Gaslight (Crossbreed #4)(40)
She quirked a thin eyebrow. “Honey, I don’t swing that way.”
I gave her a mechanical smile and left the bathroom. Blending in was a bitch. I knew humans—understood them, having recently been one. But even in my human life, clubs like this were never my scene. Hell, I wasn’t sure exactly what my scene ever was. I’d hardly had a chance to live before turning at twenty-five. But even then, I usually liked to hang back in a quiet corner. Now I had to be front and center, and the attention made me uncomfortable.
I strutted over to the bar and ordered a shot of tequila. It burned deliciously on the ride down to my empty stomach, so I ordered another. Hours of mingling, and all I had to show for it was a headache and sweaty thighs.
I hadn’t noticed Christian next to me until he reached for a beer that the bartender set down. I recognized the onyx ring and glimpsed him in the mirror, but he kept his head down and moved out of sight.
Casually turning to face the open room, I propped my elbows on the bar behind me and scanned the crowd. My heart skipped a beat when I spotted a familiar leather-clad lumberjack.
Boomer was unmistakable—like spotting Bigfoot in Munchkinland. His bushy beard tapered at the bottom, and I bet he hadn’t washed his stringy brown hair in ten years. Yet he somehow managed to attract the ladies. No sign of Denise, but another pretty girl was in his thrall. Boomer’s long sleeves weren’t uncommon in winter, but why the leather gloves? This club was a sauna, so why not tuck those in his back pockets? They weren’t the fingerless kind either.
When he shifted his eyes toward a long-legged woman walking by, I could barely look away. The wraparounds covered some of his face, and I wasn’t sure if I could identify a Vampire by his cheeks alone. Probably not. Vampire skin was one of those features you noticed up close with more real estate showing. When Vamps are made, their skin pigment returns to a rejuvenated state like that of a newborn. It has a flawless quality bereft of wrinkles and sun damage. On a twenty-year-old, no one would notice. But men over thirty stood out, and this guy was easily pushing forty-five.
Had he done something to poor little Denise? Best-case scenario, he was just another dickhead, and she’d learned a lesson about finding Mr. Right in a club. Hopefully she was at home with a carton of ice cream, sulking over her failure. Better that than the alternative.
Most everyone in the Breed world had a unique alias. But if Boomer was carrying ID, there was no way I was getting my hands on it. Not with that metal chain on his belt loop attached to the wallet in his back pocket. Maybe if I seduced him and got his pants off, but the odds of that happening were slim to not a chance in hell.
I stood beneath a bright light, and when he looked my way, I steered my attention to a group of drunken girls getting up to leave. Boomer needed to see my mismatched eyes. I didn’t want to make him uneasy by staring at him, so I watched the crowd around him. When I was confident he’d seen me, I coolly turned around and knocked back a shot of tequila, making sure to shift my ass in those leathers. My body tingled delightfully, and I pretended to be checking my phone as most humans did obsessively.
“Hey, Simone.”
I almost didn’t recognize my fake name. A familiar face claimed the empty spot to my left. “Hey, Chase. So we meet again.”
We’d run into each other a couple of times, but we only nodded at each other in passing. I smiled at his leather pants as I took a seat on the stool beside him. He looked like he belonged in them, whereas I looked like I only took mine out of the closet on special sex occasions.
“No drink?” I asked.
He jerked his head to the woman behind him. “In about a minute. I bet she doesn’t finish it.”
“You don’t get grossed out by drinking from someone else’s glass? You might get the superdeluxe avian flu cooties.”
An imperceptible smile touched his lips as he rubbed one of his black ear studs. “I’ve already got cooties.”
“What happens if you meet a nice girl who wants you to buy her a drink?”
He leaned in. “A nice girl doesn’t expect anything.”
“Except chivalry.”
“Didn’t you get the memo? That died centuries ago.”
I laughed and put my phone back in my clutch. Talking to Chase gave me a little reprieve from the madness of being a social girl. I peered over my shoulder, and when I saw Boomer look my way, I jerked my head back to Chase, whose thin-lipped smile implied he wanted to say something.
But he didn’t. And thank God for that. He probably thought I was checking out Boomer and was judging my taste in men.
“Something wrong?” he asked.
I waved my hand. “Nah. I thought the club scene would be a lot of fun, but maybe it’s better when you have friends.”
“Well, you got me, right?” He bit his thumbnail for a second before resting his elbow on the bar. “You’re a cool chick. Where are all your cool-chick friends?”
“After college, they went their way and I went mine.”
His brows arched. “What college did you go to?”
“The School of Hard Knocks. That’s why we went our separate ways.”
“What about since? Surely you go out to lunch with the girls at work.”
I touched my pendant and tried to play it cool. I’d been telling people I worked at home doing telemarketing. “I never clicked much with girls, and guys can only be friends as long as they’re single. Once they get into a relationship, it’s sayonara. You know the story. She begins to wonder why he needs other female friends. Isn’t she enough? Then one day”—I snapped my fingers—“you’re out of his life.”