THE BUNGALOW IN SANTA MONICA is unusually busy for a weeknight. Someone mentioned there was some indie premiere going on not far from here, which explains the influx of hipsters, pop princess-looking types, and Europeans in head-to-toe designer monograms mixed in with a few bookish, film nerd types.

“Hi, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced. I’m Maritza, Melrose’s favorite cousin.” A dark-haired girl who looks like she could be Melrose’s sister sidles up beside me.

“Favorite cousin? Try only.” Melrose winks, taking a sip of her Moscow Mule. “Oh, hey! Aerin just got here. I’ll be right back.”

Melrose dashes across the bar, flagging down one of her friends and leaving me with the woman who looks like she’s about to aim and fire a thousand questions at me.

“So how long have you had a thing for my cousin?” Maritza asks as I take a sip of my beer.

I almost choke on my drink. “Excuse me?”

“How long have you liked her?”

“No idea what you’re talking about.” I take another sip and scan the area.

Earlier tonight, I’d barely had a chance to wrap my head around the fact that she’s going to be moving out in two weeks to go shoot a movie when Nick stole the show with his perfect fucking timing.

I watched her smile and listened as she called him “Nicky” and pranced around the room like a schoolgirl gabbing with her best friend.

She’s never like that with me, so giddy and energetic.

Now I’m ninety-nine percent sure it’s Nick that she’s holding out for. And I’m ninety-nine point nine percent sure she’s not going to want to start anything that remotely resembles an exclusive relationship when she’s two weeks out from filming one of the biggest roles of her career.

I’d be a selfish bastard to even ask her to consider it.

I’m happy for Melrose. I am. She deserves this more than anyone.

“Don’t bullshit me,” Maritza says. “Our grandmother taught us how to read people. We know how to study nuances and interpret body language. When you sit by her, your body is angled toward her. When she walks toward you, you take a deep breath. When she walks away, you steal little side glances at her.”

“Those are things everyone does.” I scan the room once more, mentally pleading for someone to come save me from Cousin Maritza.

I met her boyfriend earlier in line outside the men’s room. He seemed cool. Quiet, low-key. Nothing like this chick.

“Deny it all you want, handsome, but you want her,” she says, dark brows lifted as she reaches for her mint julep. “For what it’s worth, I can tell she likes you just as much.”

“What, because she takes a deep breath when I walk toward her?” I chuff.

“No. Because she told me.”

I almost choke on my beer. “When?”

“That weekend at Gram’s banquet. I mean, she didn’t come out and say those exact words … that she liked you … but it was implied.” Maritza waves at someone a few tables down.

“How do you know?”

“Because I know her better than anyone.” She turns back toward me. “For instance, I know when she pushes someone away, it’s because she’s scared. And pushing people away is easier than putting herself out there and being rejected. Girl can take an audition rejection like a champ, but when it comes to her heart, she’s the biggest pansy I know. Plus she has a thing for emotionally unavailable guys. It’s kind of her fatal flaw.”

“You don’t say.”

“What?” she asks, distracted by a text on her phone.

“Nothing.”

“What’re you guys talking about?” Melrose appears out of thin air, leaning against me and hooking her arm over my shoulder to steady her balance.

I’m guessing she’s on her fourth drink since we got here, and she’s going to have one hell of a hangover tomorrow if she doesn’t slow down.

“The woman of the hour, duh.” Maritza tips her drink before taking a small sip. “Where’s your drink? You empty? I’m empty.” Turning, she taps on Isaiah’s shoulder and a moment later they get up, heading to the bar.

“You having fun?” I ask a question that clearly answers itself. She hasn’t stopped grinning since we got here, and on anyone else, I’d find that amount of chipperness annoying. On her? It’s actually kind of cute...

Melrose boops me on the nose and starts giggling. I’ve never seen her this shitfaced.

“I have a secret,” she says.

“Oh, yeah? What’s that?”

She leans in, her breath warm against my ear, and then she says, “I really want to kiss you.”

“And you’re really drunk.”

Maritza and Isaiah return, triple and double fisting tequila shots, and handing them out like candy at a parade to all the people who came out to celebrate. When she hands me one, I wave my hand.

I’d rather keep a clear head and an eye on Melrose.

Maritza nudges Melrose. “Callie and Aubrey just texted and said they were here. Maybe we should go find them?”

The girls run off, and I nurse my beer and make small talk with Isaiah. He seems like an average guy. Humble. Hardworking. Military-type. He has an old Porsche that he restored.

I can appreciate a no-nonsense guy’s guy.

By the time the girls return, I only notice because I feel the weight of Melrose’s stare as Maritza says something in her ear.

Our eyes meet from across our table.

She smiles.

I smile.

“Mel, it’s getting late,” her friend, Aerin, says as she slides off her chair and hugs Melrose goodbye. “I think the girls and I are going to bounce.”

Isaiah checks his watch. “We should probably think about heading out too.”

Maritza pouts, but Melrose smiles and rolls her eyes. “You guys, please, if you’re tired, go home. The fact that you showed up on a Tuesday night for little old me means the world. I love you all so much.”

She makes her rounds, hugging her people and kissing cheeks and taking last minute selfies, and by the time she gets to me, her sleepy, drunken gaze settles on mine and she takes a breath.

“Let’s get you home,” I say, rising and guiding her by the elbow. We maneuver through tables and standing patrons until we reach the exit.

The tepid Santa Monica breeze whips Melrose’s hair in her face and she smiles, slightly wobbling as she tries to stand straight.

“You’re plastered,” I say.

“I do this, like, once a year,” she says. No. She slurs. Melrose wags her finger. “I’m not normally like this, so don’t hold it against me, ‘kay?”

“Come on. Let’s get you home.”

On the way home, I pick her up a burger and fries from In-N-Out Burger, but she passes out in my passenger seat, and by the time we get home, everything’s cold and stale.

Nevertheless, she situates herself in the living room and attempts to eat a few fries.

“You need to get something,” I say. “Something to soak up the alcohol.”

“That’s an old wives’ tale, I think,” she says, unwrapping her burger. “Speaking of wives, do you ever think you’ll get married?”

I cock my head back. “That’s random.”

“Just answer me, Alcott. I’m curious. You don’t seem like the marrying kind.” She takes another fry. “You’re so … unavailable.”

It’s then that I remember her cousin’s spiel about how Melrose is into emotionally unavailable guys. She can’t resist them. They’re her napalm. Or some shit like that. And then I can’t help but remember how her cousin claimed Melrose likes me. If I put two and two together … it paints a pretty fucking clear picture.

She only wants me because she thinks she can’t have me, which means the minute she has me, she won’t want me anymore.

Melrose shoves her unfinished meal away and rises.

“Where are you going?” I ask.

“Upstairs to change.” She hobbles toward the stairs, and I go to her side. Last thing we need is Melrose falling and literally breaking a leg before her big debut.

By the time we get to her room, she’s already peeling out of her clothes, kicking them to various corners of the room before letting her dog out of his kennel.

“Don’t you want to get dressed first?” I ask.

“Oh, yeah.” Digging in the top drawer of Nick’s dresser, she pulls out one of Nick’s old t-shirts and tugs it over her head. I can’t deny she looks hot as sin in a faded Aerosmith t-shirt and pink panties, but I don’t let myself stare too much longer.

“I have to let Murphy out, but when I get back, I want you naked in my bed, ‘kay? Thanks.” She leaves, the dog tucked under her arm, and I stay, though I’m not taking off my clothes.

I’m not fucking her, as much as I may want to.

She’s drunk.

I take a seat on the edge of her bed, waiting so I can make sure she gets to bed without hitting her head on something, and from the corner of my eye, I spot a picture of Nick and Melrose. It looks to be from prom. He in a tux, she in a sparkly red dress. A vintage muscle car in the background. They look like they’re trying not to laugh.

There’s a tight squeeze in my chest. Being jealous because of a picture is a new low for me, but he’s got something I’ll never have with her.

A history, a past.

And if he wants it, a future.

“I’m back ...” Melrose saunters in. “Hey … you’re not naked.”

I rise. “I’m not having sex with you tonight.”

A smile curls her mouth as she approaches me with a slow saunter.

“I’m serious,” I say, peering down my nose.

“So am I.” She rises on her toes, trying to kiss me.

“You’re drunk.”

“And your point?”

“I don’t sleep with drunk girls,” I say.

Melrose rolls her indigo eyes. “Stop.”

“Stop what?”

“Stop being so damn perfect all the time.” She plops on the foot of her bed, beside me, and folds her hands in her lap. The hem of her Aerosmith t-shirt rides up, exposing the top of her thighs and a hint of her panties.

My cock throbs, pulsing against my jeans.

“No such thing as perfect.” I rise, eyeing the door.

“Tell me something,” she says.

“What?”

“Anything. Tell me your secrets. Something you’ve never told anyone.”

I drag my hand across my jaw, letting the bristles scratch my palm. There’s only one “secret” I have, and if there’s ever a time to confess it, it isn’t now. It isn’t in this way.

When my brother was a year old or so, my parents had a few friends over, drinking beers and grilling outside. They left Tucker inside in his crib, assuming I was home and that I’d tend to him like I usually do if he started to cry.

But I snuck out that night.

A bunch of friends were getting together at the park and the girl I liked was going to be there.

I came home around midnight that night, expecting to be able to sneak in the back door, only I was met with a flash of red and blue lights and an ambulance speeding my baby brother to the nearest hospital twenty minutes away.

Turns out at some point that night he woke up, started screaming, and since everyone else was outside and I was gone, no one came to get him. Being the precocious one-year-old boy that he was, he attempted to climb out.

The CPS investigators said it was an accident … that he bumped his head on the changing table, causing blunt force trauma to his head leading to permanent hearing loss.

Had I been there that night like I was supposed to be, that never would’ve happened.

“What makes you think I have secrets?” I ask.

Melrose lifts a shoulder. “Because you always look like you have something you need to get off your chest. And chances are, whatever you tell me tonight, I won’t remember in the morning. You could probably confess a murder and come tomorrow,” she swipes her palm across the air, “blank slate. Gone. Guarantee you’ll feel better too.”

“I’ll pass.”

“Of course you’ll pass.” She climbs into her bed, drawing her knees against her chest and reaching for the covers, pulling them over her. With half-moon eyes, she peers at me. And then she rolls to her side, cupping her hand beneath her cheek and smiling.

“What?” I ask.

“Do you ever wonder ...” Melrose yawns.

My heart whooshes in my ears.

“Do you ever wonder,” she tries again, “what it would be like to date each other?”

Her eyes flutter closed and her breathing begins to steady.

And then she’s out.