Page 52 of Night Shift

Vincent shakes his head. “Nothing. Just . . .” He scans my face, and I catch another flash of hurt before he pulls his eyes off mine and lets out a shaky breath. “I hope you find what you’re looking for. Really. There’s gotta be a billionaire with a big dick out there who needs an English tutor to rip him to shreds.”

I think it’d sting less if he slapped me.

Vincent’s made fun of me for reading romance novels before. More than once, in fact, he’s pointed out that maybe my standards are unrealistically high. I have the sudden and horrible feeling that he’ll make fun of me if I tell him how scared I am. How much I want from him. How quickly I’ve gotten attached. He’ll think I’m silly. Immature. Inexperienced.

And he’d be right.

I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to be in love. Not for real.

“I think you should go to the bar,” I say, voice shaking.

For a moment, Vincent looks like he’s going to argue, but then his lips press into a flat line and he offers one sharp nod—deciding I’m not worth the trouble.

“You’re in charge, Holiday,” he says.

You’re in charge. Words uttered half an hour ago in much different circumstances, in a much different tone. I feel like I’m standing outside my own body, watching us careen toward each other like cars on an icy freeway, incapable of stepping in to stop the catastrophic collision.

My anger explodes like an airbag.

“Have fun with your boys, then,” I snap. Despite my best efforts not to say anything else, I add a very soft and slightly sarcastic: “Happy birthday.”

I turn on my heel and march into the kitchen, determined to have the last word. The second I’m swallowed up by the crowd and the booming bassline of a dark, moody song, I feel my heartbeat pounding in my temples and against my ribs. People are laughing and dancing all around me, drinks sloshing out of red cups in their hands and hips swiveling in time with the music. Everyone’s having the night of their lives.

And I’ve just imploded mine.

It all happened so fast. It feels like a fever dream.

Oh, God. What did I do?

What had to be done. I refuse to be the girl who gets blindsided. I’m smarter than that. And I’m certainly smart enough to clock a trope when I see one, so really, I’m disappointed in myself for letting this go so far. I let him see me naked. I flinch. I let him eat me out. I came on his hand. I lunge for the now-unmanned makeshift bar and surge up on my tiptoes, suddenly glad for my height and my long arms as I lean over the counter and rifle through empty red cups and glass bottles.

I need alcohol. Immediately.

I need to be so drunk that tonight becomes the kind of night that Nina and Harper always talk about having. The kind of night that ends with your head in the toilet but makes for a good story once you’ve left the embarrassment (and the hangover) far behind.

My mind gives a sharp tug. The specifics of my conversation with Vincent are already becoming a blur of anger and fear and disbelief, but I distinctly remember him saying something along the same lines. You got your story, and now you’re done. My skin prickles with unease.

What the hell did he mean by that?

I feel a hand on my back, and for one split second, I think Vincent has followed me—but when I turn to look over my shoulder, it’s Nina.

I’m furious to find that I’m disappointed.

“Did he leave?” I snap.

Nina bites down on her bottom lip, and I have my answer. Well. Good. I don’t want to spoil his birthday. I hope he has a fantastic time at the bar with all his buddies. I hope he gets his twenty-one tallies—by whatever means necessary—and that he has tons of fun telling all his friends about how I begged him to make me come.

“Kendall,” Nina says, and her sympathy stings like a knife.

“Don’t,” I rasp. I snatch up the first red cup I see on the kitchen counter, drain it, and let out a spluttering cough. It’s straight vodka. It’s like liquid fire—but I’d rather burn down the rest of tonight than think about Vincent. “If you need me, I’ll be chugging jungle juice with Harper.”

I’d rather be the supporting cast in her tragedy than the main character in mine.

Twenty-two

I’ve never been so hungover.

My Friday-night shift at the library is brutal. Almost not survivable, really. It has to be some kind of human rights violation to force a student worker to stare into the glare of a computer screen, drag around a cart of books (with a broken wheel that squeaks so loudly it’s like an ice pick to their frontal lobe), and argue with other students about their overdue books all while battling what is categorically the worst hangover of their life.

---