Page 3 of Mating Theory
I don’t tell her to fuck off again, but she gets the message. She scrambles to the edge of the roof and throws her leg over without looking back, taking the money with her. I watch the shadow of her ass in the moonlight, the same way a predator might watch its prey scamper off on a hot Sahara day. Sometimes it’s too much trouble to catch something to eat, sometimes survival is more trouble than it’s worth. I could have had her for a hundred dollars.
A faint scratch of metal against concrete, and then she’s gone.
Back into the seething mass of partygoers, the ocean of joy that I can’t join. I’m stuck on this island, and for maybe the first time, I’m glad of it. What I wanted with her wasn’t good or clean. It wasn’t kind.
The scaffolding where Harper and Christopher had stood is empty. The people around it still do their ritual dance, but the gods are no longer listening. Having sex, that’s what the gods are doing now. I can’t see them, but I know it as surely as I feel the bass reverberate through the old building holding me up. I can imagine Harper’s red lips and Christopher’s dark eyes. There is no girl to use. Ashleigh. Ash. Leigh. I pick up the empty bottle of Jim Beam, the proof that I’m no better than my daddy, and throw it against the ledge of the roof, watch it shatter into a million sharp glittering pieces.
Chapter One
Sutton
Pounding wakes me up.
Meetings must have run late in California. I probably took the red-eye back to Tanglewood. The plane was almost empty, only a few rumpled businessmen like me and a sleepy family with Disney stuffed animals grasped in chubby hands. The airport, a ghost town. I bought a cup of lukewarm coffee on the way out so that I could make the drive home. The important thing is that I made the deal.
That’s always been the important thing.
The pounding grows louder, and I groan. I’m more than tired. Hungover? Maybe I stopped by Christopher’s place and had a celebratory drink. One. Maybe two.
I swallow down stale vomit. Jesus.
Every muscle screams a protest when I move my head. Sharp rays of light pierce my dry eyes. The digital clock face says it’s four thirty in the afternoon.
That doesn’t make any sense. My alarm should have woken me up at six. I would be in the office by seven, ready to work on the next deal.
Pain lances through my stomach, making my whole body shudder.
I’ve never been sick a day in my life, but maybe I finally caught the flu. Or something worse. Ragged breaths saw in and out of me. I push up from the sofa, squeezing my eyes shut tight against the wild swirling of the room. What the hell’s in the water in California?
“Sutton? Don’t make me break down the door.”
That would be Hugo, and I snarl against the memories that want to flood me. He has no business showing up here. No business making all that noise.
I stagger to the door, barely able to see, leaning against the door as it opens.
My old friend looks disgustingly un-drunk in a crisp navy shirt and well-tailored slacks. “You look like shit,” he says, brushing past me into the house.
“Why are you here?”
“Your house looks like shit,” he adds, taking in the empty bottles and broken furniture. I’m not sure exactly when that happened. The realization hits me like a goddamn wrecking ball—I wasn’t in California closing a business deal. I wasn’t on a red-eye flight. I haven’t even gone to the fucking office in weeks. I’ve been drunk off my ass instead of working.
I swallow the bile in my mouth. “What day is it?”
A dark glance. “You don’t remember?”
“What fucking day is it?”
“I thought I’d check on you, because maybe you’d be moping. I didn’t know you’d completely implode.”
I’ve been wasted for six weeks. Six months. I push past him to the living room, shoving aside dirty clothes and a pizza box. I find my phone between the sofa cushions, the screen black. Dead.
There’s a roar that must be me. Frustration. An animal kind of fury. I hurl the phone across the room. It hits the wall with an ominous crack. “Why shouldn’t I get wasted? Everything’s gone to shit.”
Hugo leans against the doorframe, looking almost bored. “At this point I can’t argue with you. This place is a pigsty. Where’s your sister?”
“She left.” That’s what everyone does. They leave.
He curses softly. “The wedding is tomorrow, you bastard.”
I’d had fourteen-hour days of hard labor, my muscles burning, my stomach growling. My body was a tool, hard and sharp. I didn’t worry about how the hammer felt, whether the ax needed a break. My arms carried what I told them to. My legs walked me where I needed them, except for now, when they could not help me stand. Knees folded, and I sank, graceless and heavy onto the sofa.
