Archive of Our Own

The club lights strobed in sharp electric bursts, splashing the room blue, green, pink, then blue again until the walls seemed to beat and sweat with colour. Music thudded through the floor and climbed my legs, pulsing in my body hard enough to make my heartbeat feel borrowed from the speakers. Smoke twisted from hidden machines, shimmering in the light in silver ribbons before melting away over the dance floor, where bodies churned together in a slick, restless tide. Some people moved as though the music had taken possession of them; others jerked wildly out of sync. The air carried the taste of spilt alcohol, sweat, cheap perfume, citrus mixer, and too many people breathing in too small a room.

The night was still young as we sat near the edge of the crowded bar, pressed close to the sticky counter while elbows, shoulders, and the occasional sloshing drink crowded in around us. Behind the bar, bottles glowed, and every few seconds a bartender’s shaker flashed silver before disappearing into the crush. Someone snickered too loudly near my ear; someone else stumbled backwards, brushing my shoulder with a damp sleeve.

I was wearing the tightest little black dress I could steal from Dina’s closet, the fabric sticking to me in a way that resembled more borrowing someone else’s skin than borrowing an outfit. It wasn’t my usual style, but our washing machine had broken, and I couldn’t afford to fix that, never mind buy something new just for one night out. Then, I figured if I were already stealing Dina’s look, then her razor-thin stiletto heels and expensive gold hoops wouldn’t hurt either.

Don was dressed exactly as Don always dressed, as though the world had been given one version of him and he had no interest in improving it: dark jeans, a plain black T-shirt beneath an unfastened red button-up, sleeves pushed back like he had somewhere better to be. His chain rested proudly against his chest. He looked bored, his hazel eyes drifting over the crowd with lazy precision while dancers blurred before him, occasionally pausing on someone he clearly considered worth a second look.

I watched his gaze slide past me again, easy and careless, as if I were part of the furniture or one more shadow caught beneath the flashing lights. Around us, glasses clinked, laughter cracked open, and the bass kept punching through every gap in the conversation. Something small and hot tightened under my ribs. “You look bored,” I said, trying to make it sound like a joke.

He nodded once, barely bothering to hide it.

The words were out before I could soften them, sliding through the noise with more honesty than I meant to give away. “Is it because I’m here?”

“What?” He turned to me too quickly, his expression snapping into place a second too late. “No, no. I just thought after all the hype about this club, it would be something special.” He gave a shrug that was meant to look casual, but it landed stiffly between us. “I guess Downtown has nothing new to offer after all.”

I arched an eyebrow, but my fingers squeezed around my glass until the condensation slicked my hold.

“Fine,” he said, moving closer so I could hear him over the bass, his mouth almost brushing my ear. Warm air moved between us, sweet with gin and smoke-machine sugar. “I’d admit it’s a lot easier to get my game on when people don’t think I’ve abandoned my girlfriend at the bar.”

The word caught under my skin, not because I wanted it, but because I hated how easily he used it when it suited him. My laugh broke out sharp, almost brittle. “Girlfriend?!”

His face closed immediately, just as it always did when I got too close to naming the thing between us. “Nina, we’re not having this conversation again.”

He was right; we weren’t. We never did. The conversation always stopped there, not because I was waiting for him to choose me, but because neither of us liked what happened when words tried to pin us down. I wasn’t his girlfriend; I didn’t want to be. He wasn’t my boyfriend; he would have hated the leash of it just as much. What we had was looser, messier, and harder to explain: best friends, occasional bedmates, permanent bad influences, unofficially open and officially none of anyone’s business. The problem wasn’t that he flirted. The problem was that he could call me his girlfriend when it made his life easier, then deny the shape of us the second I looked too closely.

If he was going to use me as an excuse when it helped him and deny the label when it didn’t, fine. I could work with that. I could become the problem on purpose.

I took a sip from my drink, slow enough to make it clear I wasn’t wounded, just recalculating. The liquid tasted watered-down already, sharp at the edges and sticky against my tongue. A cheer rose somewhere from the dance floor, swallowed almost instantly by the next drop in the song. “What if I joined you?” I teased, lifting my voice just enough to sound careless.

“What?!” His head twisted round, the frown cutting across his face before he could smooth it away. “You’ve never been open to that before?”

Heat rushed up my neck, half from embarrassment and half from the ridiculous pleasure of catching him off guard. I slapped his arm gently, more to break the look on his face than to scold him. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Don! I meant with the flirting.”

“What? Like my wingman?” He scoffed, leaning back as if the idea alone had insulted him. The corner of his mouth twitched with that familiar smugness I both hated and knew too well. “I don’t need a wingman.”

I tilted my head, letting my eyes sweep over him the way his had looked over everyone else in the room. Behind him, the dance floor flashed white for half a second, freezing a hundred strangers mid-motion before plunging them back into colour and shade. “No,” I said, slow enough to make him listen, “like competition.”

His thick eyebrows lifted a fraction. For the first time that night, his attention settled fully on me. “Competition?”

I nodded. “We’ll see who can get the most Social Bunny connections before one.”

“A.m. or p.m.?” he asked, deadpan.

I slapped his arm. “A.m.”

Slowly, he smiled — the dangerous little one he used when a game had finally become worth playing. “Fine. Rules?”

“Main accounts only,” I said, counting the rules off on my fingers as if structure could make the dare feel less reckless, “no business pages, no private side accounts, and no pretending a contact counts if they only gave you a number to get rid of you.” The bar lights fluttered over Don’s face, turning his smile sharp at the edges. “Oh, and you can’t use any Italian; it’s an unfair advantage.”

He nodded, slow and thoughtful, though the amused curve of his mouth said he was already looking for loopholes. “Alternatively, you could use Spanish as part of your flirting technique.”

I narrowed my eyes at him over the brim of my glass. “No Italian.”

“Fine, I won’t need it anyway.” He shrugged, but the smugness practically shone amid the dim lighting. “It’s a shame though, some guys would like a fiery Hispanic lady in their lives.”

I gave him a flat look, refusing to let the heat crawling up my neck win. “Name one, besides you.”

“Oh, there was that guy you slept with,” he said, lifting one finger, eyes beaming as if he had found exactly the button to press, “and, err, that other guy you slept with, and that French guy who had a bakery that you—”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” I cut in, before he could turn my past into a full pastry case of evidence. “But I’m still not using Spanish.”

He nodded, accepting the rule with the lazy grace of someone who believed rules were only interesting once he figured out how to bend them. “What does the winner get?”

“The winner?”

“You said it was a competition. Besides a list of potential booty calls, what does the winner get?”

“Free drinks.” The idea arrived with a reckless little spark. “Loser pays the tab.”

“Oh, Nina,” he said, drawing my name out as a caution and a compliment at the same time, “that is a dangerous game. You can’t afford to lose.”

I smiled, letting him see every ounce of the confidence I wasn’t entirely sure I had. “I know.”

“It’s a shame I don’t want to pay the tab either.” He smiled before standing, drink in hand. “Starting now?”

“We meet back here at midnight for half-time.” I grabbed my drink and stood too quickly, the borrowed heels forcing me to steady myself against the sticky bar for half a second. “Starting now.”

Don went left, disappearing between a cluster of laughing girls and the blue haze bleeding off the dance floor, so I went right, straight into the crush.

The first guy I came across was young, tanned, and wearing an unironed shirt that looked as if he had convinced himself creases counted as charm. He was handsome enough, with blond hair that changed from silver to honey to cheap blue beneath the strobes. I laughed at his jokes, even the ones that barely deserved air, and placed my hand lightly on his arm like I was permitting him to believe this was going well. He took the invitation exactly as expected, creeping a hand to the small of my back, where Dina’s dress left my skin bare. Across the room, Don was already talking to a curvy brunette, his body angled towards her with practised ease, their phones out between them.

Damn. He works quickly.

I leaned in close enough for my perfume to reach him before my words did, letting the bass blur the edges of my voice. “Hey, I need to find my friends. Can I grab your Social Bunny in case I can’t find you again?”

And just like that, his phone emerged from his pocket, screen lighting his face from below while his thumb moved with eager, obedient speed.

Across the room, Don lifted his phone in a tiny, smug salute. I smiled back sweetly, then angled myself so the guy beside me laughed directly in Don’s line of sight. Don’s salute lowered by an inch.

This is almost too easy.

Then the process repeated, clean and quick: smile, laugh, touch the arm, let them think they had earned something. I kept my messages closed while changing details, turning the phone slightly away from wandering eyes so none of them noticed how little space there was between one name and the next. The club made it easy. Everyone was half-lit, half-drunk, and desperate to be chosen by someone before the night blurred into nothing.

The next time I spotted Don leaning close to someone, I waited until he was mid-sentence, then laughed at my own target’s joke a little too obviously. Don’s gaze snapped towards me. His target followed it. I gave her a friendly little wave, and she tucked her phone away with a tight little smile.

By quarter to twelve, the game had stopped being flirting and started being interference. Don cut through my line of sight twice with that infuriating red shirt, smiling at my targets as if he’d been personally invited into the conversation.

I stole one of his targets by asking where the toilets were and somehow left with her Social Bunny. Neither of us admitted it was sabotage. Both of us absolutely knew.

Midnight rolled around in the sticky, fraying mood of a room that had started making worse decisions. Another couple had taken our seats at the bar, leaning into each other over the sticky table like they had discovered romance in the bottom of a vodka cranberry, but I spotted Don standing in front of them as I forced my way through the crowd. He had one shoulder braced against the metal pillar, looking almost too happy to see me and definitely too proud of himself.

“Hey,” he said lazily when I finally reached him, dragging the word out as if he had already won and was only waiting for me to admit it.

I winked, slipping back into place in front of him as if the bar had been saving room for me all along. “That sounds like something a loser would say.”

“Far from it.” He pulled his phone from his pocket with the smug little flourish of a magician about to reveal the chosen card, opening his Social Bunny contacts beneath the flicker of pink light. “Read ’em and weep, five new ladies.”

I pulled my phone out of my clutch, letting the pause stretch just long enough to watch his confidence settle into place before I kicked it out from under him. “Ha, six!”

He snatched my phone out of my hand so fast the screen flashed between us. “Six?! Wait, since when was there a Malcolm Landgraab the fourth?”

I shrugged, taking my phone back from him with two fingers and a smile I didn’t bother making innocent. “I don’t know, but I might take that one seriously; he offered to buy me a bottle of champagne.”

For one bright second, winning felt clean. Then the soreness in my feet pulsed up both legs, my throat had the taste of sugar and cheap vodka, and I remembered the competition was only halfway through.

He frowned, the expression ripping through his smugness. For half a second, Don looked less like a man losing a game and more like someone realising the rules applied to him too. “Oh, c’mon, that’s not fair.”

I gasped, pressing one hand lightly to my chest in a performance so dramatic it deserved its own spotlight. My smile grew wider when his jaw tensed. “Don, are you jealous?”

“What?! No!” He waved aimlessly, close to knocking into a passing girl’s drink before catching himself. “I’m just saying, you don’t even like champagne.”

“You’re right,” I said, lifting my glass as if to toast his irritation, “but it’s nice to have the option.”

He exhaled sharply, his eyes narrowing over the rim of his pride, and he looked away first, which was almost as satisfying as winning.

I let him sit with it for one delicious second before offering him an exit he could pretend was his idea. “How about some half-time drinks? A little liquid courage before the showdown?”

He looked back at me, relief disguised as arrogance, and winked. “I’ll add it to the tab. Tequila sunrise again?”

“I’d rather have a woohoo on the beach.”

Don froze, hazel eyes lighting with one reckless, hopeful spark.

“The drink, Don.”

“I know,” he said far too quickly, then vanished into the crush for the bartender.

I abandoned the empty glass on a nearby table, setting it down between two sticky rings of spilt drink and hoping the couple beside it wouldn’t decide to make it my problem. They didn’t. They were far too busy clumsily making out, all wandering hands and mismatched rhythm, though even from a glance I could tell she was not enjoying the amount of tongue involved.

Don returned a minute later with an old-fashioned in one hand and my woohoo on the beach in the other, weaving through the crowd with the nonchalant arrogance of someone who believed people would move for him. Annoyingly, they did.

“We’re tied, six-to-six,” he said proudly as he handed me my cocktail, his fingers brushing mine for half a second too long to be accidental and just short enough to deny it if challenged.

My head whipped towards him so fast one of Dina’s gold hoops swung cold against my jaw. “What?!”

He smirked over the rim of his glass, taking a slow, victorious sip. “I got another woman’s details at the bar.”

“Hey, that’s cheating!” I pointed at him with the paper umbrella. “It was half-time.”

He shook his head, maddeningly serene. “Not in the rules.”

The bass dropped hard enough to make the bar tremble. I am not paying that bar tab. “Oh, it’s game on now, Lothario. I wish I’d brought my hard hat.”

He frowned. “What do you need a hard hat for?”

Seriously, how is this idiot a doctor? “I’m going to demolish you.”

He laughed, the sound bright enough to cut through the bass. “Oh, you’re going down, Caliente.” He paused, eyes narrowing intently with the kind of idea that usually cost me money, dignity, or both. “How about we sweeten the deal?”

I took a deliberate sip of my cocktail, letting the sweet, tropical burn linger on my tongue while I waited for him to make the mistake out loud.

Don shifted in closer, close enough that the heat of him cut through the room. “Loser has to pay the next five bar tabs.”

“Three,” I said immediately, because pride was one thing, rent was another, and Don had never met a bad idea he couldn’t make financially worse, “and this one counts as the first.”

His smile grew slowly, infuriating and beautiful below the flickering lights. “Afraid you might lose, Nina?”

“No.” I held out my free hand between us, palm still despite the bass shaking through my core. “Do we have a deal?”

He took it and shook once, his grip warm, firm, and deliberately brief. “Deal.”

Again, we parted ways, but unlike the women scattered across the dance floor in glitter, perfume, and easy laughter, the selection of fine men had narrowed down considerably. Between the guys I’d already collected, the ones welded to their partners, and the ones who looked as if they’d peaked emotionally in high school, I was running out of options. I hated that I’d have to do it in Dina’s heels, the thin straps already scratching into my ankles like punishment, but if I still wanted a serious chance of winning, I was going to have to take on the dance floor.

I glanced at Don, who was leaning close to a blonde who seemed a little too comfortable placing her hand on his chest while they talked. His smile was easy; hers was easier. I guessed I never said making out with the targets was against the rules.

I looked at the packed dance floor again: bodies crushed shoulder to shoulder, raised arms parting through the smoke, the whole room moving like one reckless, overheated animal.

Screw it. I wasn’t going down without making him sweat for it.

I drifted past them slowly enough for the blonde to notice, brushing Don’s shoulder with mine as I went.

“Careful,” I murmured. “You’re drooling.”

His smile didn’t move, but his eyes promised revenge.

I descended the steps to the dance floor with my chin raised and one hand brushing the rail, Dina’s heels be damned; I refused to be reduced to a two-step just because my toes were screaming. Down here, the floor felt alive beneath me.

I loosened my shoulders first, then found the rhythm, letting it travel through my hips until the dress felt less stolen and more like mine. I looked over the room before I scanned for Don, choosing my next mistake with care. When an attractive man passed close enough, I let my fingertips trail across his chest, light as a dare, and looked back over my shoulder only after I felt him turn. He didn’t need much persuasion. By the time he stepped in behind me, I caught Don watching from the upper level, his expression darkening beneath the strobes as if he had only just realised I could change the rules without asking permission. I held his gaze for one clean beat, smiled as if I had planned the whole thing, then winked. His jaw tensed, and he turned straight back to his own target with revived determination.

The stranger’s hands fell on my waist, warm and certain, his thumbs pressing lightly through the thin fabric as the crowd closed around us. I let him stay there for exactly one beat before covering one of his hands with mine and guiding it half an inch higher, not enough to reject him, just enough to remind him whose game this was.

Another set of Social Bunny details, here we go.

After that, the night turned tactical. Don intercepted one man before he reached me by clapping him on the shoulder as if they were old friends. I stole one woman from his orbit by complimenting her eyeliner. He sent me a screenshot of his new contact with a single crown emoji. I replied with a photo of my middle finger beside my latest request.

One o’clock arrived with the brutal certainty of a final argument, and I had the awful, rock-in-my-stomach feeling I’d lost. I pushed my way out of the dance floor, Dina’s heels cutting fresh little threats into my feet with every step. Don was waiting at the top of the stairs, no longer wearing the victorious smirk he’d had at half-time. The front of his shirt was soaked dark, clinging to his chest in one accusing splash.

He looked down at himself, then back up at me with the pained dignity of a man trying to pretend he had chosen this. “Yeah, I, err, may have tried to pick up another girl in front of her sister.”

I looked from the drink stain to his face and gave him the solemn nod his stupidity deserved. “A bold move.”

He dragged a hand through his hair, pushing it back from his forehead. “Well, you did pull that little dance floor stunt. I was desperate without my Italian charms.”

I recoiled so hard my earrings swung. “Don’t act like you didn’t say ciao or bella all night.”

“No, I totally did the second I realised you weren’t keeping tabs on me.” He spread his hands, entirely unashamed.

I laughed despite myself, the sound slipping out bright and disbelieving. “So unsportsmanlike.”

“And your little stint on the dance floor wasn’t?” His eyes shifted down once, quick as a match strike, then back to my face.

“I never said I couldn’t be unsportsmanlike.” I lifted one shoulder, refusing to give him the satisfaction of adjusting my dress under that look. “You should have added it to the rules at the start.”

He shrugged, but his mouth twitched. “Well, I didn’t think you could dance like that in those heels.”

“Let’s get this over with so I can take them off before my toes unionise.”

“Nine in total.” Don held out his phone, the screen reflecting in the wet patch on his shirt. “After that girl threw her drink at me, it was game over.”

Relief hit so sharply I almost laughed in his face. “We’re tied,” I whispered.

His head jerked up. “What?!”

I turned my screen towards him, smugness blooming warm and dangerous inside my chest. “Nine. We’re tied. It’s a draw.”

Don looked between me and my phone as though the cosmos had betrayed him. “What do we do? Do we split the tab?”

For a second, neither of us moved. The game had burned through the easy parts of the night: the free smiles, the cheap lines, the confidence that came from not yet having failed. Now all that was left was stubbornness, sore feet, and the kind of pride neither of us knew how to put down first.

I looked around, desperate for an idea and unwilling to let the night collapse into something as boring as fairness. Don stood there dripping someone else’s drink onto his shoes, and then the answer arrived, reckless and perfect. “We pick each other’s final targets.”

“Hard mode?” Don asked, mischief cutting through the drink stain and wounded pride.

I nodded once.

Don pointed. “Him. Miserable blonde guy.”

“Watcher above, Don, at the very least pretend to think about it.”

He paused for exactly one beat, lifted his glass, and pointed at the same man. “Still him.”

Unbelievable. “Fine. You get her.”

I nodded towards the blonde in purple, who glanced over, met my eyes, then turned away with a smile she tried badly to hide.

Don noticed. “You picked her because she likes you.”

“I picked her because I believe in challenging you.” I lifted my glass between us as a toast and a threat. “May the best man win.”

“Or woman,” Don added, his smile tilting towards trouble.

For the final time, we parted ways. Don went right, towards the blonde and certain disaster; I went left, towards the saddest-looking man in the club and the slow death of my confidence.

I approached the blonde man slowly, the way you’d approach a stray cat, a crying toddler, or a bomb with feelings. He sat half-hidden at the edge of the room where the lights didn’t quite reach, shoulders rounded, one hand curled around his glass without drinking from it. He didn’t seem to be here with anyone else, which either made him my easiest target or the emotional equivalent of quicksand.

“Hey,” I said, softening my voice as much as the music allowed. He looked up through his tinted glasses, startled, as if kindness had tapped him on the shoulder by mistake. “Are you okay?”

He sniffed and rubbed beneath one eye with the heel of his hand. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Can I sit there? My feet are killing me.” They actually are. How does Dina walk around in these all day? Does she have no nerves below the ankle?

He nodded and scooted over, freeing up a careful amount of space on the bench. I sat next to him, close enough to be friendly, far enough away not to scare him away.

An awkward moment passed, made somehow louder by the music pounding around it.

“So,” I said, watching his hands instead of staring too directly at his face, “are you here by yourself?”

He pointed across the room to a man with dark, jaw-length hair and a purple shirt, talking enthusiastically to another man with short dark hair and a blue shirt who looked as thrilled to be there as a man waiting for dental work. “I’m here with my brothers,” he said.

“They, err, seem like an interesting pair.”

His mouth twisted around something too small to be a smile. “More interesting than me.”

Shit, this really isn’t going to be easy. Screw you, Don. I angled my body towards him, softening the sharp edges of my usual smile into something gentler. “I don’t think that’s true.”

He looked at me through smudged tinted glasses, as if he were waiting for the joke to land and didn’t trust me not to be it. “According to my brothers, I have an unhealthy borderline obsession with my ex-girlfriend from high school. Recently, she tricked me into a threesome with her husband, who is also the biggest dickhead in Strangetown, and now she might be pregnant with my kid as a result.” He inhaled as if the sentence had scraped its way out of him. “So, my younger brother thought it would be best to take me to this shithole so I could get blackout drunk.”

I blinked once, then nodded with the careful seriousness of someone being handed a lit firework. “That doesn’t sound uninteresting.”

I’m not going to lie; I want more details about whatever catastrophic little soap opera was happening there. But I have a bar tab on the line.

“It’s beyond fucked up,” he continued, staring down into his glass as if the answer might be floating somewhere under the melting ice cubes. His voice thinned beneath the music. “I don’t even want kids.”

I nodded with the grave sympathy of someone who should absolutely not be turning a stranger’s crisis into a tactical opening. “Well, if we’re talking messed-up relationships, I could really use your help.”

He looked me up and down, slow and wary, as if he’d just noticed the universe had a type and was sending it after him in borrowed stilettos. “I ought to mention my ex-girlfriend from high school was a redhead.”

“Noted,” I said without missing a beat, folding one leg carefully over the other because Dina’s heels were trying to murder me in slow motion. “I’m here with Don, a guy I’ve been sleeping with for the past decade—”

“Congratulations?”

“Don’t interrupt. I’m building context here,” I snapped. “We’re basically in an open relationship, but we don’t use titles. He’s technically engaged to an heiress, except I think he loves the idea of Cassandra more than Cassandra. Meanwhile, my sister is trying to get engaged to Cassandra’s father, which would make Cassandra my stepdaughter-in-law. Weird, because Cassandra is older than me. Weirder, because she’s already kind of my niece.” I took a breath, aware that somewhere around stepdaughter-in-law, his face had stopped moving completely. “Anyway. I made a stupid competition with Don to see who could get the most contacts on Social Bunny before one a.m., and the loser has to pay the bar tab. We’re tied, and you’re my tiebreaker. I’m supposed to get your details by flirting with you, but clearly—”

“So,” he interrupted, with the exhausted exactness of a man negotiating with a migraine, “if I give you my Social Bunny details, you’ll go away?”

I nodded immediately. “Yes.”

Without another word, he pulled out his phone, thumb moving with the weary efficiency of someone choosing the fastest route to silence. A moment later, I added my final contact on Social Bunny for the night.

I looked up at him once he accepted my request, victory fizzing throughout me brighter than the lights. “Thank you so much. I didn’t want to choose between the bar tab and my bills this month.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed so deeply it looked as if it came from somewhere under the floor. “Can you just leave?”

I stood, riding the high of victory and immediately regretting the pressure on my toes. “Thanks again!” I took one uneven step, then turned back because apparently winning had not made me smarter. “Can you tell me how the baby thing turns out?”

He looked up and fixed me with a scowl sharp enough to sober a lesser woman.

I smiled awkwardly, already backing away. “Never mind.”

I hobbled off to find Don, one hand clutching my phone like a cherished trophy, the other trying to keep Dina’s dress from riding up.

I found Don back at our original spot, slouched beside the table as if the club had finally managed to knock some posture out of him. One knee was angled carelessly into the aisle, his shirt still stained dark across the chest, and he was rolling a fresh old-fashioned between both hands instead of drinking it. A woohoo on the beach waited for me on the table, sweating a sticky ring into the wood. When he saw me hobbling towards him, his eyebrows lifted first, then his gaze lowered to my shoes for half a second too long before he remembered to look amused.

I planted myself in front of him with all the dignity a woman in a stolen outfit and mild foot trauma could manage, then shoved my phone into his line of sight without saying a word. He leaned back at first, smug on instinct, but as his eyes moved over the screen, the expression loosened. His mouth opened, closed, and then his smirk drained away one satisfying drop at a time.

“You got it?” he asked, glancing up at me as if wishing the phone might have lied.

“You bet I did.” I lifted my chin, victory glowing through me.

“That’s too bad,” he said, drawing the words out as he pulled his phone from his pocket with insulting calm. “I got hers too.”

“What?!” I snatched his phone and stared at the blonde woman’s profile, her smile glowing back at me from the screen.

Don was smirking, of course. “You fell for it.”

I handed his phone back with more force than necessary. “So, we’re still tied?”

He nodded and tapped the empty seat next to him with two fingers. “What’s the plan now?”

“I’m out of ideas,” I said, collapsing into the chair beside him with none of the grace I had pretended to own all night. My feet throbbed.

Don looked at me, then at my shoes, then back at my face. His mouth was still curved like he planned to make a joke, but his eyes had gone a shade too careful. “I say we call it quits and split the tab.”

I sighed and took a sip of my drink, letting the sugary cocktail cool the back of my throat while I searched for one last bad idea. “That’s boring. Since when were you boring?”

He looked me up and down, the concern coming through despite the tease in his voice. “Ever since I noticed how desperate you were to take those heels off.”

I glared at him over the brim of my glass. “You know my rule. The shoes don’t come off until I get home.”

He nodded solemnly, though the corner of his mouth betrayed him. “A woman of principle. I respect it, but it’s not doing you any favours right now.”

I ignored him and looked around desperately, scanning the club for inspiration as if one more terrible solution might be hiding between the strobes, smoke, and people making bad choices in public.

“You can be the new Casanova of Pleasantview if I forfeit,” he offered, lifting his glass like he was presenting me with a crown.

I grimaced, resting back in the chair as the bass pounded through the soles of my ruined feet. “Like it’s that easy.”

He shrugged, but the motion had lost some of its usual swagger; the night had worn at him too, softening the sharp lines of his confidence. “What if I pay the tab now and we get this show on the road?”

“We can’t leave!” I sat up too quickly, the movement sending a hot complaint through both feet. “We need another tiebreaker.”

He smiled into his glass, tired amusement pulling at one corner of his mouth. “Now, that’s the alcohol talking.”

“I’m serious.” I pointed at him with the straw from my drink because apparently I had learned nothing from the umbrella. “We can’t leave with unfinished business.”

Don leaned closer, shoulder brushing mine, his voice slipping under the bass and landing warm against my ear. “What if I’ve already paid the tab?”

I turned to him slowly. His face held that familiar, dangerous mix of satisfaction and trouble. He smirked.

“C’mon, Nina,” he said, quieter now, the smugness still there but gentled by something more familiar. “I was never going to let you pay the tab, even if you did lose.”

For one dangerous second, I didn’t have a joke ready. That was always the problem with Don when he stopped performing: he made sincerity look accidental, which made it harder to shove away.

“Don.” His name came out flatter than I meant it to, caught somewhere between warning and something softer I didn’t want to examine.

He looked me up and down, slower this time, not the lazy appraisal he’d given the room all night but something more deliberate, more private. “Besides,” he said, his smile turning wicked again, as if he had remembered how to hide sincerity behind trouble, “I’ve been talking with a lot of beautiful women tonight, but there’s only one I promised to take home.”

I felt my face flush, warm enough to blame on the club if I needed to. Don sat there beside me with his stained shirt, tired eyes, and infuriating smile, looking far too pleased with the damage one sentence had done.

“You, me, a bottle of red?” Don asked, tipping his head towards the exit as if he were offering a negotiation instead of an escape route. His wink came slower this time, worn at the edges but no less dangerous.

I swallowed hard, then crossed one aching ankle over the other as if dignity was something I could still fake. “Throw in a foot massage, and I could be tempted.”

He pressed a hand to his chest in mock injury. “You drive a hard bargain.”

I narrowed my eyes until his smile started to crack.

He downed the rest of his old-fashioned, unbothered by my glare, then set the empty glass on the table with a decisive clink. “I’m feeling generous. Foot massage and transport out of the club if we go right now.”

Then he stood and held out one hand like I had any intention of being sensible.

For a second, I considered taking his hand like a sensible person. Then my feet throbbed, the room tilted pleasantly at the edges, and Don looked far too pleased with himself for me to make anything easy.

“But I haven’t finished my—”

Don took the cocktail from my hand and slipped my bag from my shoulder before I could decide whether to argue properly. “Drink’s coming with us,” he said, hooking the strap over his wrist. Then, with the infuriating confidence of a man who knew I was too tired to make escape worth it, he bent, caught me around the thighs, and hoisted me over his shoulder. My clutch swung against his back; my hair tumbled over my face; Dina’s dress threatened treason until he tugged it down with one careful hand and used my bag as a shield from the people around us.

A laugh burst out of me before I could make it sound offended. I slapped his back with the flat of my hand. “Put me down!”

“No can do,” he said, already carrying me through the crowd as if I weighed less than his ego. People turned to look as we headed for the door.

“I’m serious!” I argued, though the effect was somewhat ruined by the fact I was still laughing.

“Keep laughing like that,” he said, voice warm with laughter as he shouldered his way towards the exit, “and I might start thinking you enjoy being carried.”

“I enjoy not walking in Dina’s death traps,” I shot back, gripping the back of his shirt as the world bounced with each step. “There’s a difference.”

“A subtle difference,” he said, dodging a man with a tray of empty glasses. “Mostly invisible from this angle.”

“Easy, Lothario. I’m upside down, not defenceless.” I pinched his side through the damp fabric of his shirt, and he jolted hard enough to make two girls near the door shriek with laughter.

“That’s assault,” he said, adjusting his grip with one arm as the cold night air began to leak through the open doorway ahead. “I’m adding it to the tab.”

“You already paid it,” I reminded him, grinning into the blur of his red shirt beneath my cheek. “Try to keep up.” The cold night air hit us a second later, sharp enough to cut through the heat of the club, and I pretended not to notice that I still hadn’t let go.