Don't Let Go(33)

“You okay?” she asked, mirroring what Noah had asked me earlier.
“I’m fine,” I breathed, knowing I wasn’t. Knowing that she knew I wasn’t, too. I dabbed under my eyes with a napkin and grabbed a handful of nuts, not even caring for once if they’d been freshly opened or if five hundred other patrons had pawed through them.
“Noah just walked back in the same door,” she said warily.
“Yep.”
She nodded and I saw her gaze follow him before returning to mine. “Didn’t go well, I’m guessing?”
I closed my eyes and blew out a slow breath to return my heart rate to normal. The heat radiating off my skin would take a little longer.
“Doesn’t matter,” I said, fanning myself with a coaster and forcing a smile. “So tell me about you and Becca’s conversation. What did you say when she told you that?”
Ruthie’s eyes widened in surprise. “O—kay. When did we get back here? I thought you wanted to talk about anything else.”
I pushed another handful of nuts in my mouth and proceeded to talk around them.
“Turns out, it’s the sanest subject of the night.”

? ? ?

The girl had freakish stamina. When I was pregnant—both times—I had trouble staying up past eight o’clock. She looked just as perky at eleven as she did at seven, whereas I was fading, big-time.
I was ready to go—had been since that little exchange outside—but I refused to let a pregnant woman outlast me. I didn’t care if she was thirteen years younger.
While the people-watching was interesting enough, including a brief wardrobe malfunction from an inebriated couple groping on the dance floor, the crowd began to thin. The only-here-for-dinner crowd was falling out to go catch a movie or have sober sex, while the true partiers were holding out for the drunken variety.
Or in my case, holding out for a Sprite-drinking pregnant woman to leave.
“Um, what’s—” Ruthie began, narrowing her eyes to something across the room. “That can’t be good.”
I followed her gaze through the handful of remaining dancers on the floor and my stomach twisted up. “Oh, shit,” I said, pushing off the stool.
Hayden had approached Noah and Shayna’s table and appeared to be asking them both questions with a grim expression. Shayna visibly backed up a little, looking wide-eyed.
“Hang on,” Ruthie said, patting the table at my side. “They’re men. They have to do the whole dick-swinging thing. Just wait—”
Her words were cut off by our unified gasp as Noah stood up quickly, putting the two men in that unmistakable stance.
“Shit,” I said, my feet already propelling me forward. I could hear Ruthie behind me muttering curse words as we wound our way through the oblivious gropers, reaching their table just in time to hear Noah ask him to leave.


Chapter 9

Judging by the edge to his voice filtered through his teeth, it wasn’t the first time he’d made that request.
Hayden was laughing in his face. And stupid drunk.
“Hayden, what are you doing?” I said, rounding the table to get to him. “I’m sorry,” I mouthed to Shayna, who smiled politely.
“Jules!” Hayden said, his eyes lighting up like we were all at a party. “We were just talking about you.”
“I’ll bet,” I muttered.
He slung an arm around me and I tried to use that to move us both along and away from their table, but it didn’t work that way. Noah’s eyes were dark and menacing, and I could only imagine what Hayden had mouthed off about.
“Did you know that these two are having a baby?” Hayden said loudly. “That’s fantastic.”
“Let’s go, Hayden,” I said, trying in vain to move him. He was surprisingly solid for a drunk.
“Just like we had a kid, Julianna,” he said, his words slowing. “Although I’m sure your kid’ll be perfect,” he said to Shayna, who darted a glance from me to the table and back to Noah. “Not like our daughter. I mean, she used to be. When she was born and had all that hair and perfect little fingers,” he said. I stared at him, mortified. “But now she wants to chop her hair sideways, dress like a freak, and have sex with God knows who.”
“Hayden!” I pinched him in the side, hoping he’d feel it. He didn’t. “Y’all, I’m so sorry.” I felt my eyes well up.
“Jesus,” Noah muttered, shaking his head. “Have some dignity, man. Go home.”
“But yours won’t be like that, sweetheart,” Hayden said, leaning toward Shayna, who scooted back more. “Because Jules just had me. You’ve got Superman here.” Hayden clapped Noah on the shoulder, which he shoved off with a jerk of his arm. “What could be more perfect than the man everyone wants.”
I closed my eyes, wishing the floor to swallow him whole.
“No one could ever live up to you,” Hayden said, refocusing his eyes on Noah. I got the distinct impression he’d just forgotten about Becca in that split second and was on another course entirely. “Not the perfect ghost of Noah Ryan past,” he continued on a chuckle. “Didn’t matter that I stuck around to raise my kid—”
Everyone moved at once. Noah stepped forward with lightning speed and I tried to move between them. Shayna’s stool scooted backward as she jumped to her feet. Ruthie hopped sideways to get out of the way.
Hayden had the idea all mixed up in his riddled state, and I knew it, and Noah knew it, but it triggered something primal that was already touchy.