If anyone had asked Eliza how she saw her day going when she woke up that morning, her answer would have been simple. Classes. Assist Professor Holstein. Dinner and arcade date with Nash. Amazing sex into the night. Falling asleep in her boyfriend’s arms.
She never would have said that she’d be at a trendy club downtown, surrounded by fellow law students with many, many drinks buzzing in her system. Music pumped through the huge former-warehouse-turned-nightclub, a heavy bass rattling her bones and coaxing her to jump and dance and laugh. Someone had spilled his or her drink, ice and all, down her back earlier and she didn’t even care. Drunk on the moment, Eliza found herself wondering why the hell she hadn’t done this before.
On her way out of the arcade, disappointed that she now had yet another horrible memory to cling to while walking through the side exit, Eliza received a text from one of the law girls in her new study group. Harriet had been desperate to get her out ever since they clicked a few weeks ago, but Eliza had been tactfully dodging the invitation, preferring to spend her time with Nash instead. However, it seemed that tonight Harriet had texted at the right moment—because Eliza was desperate to think of anything but Nash.
Phone in hand, tears in her eyes, Eliza made the decision not to go home and sulk over a fight. Couples fight all the time, and she didn’t want to sink into a pit of despair. Nash probably wasn’t in a pit of despair. Anger, maybe, over what…she had no clue, but she was sure that he wouldn’t be at home crying over the heated conversation they’d had. So Eliza accepted Harriet’s invitation without putting much thought into it, then met up with the bubbly brunette at a mellow bar a few blocks away from the arcade. While she’d been a little down at first, not engaging in much conversation unless it was about what drink she wanted next, Eliza slowly emerged, fluttering from her shy cocoon until she emerged the glorious drunk butterfly she currently was.
Harriet’s friends, some of which were from Eliza’s study group, others familiar because they were in a lot of Eliza’s classes, swept her under their wing. Even as they moved from the low-key bar to the jumping nightclub, not one person let Eliza lag behind, and soon enough she was laughing and dancing with the best of them. Nash, funnily enough, was the last thing on her mind.
A hand on some girl’s arm—Cordelia, was it?—Eliza shouted in her ear that she would be right back, that she was off to get another drink. Before the woman had a chance to follow, Eliza was off like a shot, shimmying and wiggling her way through the packed dance floor toward one of the four bars. The last round of shots had made her stomach feel a little off, so her drunk brain insisted on a vodka-cranberry—because cranberries were healthy. Duh.
As she stood in the huge line, toe tapping to the beat and lower lip caught between her teeth, she fished out her phone to check the time. Given how long she’d been out and how buzzed she was feeling, Eliza figured it had to be pushing two in the morning. Her jaw dropped, however, when she saw it was only a little after eleven. Clearly she wasn’t used to be out this late.
A hand brushed against her lower back suddenly, and she jumped, stumbling around to see who had invaded her personal space. It was a man—a rather handsome man with a square jaw and a messy mop of light brown hair on his head. He offered her a handsome smile as he eased around her, and she grinned at the back of his head when she realized he’d only touched her to get around her. Even still, the brief moment of contact made her heart pound, and she remembered just how excited she had been to go home with Nash tonight. Her stomach knotted uncomfortably for a moment, tightening enough to prompt a wave of nausea. Nash. Eliza frowned, her attention back on her phone.
Nash. He’d ruined everything tonight, from being too touchy-feely with her in front of Professor Holstein to bringing up the man and getting irrationally angry with her because she liked being helpful. Useful. Swaying slightly on the spot, she opened up her contacts list with a shaky finger and scrolled down to find Nash’s name.
There were no alerts. He hadn’t tried to contact her, nor had he been on any of the social media—all two of them—websites that she followed. Not that he was ever very active, but if he wasn’t sulking at home like she’d thought, Eliza would have liked to know what he was doing. A nervous wave fluttered over her, toying with her, making her feel crazy. She wasn’t like this. She wasn’t this person. Even if she hadn’t dated many men in her life—at all—Eliza knew she didn’t want to be some psycho possessive girlfriend.
Still. He’d started the fight. He could have made the effort by now to finish it. But maybe, again, that would fall to Eliza. For all his domineering energy, for all his outspokenness and sexy suaveness, maybe Nash wasn’t the brave one. Maybe in the relationship, Eliza had to be the one to make the first move, to step forward and initiate… something. She’d never considered herself to be all that brave, but for Nash, she was willing to switch hats and try.
After all, getting drunk was fun, but it wasn’t very productive—even through the cloud of shots and vodka and fruity mixed drinks cluttering her mind, Eliza could see that. So, rather than advancing toward the bar where she could pay for another shot of forgetfulness, Eliza turned and made her way for the smoker’s patio. Even though it was a chilly February night, she’d seen that the patio was busy on her way in. Pushing through the doorway, she stumbled out into the cold, her breath fogging in front of her. The alcohol did a good job at keeping her warm, and she was able to find an empty spot in one of the corners to make her phone call.
Standing there overlooking the alley outside the club, Eliza held the phone to her ear with her shoulder and crossed both arms over her, glad she finally had something to lean on. Most of the women around her were in ridiculously tall heels, and she was also suddenly grateful she’d worn boots for her date night instead.
Two rings.
Three rings.
Four rings.
She swallowed hard, half-expecting to hear his usual answering machine again. If she did, was she ever going to give that damn machine an earful. However, just before the sixth ring could hum in her ear, it stopped midway and Nash’s voice cut through the line.
“Hi.”
“Hello,” she managed, trying to keep the drunk tremor out of her words. Hearing him talk was enough to get her shaking, but she chalked it up to the cold instead. “What are you doing?”
“Watching TV.”
She waited for more, lips pressed together as irritation started to wriggle its way back into her system. While she hadn’t expected him to launch into an immediate apology, she wanted something more than two words.
“Is that it?” she snapped, temper getting the better of her with all that alcohol coursing through her. “Is that all you have to say to me after how you acted tonight?”
“How I acted tonight?” She heard some rustling in the background, followed by the clink of beer bottles. “You… We… I acted fine. You were the one who told me to butt out, so I left.”
“And you were just so dramatic about it, weren’t you?” She huffed, pushing away from the wooden patio railing and pacing back and forth. “You must have known I didn’t mean butt out of our date, just my business. Because I have no right to ask about your business, so why do you get to dictate mine? You aren’t my master in all things!”
A pair of guys glanced her way, eyebrows up, and she turned her back to them, blushing.
“Eliza, I’m not trying to control you,” he said tersely, and she could practically see his thick brow furrowing. “I’m just trying to look out for you. I gave my opinion. You freaked out. I left. Simple as that.”
“Grown men have rational conversations about things that upset them,” she insisted, hiccupping over upset in a way that only made her blush worse. To her credit, at least she wasn’t crying. Eliza didn’t feel like crying. Suddenly she felt like shouting, spurred on by rage and vodka. Her hands balled into fists.
“Fine, fine,” Nash muttered just as she drew in a breath, her words ready to explode like a volcano. “You want to have a rational discussion? Fine, but not over the phone. I can come over in a bit.”
“I’m not at home,” she said proudly. “I’m out.”
“Where?”
Behind her, someone opened the door for a moment and the pounding bass of club music wafted out. Apparently that was her answer.
“Are you… Eliza, are you at a bar?”
“So what if I am? I’m a grown woman who deserves a real night out every once in a while, Nash.”
“Of course you do.” His tone seemed softer now, and she heard him let out a sigh near the mouthpiece of his phone. “Eliza, are you drunk?”
“N-no.” She cringed. Why was she lying? She’d just made some big statement that she was an adult who could go out, yet she was too embarrassed to admit that she was wasted off her face? “Yes. Really drunk.”
“Oh my god…” Keys jingled in the background. “Where are you? I’m coming to get you.”
“No.” A cold panic clutched at her. No, she didn’t want him to see her like this. Tonight, her world was separate from Nash, and she suddenly wanted to keep him at an arm’s length until she was back to normal. “No, don’t. I’m out with some girls from my study group, and we’re having fun. I just wanted to c-call to check on you.”
“And I just want to make sure you don’t do something you regret because I was an ass,” he said gently. “Tell me where you are and we can just…hang out.”
“I don’t want to hang out with you tonight,” she quipped, throwing her shoulders back and gripping the phone tightly. “I just wanted you to know I’m having fun. And you were a jerk. And we can talk about it later.”
“Eliza, can you just—?”
She hung up before he could finish, then shoved her phone back in her purse.
Well. That hadn’t been productive. All it had done was rile her up and earn the attention of a few of the quietly chatting smokers nearby. Brushing them off with an embarrassed shrug, Eliza made a beeline for the door, desperate for that vodka-cran and the anonymity of a busy dance floor once more.