The Unlikeable Demon Hunter (Nava Katz #1)(51)

“Sorry. I didn’t even think to ask. Are you an AA member?”

“Hardly.”

“You were a rock star. Addictions are within the realm of possibility.” I waggled the shot glass at him again.

“I’m on the clock.”

I left the drinks on a nearby high round table, licking sticky spicy cinnamon schnapps off my fingers before choosing a cue stick off the wall rack. “Right. Babysitting duty. We’ll play for it. Loser drinks.”

He tested out some cues as well. “I’ll try to contain my excitement.”

Rohan offered to let me go first but I wanted to see his form on his break shot, so I waved him over to the table. He bent over, cue held steady, preferring to hit the head ball from slightly off to the left. The racked balls broke with a satisfying crack. He even managed to sink the three-ball, but his five got tangled up in a nasty cluster.

“Not bad.” I eyed the table for my best move.

“By all means, do better.” He slid past me, his ass deliberately brushing against my hip.

Amateur. I wasn’t that easily distracted, though feel free to rub up against me any time. Gripping the cue with a confident hold an earthquake couldn’t shake, I sank three balls in rapid succession. I straightened up and smiled. “Better, like that?”

Rohan scratched at his chest. “I was going easy on you, but if that’s how you want to play it…”

I picked up the chalk. “It is.”

He leaned over the table. “Buckle up, baby.”

I learned something very interesting in the next little while. Rohan was exceedingly competitive. There was no banter, no joking around. You’d have thought humanity’s survival depended on the outcome of the game, he was so laser-focused.

In the end, though, I sank the eight-ball first. I picked up both shots and made him take one. “L’chaim.” I clinked my glass to his and shot the drink back, shivering at the sharp burn of booze hitting my throat, warming a path down to my stomach.

“Rack ’em.”

Rohan placed his empty glass next to mine. “What happened to ‘loser drinks?’” he asked, as we moved around the pool table removing balls from the pockets.

“I didn’t say winner couldn’t drink.” I rolled balls over to him, hips shaking to the up tempo dance music.

A few people drifted over to watch the next game. I ended up with a small group of interchangeable hipster fanboys–thankfully beardless–alternating between cheering me on with poorly disguised innuendo and offering tips. Neither of which impressed me.

Rohan’s posse, on the other hand, consisted of a trio of chicks named after designers, sporting streaked blonde hair and prodigious breasts. Armani, Chanel, and Prada were either incestuous triplets or friends with benefits who didn’t like each other. I wasn’t sure how to deconstruct their alternate sniping and groping.

About halfway through the game, the girls started buying Rohan drinks. Sure, them, he’d take booze from. I hoped he’d become a sloppy drunk. No such luck. If anything, his playing got better.

“You guys learn to fight wasted, don’t you?” I muttered after he slammed back yet another tequila then pocketed the eight-ball with an impressive stroke that won him game two.

He gave me a wide smile and handed me my loser shot.

I fired it back. Good thing I could hold my liquor. I couldn’t afford a loss in motor skills.

“Let make this interesting,” Rohan said. “If I win…”

Cuntessa de Spluge woke up, having a vested interest in hearing the rest of that sentence.

“You go home,” he finished.

Back to seniors’ hours. “All right,” I said, “but if I win, we stick around for dancing.”

The DJ was winding the crowd higher with a little Usher. How fun would it be to be out there with Rohan? I made a face. “Unless you can’t dance.” I beckoned him closer. “If you have no rhythm, tell me now.”

“My rhythm is bang on,” he drawled in my ear.

Cuntessa pulsed.

The two posses took our escalation into betting territory as the green light to place bets with each other. Given the shrieking giggles of the girls, it wasn’t hard to guess what was at stake. The trouble was that they now ganged up on poor Rohan and me, deciding that a shot of their choosing (and buying) had to be drunk for each ball missed.

Rohan readily agreed to this. I did too. I could hold my booze and was determined to crush him.

It was on.

I lost track of everything around me. My world narrowed down to the felt, the cue ball, and the occasional fresh cool glass pressed into my hand. Which started happening more and more often as that one drink too many tilted my pool playing abilities into potential epic failure territory. My stomach protested the boozy onslaught.

“Spit or swallow?” Rohan murmured to me, near the end of the final game. We were neck and neck for balls sunk.

I sputtered the water I’d been gulping down. “Beg pardon?”

He nodded at the triplets. “Spit or swallow? What are your boys in for tonight?”

I didn’t even need to glance at the girls to answer that one. “Neither. Those girls are not putting their mouths on it.”

Rohan gaped at me like door number three wasn’t even a reality in his world.

I laughed and patted his shoulder. “Such a sheltered life you’ve led, Snowflake.”