t remember kissing them.John? No, not him. She hadn’t even hugged him.
“Oh, god,” she groaned. “I think I kissed Tristan, too.”
“Well, that’s only fair. He kissed you the other day. In the kitchen in Drex’s territory, remember?”
“Yeah but…that?—“
Was sexy, she finished silently. Last night would’ve been…
She didn’t even want to think about it. She’d probably tasted like stale whiskey.Cheapstale whiskey, at that. Not to mention she’d probably slobbered all over him. Hell, she might’ve licked his face for all she remembered. He’d been sober, too. She remembered that, because it had made her feel drunker.
She had to have made him angry, even though he’d never gotten mad at her before.
She thought back to sober times, wondering if that were true. But no, regardless of all the stupid things she’d done and said, he’d never raised his voice at her. He’d never called her a nasty name or threatened her in a way that didn’t tighten her core and make her think of begging him to take it further. He’d teased, he’d sauntered around full of infuriating but sexy arrogance, but he’d never turned anything she did against her.
And she’d slapped him.
More memories, distorted, of something painful. Something sweet. Something sad. She couldn’t remember any details, just that…
“I think I cried at one point.”
“Everyone needs a good cry,” he said noncommittally.
“Sure. And I have good cries—alone, in my bedroom with the door locked. Not in abar.”
“I heard everyone in your crew was blind drunk. Jasper couldn’t stand straight, and Ulric upended a table and got you all cut off. They think it’s funny.”
“They didn’t slap Tristan, then stick their tongue down his throat, then cry all over him.”
“They probably would’ve if you’d dared them.”
He wasn’t helping. “I threatened a half a dozen people with stolen weapons.” She flopped her arm back onto the bed. “Whatwas Ithinking?”
Someone knocked at the door. Sebastian swiped out of the game he’d been playing and tossed his phone onto the bed.
