Page 8 of Meet Me at Midnight

Avery responds by blowing him a kiss before grabbing my hand and dragging me out of the VIP section. She offers a flirty smile to one of the security guards working the VIP entrance stairs before guiding us into the crowd of dancing bodies.

Of the two of us, Avery has always been the lead partier. I followed her because I’d be flogged if I didn’t—even got pretty good at downing shots in college—but the more I go out, the more I end up in some weird internal crisis about what life has to offer other thanthis. Realistically, are parties and booze and money and fancy yachts and big mansions with the best ocean view going to be it for me?

Or is there more? Something better? Somethingreal?

And how shitty of a person do I have to be to complain about how rich I am? I don’t want to be ungrateful, I swear. I know I’ve been afforded a million things that so many people do nothingbut dream about. But I just…I don’t know. It all feels fucking shallow. Like there’s no substance or purpose at all.

It’s so complicated.

I sigh.See? Crisis.

Avery drags us to the middle of the dance floor, having no qualms about pushing people out of our way as she does, and doesn’t let go of my hand until she finds an open spot in the middle of the floor she deems worthy of our dance moves.

When we’re in the zone, we take up a lot of space, especially when Avery does her personal modification of a twerk. She calls it the “booty rizz,” and I don’t think we’ve been to a party or a club in the last five years where she hasn’t used it.

She shakes her ass, smiling over at me as she does, and I force myself to let go and vibe with the beat of the music. It’s not long before I’m fully immersed in the song, raising my hands in the air, and circling my hips. I lean my head back and can feel the swish of my long red locks on the bare area of my lower back.

Despite my reservations, it actually starts to feel good. I guess all that bullshit they tell you about moving your body being beneficial for your mind has some truth to it.

But Avery’s moves are a Miami mating call, and it’s not long before the vultures are circling. A big, muscular guy with a buzz cut and a toothy smile slides in beside me, and a tall guy with blond hair is now on the receiving end of Avery’s signature ass-grind.So much for David, I guess?

“You wanna dance, sweet thing?” Buzz Cut asks me, his meaty hands already grabbing my hips, and my blood pressure skyrockets.

I make a snap decision to slip out of the dancing crowd and head toward the bar, using the ASL alphabet I learned in third grade to pretend I’m deaf when Buzz Cut calls after me. I know it’s shitty to appropriate a disability like that, but men are scary. Sometimes, moral compromise is the lesser evil.

I get a water from the bartender and slide into an empty barstool as soon as it’s vacated. I chug half the bottle before turning back to keep tabs on Avery—who is now making out with the blond.

“Great,” I mutter, a sardonic laugh that probably makes me seem mentally unstable to the people around me. But if they had any idea how many times I’ve been on crime-scene cleanup due to Avery’s fickle affection, they’d be talking to themselves too.

I try to distract myself from the likelihood of David’s impending breakdown when he sees Avery on the dance floor sucking face with some random dude by people-watching the crowd, but it gets me into even more trouble.

There’s a dark, wavy, familiar head of hair in one of the VIP sections above the dance floor, and my heart kicks up into a sprint on its chest treadmill.

Beau Banks is here, and suddenly, nothing else matters.

He doesn’t frequent clubs or bars like his sister, but it’s not out of the ordinary to see him out either. Especially on a day like today—with the way work ended in a Celebrity Deathmatch with Seth—it makes sense that he’s blowing off steam. He’s the definition of an Extroverted Introvert personality.

He’s with a few guys I recognize, friends of his I’ve met over the years because I spent more time with the Bankses than I did my own family, and his smile is showstopping, even from here.

He laughs at something his buddy Henry says, and a flock of butterflies escapes their cage inside my belly. I hang on Beau’s every silent word, trying like hell to read his lips as a blond stunner in a red bodycon dress sidles up beside him.

She’s the kind of gorgeous and sexy that’s obvious. You know the ones—big boobs and a thick ass paired with a small waist and one of those collarbones that looks ethereal or carved out of stone or something. And she’s standing so close to him that every time she laughs at whatever Beau says, her pushed-up breasts brush his arm.

In a head-to-head matchup, my gangly, long legs and overly freckled skin would get KO’ed in the first round, and yet, I find myself fantasizing wildly about him brushing her off to come talk to me instead.

I’m delusional at this point. Truly.

Sometimes, I think my life would be so much easier if I could get over my crush on Beau. But after a decade of trying to move on and failing miserably, I’m starting to think it’s going to take an exorcism or, I don’t know…death…to actually do it.

I wallow in my misery for a few minutes longer, watching the way she reaches up to brush some of Beau’s perfect hair out of his eyes, but when I feel like he’s getting a little too smiley with her, and I get that stabby, can’t-breathe level of jealousy in my chest I used to get when I watched him with his ex Bethany, I avert my attention.

“What are you drinking?”

The question feels like it comes out of nowhere, but I’m pretty sure that’s the heartbroken disassociation talking. When I look to my right, I see a man standing beside me. He’s pretty tall, has light-brown hair, gray eyes, and a nice smile that isn’t threatening or over the top. His appeal is more boy-next-door than dark and dangerous, and for once, I consider the possibility that maybe I shouldn’t immediately scare him away like I usually do with most random men who approach me in nightclubs.

Avery is always saying the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else, and while I normally think she’s insane, seeing Beau smiling at big-boobed blonde bombshells is enough to shake my reality.

“Uh…water,” I answer, shrugging one shoulder as I glance down at my now half-empty bottle.

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