“SO . . . ANY NICE LOOKING guys at the new J.O.B?” Aly asks as she holds the tiny straw of her drink, then takes a sip.
I give her a shrug. “I wouldn’t know. I wasn’t paying attention.”
“How can you not notice if a man in front of your face is hot or not?” She rolls her eyes and gives a huff. “Seriously, Ev?”
“It was my first day there, Aly. Besides, I’m not interested in any man right now, never mind any that work with me. That’s like Corporate 101. No fraternizing, Aly. You should try it sometime,” I say, knowing that Aly has been screwing one of her coworkers on and off for a few months.
She laughs and takes another sip of her drink. “Ouch! That was mean, lady. I forgive you, though. You can’t be part of the club if you don’t learn to live a little. Easy access, I say. You just have to make sure you tell them you don’t do relationships up front, like me. You become what they call people on Tinder a ‘serial dater.’” She puts her fingers up in air quotes, and I just roll my eyes.
“You need to stay off Tinder. Jesus Christ! You’re going to end up on some missing poster or worse.”
“Oh stop it, Mom. It’s not as bad as you think. I’ve met some pretty normal guys on there, for your information. Like this guy, Louis. He works for an airline. Travels all over the world. There is nothing like a well-traveled man. He’s been places I’d love to go to.”
“Yeah, like the STD clinic in each state and country where he has probably fucked like every woman he’s met on that damn app. That is just gross, Aly. Stay off Tinder.”
“I don’t fuck them. I have gone out with a few. Some were normal. Some were married, looking to cheat on their wives.”
My mouth pops open. “Oh my God! You didn’t.”
“Of course not!” She makes a gagging face. “They disgust me. I don’t do married men. Gross, Ev. I have morals, you know.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear you have some,” I say with a giggle.
“Bitch.”
I cock a brow at her. “Slut.”
“Cow.”
“Nun.”
“Now you’re just mean.” She sits back and crosses her arms. “I’m not telling you anything else so that you can live vicariously through me anymore.”
“Well, that is going to suck totally!” I say in mock sadness. “Whatever will I do if I don’t get my daily dose of Alyson Payne’s sexcapades update?”
She glares at me. “Okay, enough screwing around, Ev. What are we going to do with you and your issues?”
I look away and stir the drink in front of me. “I can’t sleep with just any guy because I’m horny, Al. I need to have some feelings toward him; otherwise, I can’t do it.”
“I knew it!”
I jump when she yells. “What the hell? Knew what?”
“When you told me you’d slept with someone that wasn’t the pond scum. You have feelings for what’s his name.”
“First of all, let’s not talk about the pond scum,” I say. “I’m trying to forget that I ever knew him, and other than him, I’ve only been with Niko.” Her face lights up, and I shoot her down before she can pipe in. “Once! It was my first, and probably only, one-night stand. I just don’t think that’s something I can do again with some random stranger. That doesn’t mean I have feelings for the guy. Jesus, Aly. You’re the one that kept telling me that the only way to get over Tate was to get under someone else. Well, I took your advice. It wasn’t the best idea I’ve had, but it’s over now. End of story.”
I shift under her gaze. There’s something about it, like she can see through my bullshit and to the truth I might not want to see.
“Like I said . . . you have feelings for Niko.”
I shake my head. “I’m not arguing about this. I thought we were celebrating my coming home?”
“And the new job, but that doesn’t mean we can’t discuss your sex life. This is not arguing.” Alyson sits there, stirring her drink that’s almost empty, and I wonder just how many of them she had before I got here.
“Fine,” I grumble. “I’ll talk about my sex life as long as we talk about yours. Deal?”
Aly starts squirming in her seat, and I know she’s uncomfortable but too bad. It’s only fair I know what’s going on in her sex life if she’s insisting on making me share mine.
“Trust me; you don’t want me to tell you about mine.”
“What do you mean? You’re always telling me about yours.”
“I keep it pretty tame for you. I mean, I will if you really want to, but you can’t even deal with what you did with Niko, so I know my kink would scare you. I vote that we keep this PG-13 and concentrate on Everly.”
“What are you hiding, Aly? And why have you been running through guys like it’s the end of the world?”
“I can tell you whatever you want. I’ve nothing to hide,” she says and shrugs her shoulder. “I like sex and you already know that I’ve been fucking someone from the bar. It’s not like I’ve hidden that from you, but what I’m doing is different than what you did with Niko. I don’t care about anyone that I’ve slept with.” She lifts a brow at me, daring me to tell her that she’s wrong. She’s not, but I’m trying not to think about Niko. Not while I’m busy settling into my new job and trying to find a place to live.
“Fine. Let’s just enjoy the rest of our night, drink, and deal with the other stuff later.”
“Fine by me, babe. I’m going to grab us more liquor. You want the same?” She looks at my almost-empty glass and then up at me to see if I’m willing to have more alcohol tonight. I almost want to groan out loud. I’m going to need lots of water before we leave, and tomorrow, I’m sure I’m going to feel like death. I don’t want to look like something from The Walking Dead tomorrow.
“Just water for me. I told you. The second day on the job tomorrow. I’m positive that hung over employee wasn’t in my job description.”
Aly shakes her head at me but decides to ignore me. This I’m sure of because just then our waitress arrives with a tray full of drinks. She places two freshly made fruity drinks in front of us, and I immediately know I’m not going home tonight without marring my address to our Uber driver.
“Compliments of the very fine gentleman at the bar,” the waitress says, and she sticks a pink Post-it note down on the table. I instantly sit straight up and look over to the bar.
“Gentleman?”
“Yes. He’s directly behind me, but closer to the bar near the exit. Black shirt, dark hair, eyes like liquid silver. Oh, and an ass that I’m positive you could bounce a quarter off of. See him?”
Alyson starts laughing at our waitress’s description of our mysterious admirer, but now I’m curious so I look to the area she said, but I don’t see anyone matching that description.
“I don’t see him.”
She turns and looks herself, but then turns back with a shrug. “Not sure where he went, but if a guy like that sent me a drink, I’d be all over that. I’m just saying.” She laughs and walks away to deliver the rest of her drinks to her customers.
“Eh, you won’t see me complaining about getting a free drink,” Alyson says and lifts hers to her lips.
I look down at the Post-it and peel it off the table where she left it to read what it says.
You’re very, very welcome. Let’s do it again sometime. ;) 617-554-1214.
It takes a second to sink in, and then I understand why her description seemed so familiar. I freeze. Niko.
“Holy shit!”
“What?” Aly asks as I sit there looking around the room, going into major freak-out mode.
“Holy fucking shit!” I yell as I frantically look around.
“What!”
I point to her purse as I stand and pick up my own. “Grab your bag; we need to leave.”
“What?” Her forehead is scrunched in confusion. “Why? What the fuck, Ev? You only just got here an hour ago.”
“We just need to go, because if he’s here then that means my brother isn’t far behind, and I’m not ready to deal with all that right now,” I hiss. Anxiety pumps through my body. This is not good. “Especially not when I’ve been drinking with you.”
“Wait. Ev, who are you talking about?” She snatches the Post-it from my hand and reads it out loud. “You’re very, very welcome? For what? Everly, what’s going on?”
“Niko!” I whisper-yell at her, then point to the note. “That’s from Niko. The drinks are from Niko, and if Niko is here, so is Cam!”
The mention of Cam’s name has her face turning sour, but then she replaces it with a look of indifference while focusing back on the reason for my distress. “Where is he? I so need to see the famous Niko Callahan.” She starts to stand up to look over our booth toward the bar, but I pull her down.
“He’s not there. I looked already! Stop looking,” I say, grabbing her hand to pull her back down. “I don’t know where he went, but please, let’s leave before Cam comes with him and ruins my entire night. Please, Aly?”
“Oh, fine! But only because I don’t want to see your brother’s ugly mug, or hear any of the ugly shit that comes out of his mouth.”
“I’m not even going to bother scolding you about my brother. Let’s just go. We can go somewhere else, or better yet, go to my house. Yes, my house is safe right now, so let’s go.” I ball the Post-it note up and toss it on the table, grab my bag, and start to follow Alyson out, only to bang into her back when she stops short. “Ummm, what are you doing? Go!”
“I am. Just give me a second. I forgot something.” She walks around me and then back to our table and grabs the crumpled Post-it I left with Niko’s note on it.
“What are you doing?”
Alyson gives me her “I’m up to no good” smile and walks past me, grabbing my hand and pulling me along with her to the exit. “Helping you graduate, Everly. Mama wants to make sure you walk tall and proud across that bad girl’s stage.”
The Uber we called after our close encounter at the Newton pub earlier pulls in front of my parents’ house, and I drag myself from the car. We didn’t end up at my house after we left like I’d hoped. Another pub not far from where we were and way too many drinks I did not plan on having are not sitting well with me. The world is spinning, and I’m pretty sure that I won’t end the night without throwing up. God, tomorrow is going to suck when it’s time to get up for work. “Thanks, Ronnie!”
“It’s Roland, Ev.”
“What’s rolling?” I slur at Aly. I only had three Sex on the Beach drinks, but I’m a lightweight when it comes to drinking. I always seem to let Aly talk me into more which is why I’m a little more than tipsy right now, but not exactly drunk to the point that I can’t see straight.
“His name, Ev.” She starts giggling. “You said Ronnie, but his name is Roland.”
“Well that’s a—” I stop trying to think of a nice way to say it’s a strange first name, but Aly says thank you, closes the door to the car, and starts pulling me toward the front door of my parents’ house.
“Hey! I wanted to tell him that it’s okay if he had the last name for a first name!”
“Yup! He knows. Now let’s get you inside. You’ve got work in the morning, and I’ve got to get some sleep if I want to get up with you at the ass crack of dawn and drive my happy-ass home to get a few extra hours in before my shift tomorrow night.”
“Oh! That’s right. You’re staying over! It will be like when we were kids again. Sleepover!”
Aly laughs at me again, pushing the key into the door. “Yup. Like old times. Let’s go, drunk lady.”
“I’m so not drunk, drunk. I’m just tipsy drunk.”
“Mmm hmm. Same thing. You’re going to hate me tomorrow when your head is breaking in half. I’ll grab you some Advil and water. Can you manage the stairs?”
“Pfffffff I’m fine! I totally couldn’t hate you! You’re my best friend! You know that, right, Al?”
“And you’re mine, but you are going to be Everly Hayes mad at me tomorrow, so do me a favor and head upstairs, get your jammies on, and I’ll go get you something to help you in the AM.”
“Okay,” I say and drop my purse and phone on the stairs.
Heading up to my childhood bedroom, I turn and see Aly walk toward the kitchen. Once I get to my room, I face-plant on my bed. Screw the sleepwear. I can’t move. The last thought I have before I pass out is of Niko. Maybe Aly is right. I think I still have feelings for Niko, although I’m positive they have gone from childhood crush to major adult lusting. We’ve only had one night together. One wild, crazy, hot-as-hell night full of sex. Yeah, not seeing that night as something I can forget anytime soon. Maybe not ever.
I’m so screwed.