Page 73 of The Failed Audition

Then she liesoverhis lap, hiking up the bottom of her dress to reveal her ass.

My stomach compresses without my permission—my heart on a strange, foreign descent. A burly man with a thick neck passes Nikolai a tattoo gun.

“I would’ve won,” Timo announces, disappointment lacing his voice. Though he squeezes my shoulder likecheer up, Thora James. It’s okay.

I must look as horrible as I feel.

“Everyone wins eventually,” John says, his tone less hostile than usual. “It doesn’t mean you can’t lose.”

Nikolai places his hand on the girl’s ass, concentrating on the needle as it digs into her flesh. He tells her something, his lips rising in a charismatic smile that lights his gray eyes. And she laughs. I want to look away. I don’t want to watch this—because it hurts.

It shouldn’t hurt this much.

And yet, I can’t. Move. I can’t lift my foot or spin around. I torture myself by staying here.

The red glow of his necklace swathes his face, his features as devilish and masculine as that first night we met. Only I’m not the subject of his intensity.You know this happens every Saturday, Thora.I know. It’s nothing, really. It all means nothing—in every direction.

A couple brutal minutes pass and he’s finished, inking a well-drawn heart on her left butt cheek. Carefully, he places a bandage on the tattoo and tugs her dress down, covering her thong. She wobbles as she stands, and he rights her with a protective hand to her waist.

“Thora,” I hear Timo say in concern.

I open my mouth, but no words come.

In a millisecond, the girl goes from clutching his biceps. To leaning in.

Her lips are on his.

And he grips the back of her head, reciprocating the single kiss. My breath is padlocked in my lungs. Even after they disconnect. Nikolai kisses her cheek and gestures to a group of girls who cheer and shout things likeget it, Rachel!They must be her friends.

The girl returns to them with the smuggest, happiest grin. She kissed the God of Russia and can now recount the tale. He’s already scanning the room with a charming smile, searching for his next volunteer. Hands shoot all around me.

Timo squeezes my shoulder again and then he shouts something in Russian. His voice overpowers the music and causes Nikolai to rotate towards us.

His eyes stop dead on me.

And that smile fades in an instant.

I can’t pick apart my feelings. Or his. But if I could assume anything at all—it’d be on the precipice of pain and distress. I’m rethinking my choice in glowstick. This is utterly complicated.

“Let’s go dance,” John tells me, reaching for my arm past Timo.

“Yeah, I could dance,” Timo nods.

“Not you—ugh, whatever, come on, Thora.” John guides me through the masses and closer to the mosh pit dancefloor, people jumping or grinding, depending on their level of intoxication.

I’m surprised my feet moved at all.

John tips a waitress an extra twenty to steal the drinks off her tray, and he passes me the shot and keeps the other two for himself.

“You seriously aren’t going to share?” Timo asks with the tilt of his head. He rests his forearm on John’s shoulder.

“I’m seriously not sharing,” John replies, and to further his point, he throws back the first shot and then the second.

Timo isn’t discouraged in the least. He dances with better rhythm than most everyone here. The three of us group off in a cluster, blocking out the surrounding people. I’m less overwhelmed, and the shot will help too. Normally I’d take an economic sip, but I mimic John and toss mine back.

It burns my throat, and I cough into my fist.

“Easy, Thora James!” Timo shouts over the music. When I look at him, his eyes beam like he’s having the time of his life. In the prime of his youth. And it lightens my weighted body, immeasurably.

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