Tate eventually composed herself, and we finished the dishes and joined everybody else. A few more hours passed before Mom and Dad headed for bed. Will left to get some sleep since he was working at the garage early the next day, and Tate and Declan headed back to her folks’ place. But Mace, Killian, and Garrett had talked about hitting up a new club called Fresh and making a night of it.

That was when I was hit with a brilliant idea.

I waited until everyone was gone and the house was locked up for the night before snatching my phone from my desk. I scrolled to the name I needed and hit Call.

“Miss me already?” Bethany asked the second she picked up.

“Something like that,” I replied with a wide smile. “If I told you I knew where Civil Corruption was gonna be tonight, you think you could get us in?”

Her squeal was so loud that I had to pull the cell away from my ear. Once she was finished, she responded exactly like I’d hoped she would. “Oh, I’ll get us in. Don’t you worry about that.”

* * *

The wave of adrenaline I’d been riding the past couple of hours as Bethany and I got ready for our excursion to Fresh had officially worn off, leaving a whole mess of nerves in its wake.

“Uh, Beth? I’m not so sure I can do this,” I murmured as she used her grip on my hand to pull me past the ungodly long line wrapping around the block to get into the club.

“Oh no you don’t.” She shot me a warning scowl over her shoulder as she continued to drag me along with her. “Don’t you even think about backing out of this now. Not when I’m this freaking close to some of the sexiest men on the face of the planet. You already cock-blocked me with your brother. Don’t ruin this for me too.”

My face twisted as I gagged. “God, stop it with my brother already! I’m gonna be sick.”

We made it a few feet to the door when she jerked me to a stop and spun around. “Oh get over it. You’ve got a hot brother. There are worse things in the world. Now, it’s show time.” Then she reached up and tugged at the V-neck of the skintight black bandage dress she’d loaned me for the night to expose more cleavage.

“What are you doing?” I yelped, batting her hands away and pulling my top back up. She smacked me and yanked it back down.

“Knock it off!” she hissed. “You want into this place, Little Miss Seventeen? Then you have to look the part. Which means giving that walking steroid at the door something to stare at other than your baby face.”

“I don’t have a baby face,” I snapped defensively.

“You’re right, you don’t. But what you do have is a deer-in-headlights look that tells everyone here you’re not really twenty-two. And since you’re crap at acting, you need to use these as persuasion.”

I looked down at her and the tons of skin she had bared. She was showing twice as much cleavage as I was, and the sides of her dress were cut up. Not to mention the fact that the thing barely came low enough to cover her butt cheeks.

Reaching into her tiny purse, she pulled out two fake IDs, slapping one in my hand. “You ready?” she asked before taking my hand once more and moving me toward the bouncer without giving me a chance to answer.

“Hey there,” she said in a sultry voice I’d heard her use on Tim Watson every time she needed him to do her calculus homework.

The guy with no neck glanced at her rack in appreciation, ignoring the ID in her hand completely. I copied her stance in the hopes of a similar outcome, breathing a sigh of relief when he unhooked the velvet rope and waved us through.

“See?” Bethany cooed, batting her eyelashes as she shot me a smug grin. “Told you it would work.”

The entrance gave way to a massive open space with three small steps taking you down to a dance floor. On the far wall at the front was a small stage about three feet off the floor where two women in gold bikinis and body paint danced to the techno beat the DJ was playing. There was a cordoned-off area in the far-left corner closest to the stage with white wispy curtains giving the illusion of privacy while the occupants were still able to see everything happening on the stage and dance floor. That was the VIP area where I knew the guys would be. The three other sides of the dance floor were surrounded by seating areas with low white love seats and circular glass coffee tables.

Around that was wrought-iron railing for the upper level where we were currently standing. Dark wood high-top tables were placed against the railing all around, with two long bars on the far walls of both sides.

There wasn’t a single empty seat in sight. Hell, there was barely enough room to move with all the people packed inside. I wasn’t sure if it was because the club was popular or because word had gotten out that Civil Corruption was on the premises, but most likely it was the latter.

The music was so loud it reverberated through the floors and vibrated up my body. “They’ll be over there,” I shouted, pointing toward the curtains.

“Then let’s go.”

It was then that I realized I hadn’t really thought this plan out. “Wait!” I grabbed her arm to stop her before she could get down the stairs. “I just…”

“You aren’t flaking again, are you?”

“No. I’m not flaking,” I snapped. “But… if we go up there now, we’ll be just like all the other chicks crowding around them. We need to stand out, not blend in, right?”

“Hmm. Good point.”

I thought so too, and was truly shocked I managed to sound so logical when every inch of my skin felt like a live wire. “Let’s grab a drink,” I suggested, knowing I was going to need all the liquid courage in the world to get me through tonight.

I let her lead me to the bar where she worked her magic on a couple of college guys and got them to buy us a round of shots.

“So.” She leaned in as the tequila I’d just downed warmed my body from the inside out. “Which one do you have your eye on tonight?”

My mouth opened, and the words I’d never spoken out loud to anyone came pouring out. “Mace,” I answered. “I want Mace.”

“Ooh, does my girl have a little crush?”

“Something like that,” I replied, my cheeks growing red.

“Then I’ll consider him off-limits. He’s all yours, babe,” Bethany cheered, then grabbed another shot glass from the bar and shoved it at me. “Let’s get our buzz on and land you a hot rocker!”

I clinked my glass with hers and sucked back the second shot with determination. Two turned into three, three to four, until I eventually lost count and everything started to feel really freaking nice and fuzzy.

Bethany was totally right. I was finally going to get my hot rocker.

* * *

Mace

Tonight was a mistake.

Usually I was down for carousing with my brothers, but for some reason I wasn’t feeling it—at all. I refused to allow myself to consider that it was because of Lyla. Sweet, gorgeous, all-grown-up Lyla.

Kill and Garrett were a different story. They’d already pulled in a gaggle of chicks to fawn all over them while rubbing their tits in the guys’ faces.

“So, what’s it like to be a famous rock star?”

Fucking really?

I turned to the woman who’d been sitting next to me most of the night, just gagging for my cock. Desperate bitch wouldn’t have gotten it even if I had been in the mood, but seeing as I wasn’t, she was really starting to annoy the shit out of me.

“It sucks,” I grumbled, turning away and taking a pull of my beer.

“Really?” she gasped, totally clueless. “It does?”

Jesus Christ. I was miserable.

“Yeah. It’s the fuckin’ worst. ’Scuse me, gotta take a piss.”

Plunking my bottle on the table, I pushed up on my feet and started the arduous task of squeezing through all the barely dressed women crowding our private area.

Once I cleared VIP, I pulled in a breath and glanced around the club. It was packed to the gills, probably violating a thousand fire codes. Getting to the bathroom was going to be a pain in the ass, but before I could even start in that direction, I saw something that froze me solid.

I don’t know how long I stood there, trying to wrap my head around what I was seeing.

Lyla.

Lyla in the sexiest fucking dress I’d ever seen.

Lyla dancing with her eyes closed as some fucking prick grinded up on her and palmed her sweet ass.

That was when I jumped into action. My blood went from a simmer to a full-on rolling boil, my brain chanting the word mine over and over. In one second flat I’d reverted to a caveman, determined to beat that fucker bloody for putting his hands on my golden girl.

“The fuck you think you’re doin’?” I growled once I reached them.

The dude looked at me with large, scared eyes while Lyla slowly teetered around and gave me a sloppy grin. “Mason!” she shouted, throwing her hands in the air and nearly toppling over. I reached out and caught her, pulling her against me at the same time the jackass she’d been dancing with tried to do the same. I shot him a look that said if he touched her again, I’d take immense pleasure in killing him, and he wisely backed off.

“I was jus’ comin’ to see you,” she slurred as she leaned heavily against me. Just the feel of her lush body rubbing against mine was enough to make me hard.

“Really?” I glowered down at her. “That why you were letting this asshole feel you up right before I cut in?”

“Oh! That’s Travis! He’s my friend. Travis, this is Mace. Nice to meet you.”

Sweet Jesus. “Are you drunk, Goldie?”

“I’m floaty!” she cheered enthusiastically. Yep, totally fucking wasted. “Travis bought me shots! Wasn’t that nice of him?”

“Yeah,” I snarled in Travis’s direction. “Real fuckin’ nice. She’s seventeen, dickhead. Get lost.”

At the realization that he’d been liquoring up a minor, he blanched and quickly took off.

Lyla, already three sheets to the wind, barely noticed when he disappeared. Wrapping her arms around my neck, she began to sway sloppily to the song the DJ was playing. “Dance with me, Mace.”

She started gyrating her hips in perfect synchronicity, and it took every ounce of willpower I had not to touch her the way that other guy had been.

I wanted to. Christ, how I wanted to. I wanted to fucking own her.

But I couldn’t.

“Stop that.” Every ounce of need and sexual frustration I had for her poured into those two words, causing them to come out brittle and harsh. Taking her by the arm, I dragged her off the dance floor into the VIP area. “Everybody out!” I shouted loud enough to get everyone’s attention. “Now!”

“What the hell, man!” Killian exclaimed once the women all cleared out. “I was just about to get me some hea—what the fuck? Lyla?”

“Yeah. Lyla,” I bit out, tugging her so she’d land on one of the plush couches. “Caught her out there with some prick dry-humping her all over the goddamn dance floor.” What I didn’t let out was that I was only seconds from doing the same damn thing.

“Oh shit,” Garrett sighed. “What are you gonna do?”

Pulling my cell phone from my pocket, I scrolled to Will’s number and hit Call. “I’m getting Will to pick her up before she gets her ass in trouble,” I replied as the phone rang in my ear.

At my answer, Lyla seemed to sober up pretty damn quickly. “What? No! You can’t do that!”

“I can and I am.”

“So you’re telling on me?”

“If it gets you out of here and keeps you safe, you bet your ass I am.”

I needed to get her out of the club and away from me as soon as fucking possible, or it was likely I’d do something I could never take back.

Then I was going to need to find a woman to take home in the hopes of fucking Lyla and that goddamned dress out of my head.

However, my gut told me it wasn’t going to be that easy.