“Anyway, it’s kind of funny right?” Whitney asked. “Pretty soon you’ll be the only girl who’s been used and dumped by both Leo brothers. Impressive, honestly, but also kind of fucking tragic, if you ask me.” Clucking with mock sympathy, Whitney giggled to herself. Then she grabbed a bottle of water and waltzed back out just as Noah came in trashed. Holding a bottle of tequila, he barely registered brushing past Whitney on the way in. But he did stop and notice me, frowning curiously.
“Couldn’t find the bathroom?”
I ignored him. “Can I have some of that?”
He looked down at his half-empty bottle. “Thought you only drank wine.”
I clenched my jaw. “Nope. Wanna pour me a shot?”
His eyes were barely open at this point but he managed a grin and nodded toward the counter. “Why the fuck not? Show me what you got, Simms.”
So one after another, he poured me shots. And one after another, they burned the memories away.
Chapter Ten
If she weren’t wasted herself, Sofia would’ve murdered Noah. But since she was in fact quite wasted, she joined us in the penthouse with an exuberant whoop, knocking back her first round as I did my third. I closed my eyes, shuddering at the liquid scorching my throat and leaving a trail of fire as it trickled down to my chest.
“Are you happy?” Sofia whispered to me in that kid-like voice that came out when she was truly drunk. “Tell me you’re happy.”
I laughed. “Quite the opposite, but it’s okay.”
“What? Why?” she gasped with genuine puppy eyes. “You have everything right now! You have that necklace and Mason and me and…” She trailed off, oblivious to so much I wished I could just tell her the truth right now – that Mason and I weren’t real. Nowhere close. The necklace was purchased half out of the need to legitimize our image and half out of curiosity to fuck me. He was still a prick of a human being yet tragically, he was still much better than his brother, my ex-fiancé who had apparently been secretly bitter and hiding resentment for my lack of libido during the worst time of my life – a time that again, could have been avoided if I could just get that one night back.
But you’re an idiot, an idiot, I sang in my head, my chest hot and my head spinning as I let Sofia take my hand and spin me around in a silly dance, our fingers entwined and our heels clacking all over the floor. The room was a carousel around me as I laughed, and when she accidentally let go of me, I yelped only to find myself slamming right into a hard body with strong arms that caught me before I could hit the ground.
“What’s going on?” I looked up at my catcher. Mason. Of course. His hard eyes were glued to Noah, who was still pouring shots at the counter. He flicked his stare to Sofia for a second before looking down at me, his look one of concern mixed with anger. “You said you didn’t have a tolerance left, Taylor. How much did you just drink?”
“Not a lot,” I said defensively.
“But enough!” Sofia cackled. Mason shot her a look but his attention snapped back to me when I wrestled out of his grip. Catching my hand, he pulled me back to him.
“Get her coat for me, Noah,” he said. “We’re going home.”
“Why?” I challenged. “I don’t want to go home, and I certainly don’t want to go home with you.”
“If this is something about your misinterpretation of what I said outside, we can easily clear it up but before we do that, you should probably drink some water and I should probably get you home,” I muttered.
“Misinterpretation?” I ignored the rest of what he said. “I’m not sure exactly how someone can misinterpret the words ‘fuck me or fuck off.’”
“Was that what I said?” Mason glowered, ignoring Sofia’s tipsy plea to be nice.
“Just about.”
Mason lowered his voice. “Look, I don’t know what’s got you acting particularly fucking difficult but if it has anything to do with Whitney or something she might’ve said when she came in here, you should just fucking let it go. She’s petty and immature and she should be nobody to you.”
She’s far from nobody, but you’d know that if you cared to ask. “Alright, Mason, let’s just drop it, okay? Whatever happens to me or has happened to me is none of your business and you’ve made that clear,” I muttered just as Sofia inserted herself between us.
“Hey, hey, hey. Come on, guys. I don’t know what’s going on but I sense that we all need to just breathe and cool down a bit, right?”
“Yeah, go jump in the pool or something,” Noah said, knocking back another shot. It was a sarcastic suggestion but Sofia gasped as I blinked the tequila burn from my eyes, surprised by the fact that – fuck it, I wanted to do exactly that. I wanted to dive into crystal clear water and just wash this grimy, nasty feeling away. I wanted to sink till I hit rock bottom, found my fresh start and burst back above the surface a brand new woman no longer haunted by Aaron or Whitney or any other demons of my past.
“You can barely stand, let alone swim right now.” Mason pulled me tight with a look of controlled anger on his face. “Listen to me, Taylor. I want to take you home and make sure you’re fine. I want that more than anything right now, okay? So will you fucking let me?”
I stared into his eyes, struck by how earnest he could sound despite the profanity. But then I reminded myself to stop letting him charm me and trick me and fuck my mind up more than it could probably afford anymore.
And before I knew it, I was hand in hand with a whooping Sofia. She was jovial and exuberant and everything I wanted to be as our heeled feet made their way to the edge of the pool. Mason trailed behind us. I could hear him coming, already regretting his decision to let go of me. His footsteps were faster, more urgent than ours, but we had the head start and the tequila-inspired tunnel vision. We wanted water and that was what we were going to get.
“Taylor!”