This promised to be aninteresting night.
FIFTEEN
MILES
I REALLY SHOULD have been used to eventslike this, considering how many I’d been to in my life, but I’d never quite gottenthe hang of them.
The tinkling of glasses andsparkling of sequins and glittered evening clutches should have been soothing,I thought. This was meant to be my element, but I’d never felt especially athome among flutes of champagne and polite small-talk that always took on anedge as the evening progressed.
Even the glut of handsomemen all dressed up in their most flatteringly-cut suits didn’t really do itfor me when I had to be there all dressed up, too. I was happy to look, but Ialways felt a little out of place being lookedat.
The only reason I’d agreed to comewas that Emily had always looked out for me when we were kids, and I felt likeI owed her my presence at her endless parties.
Online donations to her petprojects just didn’t have the same level of warmth as actually showing up inperson and being able to see that we were both still alive and more or lesswell.Thatpart, I didlike, and the way Emily’s eyes lit up when she saw me kind of made thewhole thing worth it.
Especially since Gray washere.
Having Gray as a socialbuffer would have been worth every penny if I’d been paying him hishourly rate and then some. It wasn’t that he kept people away, exactly, justthat they were a little more careful about how long they stared and what theysaid.
Not even because Gray was abig guy, I thought, but because he wasthere,and he seemed like someonewho cared about me. Someone who wouldn’t take the same amount of crap I usually tookin the name of being polite.
“I should have hired abodyguard years ago,” I said as Gray passed me my second drink for the evening,every inch the doting boyfriend I desperately wanted him to be right in thedarkest corner of my heart.
“You do seem relaxed,” Graysaid. “And you’re not even drunk yet.”
“I’m not planning to end updrunk,” I said. “Two drinks is my limit, and even my skeletal ass can handlethat.”
“I thought we agreed you hada great ass?” Gray said.
I turned to look at him,hating how easily he could make me blush. Playing it cool just wasn’t an optionaround him.
“I think we got as far asnot agreeing that watching it means actually staring at it,” I managed, amazedby my own ability to form a sentence that kind of made sense.
“Oh,” Gray sipped what I waspretty sure was plain soda water. He didn’t drink, either, as it turned out.
“Well,” he continued after amoment. “It’s great. Very cute. Attached to the rest of you, which is adefinite plus…”
“Yeah?” I squeaked. I reallydidn’twantto squeak, butthat was how it came out, and I was stuck with it now.
Gray chuckled. “Yeah. You’reactually okay, y’know? Not like I would’ve expected you to be.”
“Spoiled?” I asked wryly.
Gray shrugged. “We’ve all gotgood and bad in our lives. Can’t honestly say I would’ve traded for yours, butI don’t think that’s why you are who you are. I think you’re just… one of thegood guys.”
Just as I opened my mouth torespond, something terrible happened.
Aunt Mina spotted me fromacross the room.
I was fast enough to pretendI hadn’talso seenher, but I could seeher shouldering her way through the crowd, eyes burning with delight at having foundme.
She liked me.
My feelings toward her wereless…warm.
She didn’t have a son ofher own, and once my mom had left she’d tried to replace her, with mixedresults. I appreciated that she was trying, but she was terrible at it,overbearing and sulky when she wasn’t getting the attention she wanted, butpersistent.
So persistent.
