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“Leslie? Lila, Leigh or some shit like that … No, only met her tonight.” He pulled out cigarettes and packed the box into the palm of his hand with humor in his eyes. “You looking to smash?”
I glared at him, putting no energy into responding to the ridiculous question before my gaze made the journey over the packed crowd. Smoke swirled in the air between us, and Jinx went on about something that had nothing to do with Mia or Scott.
But I couldn’t focus on a single thing. Many heads turned to face us, looking over to where we stood, judging, plotting, or admiring, I couldn’t tell. There were too many eyes on me, and their noise was too fucking loud.
“Oliver,” Jinx pulled me out, and I snapped my eyes forward where the girl whose name started with an L looked up at me with a cup in hand. Cheap vodka on ice. The burn hit the back of my throat as I drank it in one large gulp to drown out the noise around me. Setting the plastic cup on the hood of the car, I looked back over at Jinx who wore a pleasing grin. “You okay?” he asked, and I nodded in reflex. “Let’s go inside. I’ll tell you all about Scott.”
After two drinks, I’d learned Scott kept to himself and made zero friends with the other security guards at Dolor. My nerves calmed a tad from the liquor, mind stuck in a trance, and my gaze hung on to the blur of bodies dancing before me. A new song I’d never heard of drifted, laughter and soft voices flowed, and the girl with the L name ended up at my side, the both of them feeding me drinks and information. None of which were of any use to me.
Everything he’d said about Scott wasn’t new to me.
Scott was quiet, careful, and cautious.
The only person he fancied was Mia.
“I’d never heard anyone talk to Lynch the way Scott did,” Jinx leaned over and flicked his cigarette, dropping ashes in a cup between us, “Scott just didn’t give a shit, you know? Acted like he was doing Lynch a favor by being there, and Lynch never said otherwise. It was fucking weird, and it pissed off some of my mates. The whole situation was dodgy.”
“So, you have nothing,” I mumbled before bringing the rim of the cup to my lips. Sinking back into the couch, I stretched open my thighs as my heel tapped over the ground.
“The best I can do for you is to try and get his address tomorrow. My shift starts at one, but it’s risky. I’m putting a lot on the line for you.”
“I’ll take care of you,” I said, meaning every word. Usually, I wouldn’t put anyone on the line for me, but Mia? There was no line.
Jinx stood and gripped my shoulder. “I know you will. You’ve never done me wrong.”
After every sip, it became harder to hold it together. I clenched my teeth and fisted the plastic cup at the smiles surrounding me, couples rubbing against each other, and people pairing off. My eyes burned from the memories swirling inside me, reminding me how far apart Mia and I were.
“Jinx says you’re a writer?” L asked with a hand over my stretched thigh and vodka in her breath. I climbed to my feet and snapped my eyes to where Jinx had been sitting moments before. “He’s gone,” she added, tugging on my arm.
“Where did he go?” The room spun as sweat, the beat, and the laughs infiltrated my useless fucking brain. The dizziness sent me back over the couch, and I dropped my head into my hands.
“C’mon, I’ll take you to him.” The girl with the L name lifted me off the couch and led me down a hall. We squeezed through sweaty bodies, and drinks spilled down the front of my shirt and pants until we pushed through a door. The room was bright, and all I wanted was to lay my head to stop the world from spi
We were in a small room, separating the kitchen from another door leading somewhere else. Disgusted by the touch, I gripped L’s wrist and pushed her arm away. She had blonde hair, but brown seeped from her roots, and her black eyes looked up at me from below as she held my hips steady against the wall. Everything about her screamed my mum, and I wanted to curl inside a ball until she disappeared.
“I have to go. Tell Jinx I’m leaving for me?”
A curtain of blonde hair surrounded the faux i
“It’s okay. We’re alone in here.” L’s voice hit my skin, sounding like syrup pouring from sticky red lips. She gripped my bicep, and naturally, I jerked away from her.
The wall behind me was the only source to steady myself through the swaying fog. Time didn’t pass normally in this black hole. “I need air … I need to find air. I need to find Mia.”
“Is she your girlfriend?” L asked, and my head snapped forward at the sound of Mia’s name coming from somewhere else other than my head.
She’s my love. Why couldn’t she meet me? We’d made a promise. Hell, we fucking made promises. Plural. “I can’t feel her anymore.” I scratched at my chest. The alcohol was poisoning me—my heart and mind. “Why can’t I feel her? Something’s not right. I don’t feel right.”
My back hit the wall again, and I dragged down until two hands gripped my hips to keep me upright. “Oliver,” my name slithered into the space between us. “Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m okay! I’m fine!” I pushed past her, stumbling through the other door, into a garage, until reaching the side of the house. My fist punched the stucco, breaking the skin, and I turned and slid down the rough siding until my bum hit the floor. Fist pounding and blood spilling, I was drunk in despair and stuck in the middle of nowhere.
I shoved my hands into my pocket for my mobile.
Ringing Travis, he picked up with a tired tone, and my fingers pinched the bridge of my nose. “I’m not okay, Trav,” I finally admitted, dropping my forehead into my hand. My shoulders shook against the side of the house. “I’m not fucking okay. I’m a fucking mess right now.”
“Where are you?”
“She’s gone, man. Fucking gone,” I slammed my eyes shut as the world spun around me, “What if she left me? What if she doesn’t want me to find her? I don’t know what to do anymore,” I turned into a bloody drunken wreck, “I have to believe something happened, that she wouldn’t leave me like this. She wouldn’t turn her back on us—”
“That’s it. I’m coming to get you.”