Page 6 of The Enemy: Extended Edition

Logan hangs his arm over my shoulder, and his breath rams into me like a four-hundred-pound linebacker. “Fun party, right?! I’m having a killer time, bro.” Anytime Logan is drunk, he talks like an eighteen-year-old frat boy who sneaks watermelon wine coolers. He raises his glass into the air. “Best bachelor party ever!” he yells and then woooos at the top of his lungs right beside my ear. I’m deaf now.

He continues to hang on me as we make our way around the bar. “Where’s Stacy? I think we need to get you back on that leash of yours.”

“She went to the bathroom.” Logan then abruptly stops and catches my arm to get me to stop walking. His face is so serious now I’m worried he might be about to hurl all over me. “Ryan, bro”—he never calls me bro—“have I ever told you how much you mean to me?” Oh, good. We’ve entered the heartfelt portion of his drunkenness. I need to get him home before the next phase hits: Naked Logan.

“Yeah, yeah, we’re besties. Let’s go get you some water.”

He shakes his head. Clearly, he’s not said all that was in his heart. “I’m serious, man. If there’s ever anything I can do for you. Just name it. Seriously. Like, do you need my shirt? It’s yours!”

And yep, he’s unbuttoning it. I guess “Naked Logan” is already in motion.

“Stop taking off your shirt.” I grab him by the shoulder and start dragging him toward the table where a few of the other groomsmen are huddled and drunk-swiping through Tinder together. One guy is about to send a message to a woman that he will most definitely regret in the morning, so I snatch his phone and pocket it. He frowns and protests, saying something about me being a killjoy.

I spot Stacy’s bridesmaids across the room, all writing their numbers on the bar’s wall in Sharpie. This is not a “draw on the wall” sort of bar, and I’m pretty sure they are seconds away from being kicked out.

But I knew this would happen. That’s why I cut myself off after one drink. Someone needs to be the voice of reason in the group. That, and because I haven’t partied since I was in my early twenties. Life hasn’t exactly given me any downtime to go out late with friends. I’m not even sure I know how to let loose anymore.

“Sit,” I say, depositing Logan in a chair. He looks up at me, and now he’s a pouty toddler who’s just had his lollipop ripped from his hand. “I’ll go find Stacy and then call you two a ride.” A few of the guys at the table boo me. “Looks like I’m calling everyone rides.”

In the next moment, the music cuts off, and I hear someone blowing into a microphone. I turn around and spot June up on the karaoke stage, mic clutched between both her hands, smiling like her mouth is numb from dental surgery and she’s halfway under the effects of anesthesia. She still looks every bit as cute as she did at the beginning of the night, though. If not a little more, because now she’s taken off her high heels and loosened up. She looks more like the girl I secretly crushed on in high school, and it’s making my stomach twist.

“Helllloooo, ladies and gentlemen! Who wants to have fun tonight?!” she yells into the microphone. My ears bleed when a sharp whine tears through the speakers. Everyone else in this bar is so far gone, though, that they don’t notice. They hoot and catcall like Lady Gaga herself has just stepped onto the stage.

“Good!” June rips the mic from the stand and paces. She actually looks pretty natural up there. “ ’Cause we’re gonna party ALL NIGHT!”

No, we’re not. The bar closes in thirty minutes.

“But first”—her eyes cut right to me for the first time since the beginning of the night when I removed the toilet paper from her shoe—“I want to introduce you all to my friend, Ryan Henderson! Come on up here, Chefy!”

I should have known she had something planned. What does she think will happen? I’ll go up there and she will stick the mic in my hand and trick me into singing and embarrassing myself in front of everyone? Apparently, she doesn’t realize that she’s about four more drinks in than me.

I smile and shake my head no at her, trying not to make a big scene.

June stumble-sways to the right before catching the mic stand to balance herself again. “Oh, come on, don’t be a party pooper, Mr. Darcy!” It makes me laugh that June still calls me Mr. Darcy. She’s been doing it ever since I tried to keep my best friend away from her best friend in junior high, aka “pulling a Darcy” from Pride and Prejudice.

The bar erupts with drunken encouragement. A beautiful redhead in a skintight dress sidles up next to me and wraps her arm around mine. “I’ll go up there with you if you’re shy.” Yeah, no.

I extract my arm and look back up to meet June’s seething expression. Seething that I’m not budging or because of the pretty redhead?

“Sorry. Not gonna happen,” I call out, trying to settle the crowd.

“Go on, Ryan! Sing with June,” Stacy yells after returning from the bathroom and planting herself on Logan’s lap.

But June doesn’t want to sing with me. This is all a part of the war she started back up tonight. She’s looking for a way to humiliate me. To knock me down a few notches. And even though I came here intending to bury our old feud, seeing her again makes me want to play along. I loved dueling with June back in the day. It felt like flirting back then, and it feels like it now. So, I’ll join her battle, but I won’t play by her rules.

Game on, June Bug.

I lock eyes with June and take off my jacket with a smirk. Her smile falters as I walk toward the stage, because she can’t believe how easily she has won this round.

The back of my neck heats from the bright lights as I approach the stage, and she takes a step back. I don’t bother with the stairs and, instead, take one big step up—directly in front of June. She looks like a trapped animal now with big alert eyes. I walk closer and take her by surprise when I wrap my jacket around her shoulders. She was anticipating danger and got warmth instead.

“What are you doing?” she asks, looking down dramatically to the jacket. Her mind is moving too slow to figure out what’s happening.

“It’s cold outside, and I don’t want you to freeze when we leave.” I put my arm around her, escorting her from the stage so she doesn’t face-plant. The second we are off the stairs, she rips away from me and stumbles backward.

“Everyone wants a performance, and if you’re too good to sing at karaoke night, then I’ll do it!” It’s adorable how powerful she thinks she looks right now. I could pick her up off the ground by my index finger and thumb and place her in my pocket.

“You can perform next time. Right now, it’s time to get you home safely.”

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