King's Baby - A Bad Boy Romance (2 page)

I
heave another deep sigh and agree with her insane plan to climb out of my
second story window, onto the overhang of the front porch, and down the
trellis. Maybe one of us will fall and we can stay home. I can only hope.

“Yeah,
I guess so. Let me check to be sure I have enough time left on my practice
recording.”

“And
don’t forget to plug in your laptop. You don’t want it dying before you’re supposed
to be done.”

“Yeah,
right, okay.” I bend down to plug the cord in under my desk. When I stand up
and turn around, I see Savannah disappear out my window. I grab the stilettos
from the bed and follow her out. On the roof, I carefully turn and slide my
window shut. I hate heights. It’s just one more bad idea in what is fast
becoming a night full of bad ideas. I inch toward Savannah and hold onto the
back of her jeans.

“I
feel like we’re in
Ferris Bueller’s Day
Off
, sneaking out with my music playing.” I hand her my shoes and watch as
she tosses both pairs over the edge and into the grass below.

“Ferris
what?”

“The
movie; you haven’t seen
Ferris Bueller’s
Day Off
?” How can my best friend not have seen one of my favorite movies?

“Nope,
I’ve never seen it.”

“Well,
if my mother ever lets me see you again after this, we’re watching it
together.”

“Deal.
Be careful—it’s a little wobbly,” she whispers up to me as she reaches
the ground and drops herself easily onto the grass.

“Coast
is clear. Your mama has the curtains closed. Hurry up.” She waves her hand in a
circle toward her body, motioning for me to follow, and I gracefully lower
myself to the ground.

“You’re
pretty good at that.”

“Thanks.
It must have been the gymnastics in third grade.” She chuckles as we gather up
our shoes and hurry through the perfectly manicured bushes into the neighbor’s
yard and down the street where our friend, Mika, is parked and waiting for us.
Mika is twenty-two. She lives in our neighborhood, and we’ve all grown up together,
so she’s cool with hanging around with us even though we’re younger.

 
I open the door and jump in the back, and
Savannah slides into the passenger seat.

 
The second our butts hit the
seats,
Mika turns the ignition and pulls into the street
without looking at us.

“Took
you long enough, ladies.”

“Had
to look the part,” Savannah says, turning to wink at me in the back seat and
flipping her blonde waves over her shoulder.

Mika glances at Savannah and then in the rearview mirror at
me. “Well, you did a fine job. Man, Savannah, you should go to school to do
that shit. You two look like those Victoria’s Secret models.”

“Well
I don’t know about that, but I don’t think we’re going to have trouble getting
into the club now,” I say. I slip on the ultra-uncomfortable shoes and wince.

 
“Where did you get shoes like this
anyway, Savannah?”

“My
mama.”

“Your
mama? No way.”

“Yep,
she used to be a party girl before my daddy ditched us, I guess.”

Wow.
I can’t imagine her mama wearing these shoes . . . ever. She’s practically
lived in a uniform sixteen hours a day for two years.

Savannah
is flippant about her daddy, but I know mentioning him hurts. She’s good at
concealing her emotions with distraction, and she proves it when she rolls down
the window to holler at the world.

“It’s
Friday night, and we’re gonna party!”

“Friday
night at Ecstasy. Oh yeah . . . fun,” I mutter under my breath and turn to look
out the window. I gather my hair behind my neck to protect all the hard work
Savannah put into straightening it and watch the cars pass by. I wish I were
back in my boring bedroom with my violin and my dull homework.

Twenty
minutes and ten base-pounding club hits later, Mika pulls her candy apple red
VW Bug into a spot that is at least a
half mile
away
from the front door. Savannah and I exchange concerned looks.

“Mika,
can’t we look for a place closer? I don’t think I can walk that far in these
stilts.” I hoist my foot up between the seats so she can see my ridiculous shoe
situation.

“We’re
lucky to have a spot in the parking lot at all. It’s usually overflowing by
now.”

Well,
I guess she would know; she comes here every weekend. Savannah pulls me from
the back seat and helps me get my balance when I’m out.

“It’s
good practice. Work those hips.” Mika laughs as I take my first couple of
steps. I’ve worn heels before, but not like these.

“I
think I’ll stick to a simple walk. If I shake anything, I’ll be on the ground.”

Savannah
links her arm through mine and we follow Mika through the parking lot to the
brightly lit entrance of the hottest new dance club in the city, Ecstasy.
Halfway through the parking lot, I start to feel the beat of the music
vibrating the ground under my feet. Savannah and I pause and look at each other
with wide eyes. For the first time all night, I’m excited.

“Oh
my God, I didn’t know it would be so . . .”

“So
loud?” Mika asks with a grin.

“Yeah,
and busy,” I say, looking at the people lined up all the way down the sidewalk
and around the side of the building. Outdoor speakers blast an electronic
version of Beyoncé’s
7/11
, and
several of the people waiting in line are getting a head start on their ass
shaking.

“The
line moves pretty fast, and the people are interesting. Don’t worry, your
little feet will get some relief soon.” Mika winks and bumps her hip against
mine, throwing me slightly off balance.

Mika
is gay, and she’s never made it a secret that she likes me, but she also knows
I’m not into girls—or boys, for that matter. I have no social life to
speak of, and I don’t have time for a boyfriend. Mama would kill me if I did.
Daddy travels a lot for work, but Mama’s always there keeping a sharp eye out
for me—except for tonight, I hope. Savannah and Mika affectionately call
me a goody two shoes, but they just don’t understand. I’m different. I don’t
care about popularity or boys or stylish clothes. I’m quiet. I read, study and
practice. That’s my life and I like it that way.

Mika
was right. The line moves fast, and within twenty minutes—five of which
are spent having heart palpitations while the bouncer looks at our IDs—we
are inside. They’re good IDs, the best money can buy, according to Savannah,
and she wasn’t lying. He doesn’t question it at all. He just hands it
back to me and gestures toward the second set of doors leading into
the club
. Mika goes ahead, and when she opens the door, I swear my hair
blasts back over my shoulders from the pulsing beat of the music. I wince and
resist the urge to cover my ears. A wicked grin spreads across Mika’s face as
she motions for us to follow her into the deafening, dark, packed club.

“Welcome
to Ecstasy, ladies.” My ears are buzzing as we squeeze through the throngs of
people toward the main bar, which is, of course, as far from the front door as
possible. My feet are already killing me.

It’s
a three-level club, and we’ve just entered on the second floor, where the
lighting is a glowing electric blue with the exception of the dizzying strobes
reflecting off of mirrored pillars and walls. Mika leads our little caravan
past an atrium, where you can look over the rail and see through the entire
club. When we stop, I lean forward to check it out. One floor down is a glowing
pink pit of beautiful, sweating bodies moving fluidly with the music like one
big, pulsing entity. Savannah smiles wide, pointing up. I look and see that the
third floor is darker than the others and glowing red. It’s creepy and it
reminds me of a vampire movie I once saw on Netflix. Mika grabs Savannah’s
right hand and I take her left, forming a chain. We make our way to the bar
without getting separated. “What do you want?” Mika yells over her shoulder,
squeezing between two tall blonde women that could very well be twins. Her
smile has ‘threesome’ written all over it.

“I
don’t know. I don’t drink,” I yell.

“Two
raspberry Kamikazes,” Savannah answers for me. God, that sounds menacing.

“A
drink named after suicide attacks by military aviators?” I yell at Savannah,
and Mika turns around again, looking at me like I’ve suddenly grown a second
head.

“What?”
I shrug my shoulders.

 
“You’re too smart. Relax and have fun.”
She’s directly in front of me, but she still has to yell to be heard; this
place is too loud. I’m definitely leaving with some degree of hearing loss
tonight. People press in from every side, and I feel a hand slide between my
legs from behind, squeeze my thigh, and disappear so quickly I’m not sure it
really happened.

“What’s
wrong? I thought your eyes were going to bug out of your head,” Mika says. I’m
surprised she saw me at all. She’s had
her
eyes on the Doublemint twins’
asses
since she placed
our drink order. I’m glad she did, though, because I may have thought I’d
imagined that. Yeah, okay, no. I didn’t imagine that.

“Someone
just grabbed my . . . well, my ass, sort of.” I turn, bumping shoulders and
hips with strangers to see if I can find the thigh violator, but it’s body
against body in here. Any one of a dozen people could have done it.

“You
have a fine ‘sort of’ ass, Holland. Get used to it.” I frown at Mika and she
hands me my drink. Fine ‘sort of’ ass or not, it’s mine, and I don’t want
strangers touching it.

Our
drinks are a bright red raspberry color, with a stick across the rim of each
glass speared with raspberries.

“Drink
it fast and let’s go dance,” Savannah says in my ear, and I nod. I’m not sure I
want to be walking around this place with people putting their hands in places
they don’t belong—which is anywhere on my body—but I’m here, and I
know every party has its pooper, but I don’t want to be ours, so I toss back
the drink and slide the berries off the stick and into my mouth with fanfare.

“Woohoo!
Look at our little virgin drinker go,” Mika yells.

I
blink several times and feel tears pricking at the corners of my eyes while the
alcohol burns its way down my throat.

“You
like it?” Savannah asks.

“Uh,
yeah, sure . . . if you like turpentine and berries.” I open my eyes wide one
more time and clear my throat. Mika hands us both another glass of the red
paint thinner while Savannah throws back her first. We exchange a look that
says this night is going to be utterly chaotic, and she turns me around to
press her body against mine, moving me forward through the crowd.
   

“The
stairs are over there. I’ll protect your ass.” She’s laughing, but I’m glad to
have her do it. I grasp the bannister tightly all the way down the wide spiral
staircase. My head is already swimming from one drink, and I’m teetering on
heels that are beginning to kill my feet.

About
three steps from the bottom, I realize that we aren’t taking our drinks out on
the dance floor. I’m not sure you can even consider what they are doing as
dancing. It’s more like a unified wave of movement, two hundred strong. I look
over my shoulder and see both of the girls finishing their second drink and
handing the glasses to a waitress through the spindles of stairs. Here goes
nothing. I choke down my second alcoholic beverage ever. I literally choke and
sputter as I drink it all, just in time to be pushed onto the dance floor and
swallowed up by the crowd.

It’s
really hot down here, and my head is fuzzy when the music and the people suck
me in and take me with them, making me part of their single unit. It only takes
a minute before I lose my hold of Savannah’s hand, but the crazy thing is . . .
I don’t even care. This is fun. No wonder she put it on the itinerary. I don’t
even have to try to dance. Bodies press in from all sides, moving me around.
Occasionally, hands circle my waist and someone grinds against me from behind,
but as soon as I try to turn and see their face, the hands are gone. You would
think that with all these sweaty bodies it would smell bad, but it doesn’t. It
smells like heat and musk infused with sweet vanilla.

Long
wisps of my hair stick to my face and neck. My tank top is damp and plastered
to my skin, and I smile to myself and giggle when I start to see two of every
face around me.

I
drop my head back and look through the atrium at the blue and red levels above,
and I notice that the ceiling is painted like the Sistine Chapel, with cherubs
and angels making the red lighting even more eerie. The alcohol flows through
my veins full force now as I raise my arms over my head and let my body flow
like liquid through the crowd. There is a thin, constantly changing and
mesmerizing screen surrounding the dance floor. I watch, hypnotized, as the
images switch from a flow of smoke to dripping honey, each visual effect cooler
than the last, until one particular optical illusion of tiny pulsing squares
nearly causes me to fall.