“Hey,” I called out to Ace as he moved nearby. He looked at me unwillingly, and I could see he hoped I wasn’t going to try to talk much. I had to try, though. At least I could make conversation and see if it could go somewhere. I just needed a friend. “Are you going to stay out long, or go back to the room?”
“I’m staying out,” Ace said, ignoring my attempt to get him to give a longer explanation and looking away from me. “Hey, Xavi! Hold up!”
And then he was gone, walking after his friend and leaving me behind.
I looked down at my drink on the bar and swallowed. There was a lump in my throat that wouldn’t go away. Only one thing to do for that.
I threw my drink back, pouring the alcohol down my throat, hoping everything would hurt less if I was numb.
Ace
“Nope,” Xavi said and threw back a shot.
I blinked. “What do you mean, nope?”
“Buzz off.” Xavi cocked his head at me and then looked away like I wasn’t even worth contemplating. “I told you. I’m working on Taeho.”
I took a breath and then bit my tongue to keep in what I wanted to say. It wouldn’t have been pretty, and I also doubted it would get me anywhere, anyway.
Xavi probably already knew he was a prissy little bitch, and me saying it out loud wasn’t going to change him.
“Fine,” I muttered and turned away, heading right back for the bar.
I asked the barman for a row of shots and moved down them myself, watching his eyes slowly widen as he realized I hadn’t ordered them to share with friends. I finished the last one and shook my head to clear it, feeling the alcohol hit my system. It was strong. That was good. I needed strong right now.
I needed numb.
“Woah.”
I looked up to see Olly watching me from the spot next to me at the bar. He’d left Keaton and a bunch of our group on some chairs over to the side, clearly coming over to place the order on their behalf.
“What?” I asked.
He stared at the empty shot glasses and then back up at me. “You okay?”
I sighed. “I’m fine,” I said. I didn’t want to get into it. This was supposed to be making me feel better, not worse.
“Okay,” Olly said. But in typical Oliver Harvey fashion, that one word said a lot more than it seemed. It conveyed doubt in what I’d said, an offer of help if I needed it, and even a hint of warning that going on and drinking so much probably wasn’t a good idea.
“I’ll come and join you in a bit,” I said, waving my hand – an acceptance of his help. He nodded his head in satisfaction, gathered up six drinks somehow in his massive football player hands, and walked back over to the others.
Which left me sitting at the bar, already regretting my choices and wondering where I was going next with this.
Xavi didn’t want me tonight. Taeho was off limits since Xavi would be sniffing around him all night like a bitch on heat. The rest of our group were either taken or straight, or both.
Except for…
Maybe, at least, the one person who would understand what it was like to feel left out.
Brody was sitting at the bar around the corner, at a right angle to me, nursing what looked like a whiskey. I grabbed the bartender’s attention and asked for another one of the blue cocktails I’d had at the table – it was both delicious and full of so much sugar that it actually added to the feeling of drunkenness, which suited me perfectly at that exact moment. Once it was in my hand, I got up and sidled around towards Brody, pitching up on the stool next to him.
“Hi, roomie,” he said, with such a wry and self-deprecating tone that I actually felt sorry for him for about a half-second.
“Propping up the bar?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I was thinking about calling it a night early. I’ve had a long day – I had a full day of work before I got to the airport.”
I shook my head in sympathy. “Boss wouldn’t give you the time off?”
