“Screw you, asshole.” Amber pushes off the wall strides to the open door. “Not interested in you. Stay away from me.”

I laugh, but something painful twists inside my chest. I have no idea what it means, and what to do about it, so I just watch her enter the apartment and vanish in the party crowd.

Fuck. Me.

“Jesse,” the blonde whines, red lipstick smeared all over her face as she pouts at me. “I don’t feel so good. I think I’m gonna puke.”

I let her go as if burned, then grab her again when she sways on her high heels.

Goddammit. My chest still feels too tight, but I ignore it with the ease of long practice and haul the blonde back inside and straight to the bathroom. Nothing out of the ordinary, a typical party night—and yet something has changed.

I have this feeling I haven’t had in a while—the feeling I don’t know where I’m going and what I’m doing.

I know the cure for it, though. As soon as I make sure the blonde is not in need of a trip to the ER, I’ll grab a bottle of tequila and settle down with a mission to erase all emotion and wipe out all memories.

Sometimes it even works.

***

“Hey, Jesse, whatcha doing?” Rafe lifts his fist, and I bump it with mine—or try to. I manage to miss it. I see double by this point, so it’s no wonder.

“Heya. Wassup?” Damn, my mouth isn’t cooperating. My hands either, I realize, when Rafe easily pulls a glass—empty, I notice—from my lax fingers and sets it on a low table. Has to be low, ’cuz I’m sitting on the floor, my back to the wall, and it’s at eye-level.

Unless I’ve grown bigger. Kinda like the Alice eating that cake in Wonderland. It was in a book I found in one of the foster homes I’d passed through, but then I lost it.

Like I lose everything important in my life.

Did I eat cake? Can’t remember eating anything. I often forget about food. There was a time I tried hard to forget about food, because I didn’t have any, and now I can have it, I keep forgetting about it.

Figures.

“Man, you’re so fucking out of it.” Rafe grumbles as he thrusts a plastic cup into my hand, liquid sloshing inside. “Drink.”

I take a sip and grimace. “What’s this?”

“Water with sugar and salt. Chug it down already. No alcohol poisoning on my shift.” Rafe scowls at me through the blond hair falling in his face.

Second person I managed to piss off tonight, blondes excepted.

“Yessir,” I mumble and down the water in two gulps. I somehow end up with some of it on my T-shirt, and it makes me snort.

“Yo, Jesse.” Another tall form appears behind Rafe, and the Mohawk tells me I’ve drawn Zane’s eye.

Oh shit.

“Damn. Is he as piss-ass drunk as he looks?” Zane rubs a hand over his face, and the look of disappointment on it cuts deep. He’s my mentor, my teacher, the one who took me in.

Then again, feels like tonight everything cuts too deep, like I’m a reopened wound, letting the blades of words sink all the way to the bone.

“I’m okay,” I mutter and push to my feet, holding on to the sofa as the floor tilts. “See?”

“The hell you are.” Zane huffs. “What’s the matter with you, kid?”

It’s always funny how we calls me that, not being any older, but tonight I don’t find it funny.

“Everything’s fine.” Has to be fine, and I was wrong: alcohol isn’t helping me forget and get numb tonight. It rubs into my scabs, reviving every single fucking memory. “Perfect.”

“I’m driving you home,” Rafe says, grabbing my shoulder as I stumble on empty beer bottles. “Come on.”

And I go along. I paste a wide smile on my face and stagger out of the apartment, keeping my gaze straight ahead and my heart lodged somewhere in my throat, telling myself I don’t care what happens, what others think of me and where I will end up tomorrow.

If life has taught me one thing is that it makes no difference if I care, if I try—and fuck the world, anyway.

Chapter Three

Amber

Pre-party, the apartment looked small but cozy and clean. Post-party, it looks like a bomb went off—a bomb filled with beer bottles, plastic cups and, for some reason, multicolored confetti. Probably napkins, though why someone would shred them into tiny pieces is beyond me.

Much in life is beyond me. I’ve long given up trying to understand people. Seriously. Trying is a waste of time. Instead, I let life flow around me, over me, let people brush me by, and do my best to keep my head down and be invisible.

In my experience, attention is a bad, bad thing. It leads to interest, and interest can turn bad more times than not. Avoid interest, avoid attention, and you avoid problems.

Which is why Jesse has unsettled me so much, I muse as I gather plastic dishes and cups, throwing them into a huge trash bag. There was interest and curiosity in his gaze. I had somehow, mysteriously, drawn the attention of the hottest guy in the room, and it only served to frighten me.

I need nothing from him. No attention, no interest, thank you very much. I hope he got the message. I’m perfectly fine without any more men in my life. I mean, I have my dad back in Chicago, and I can’t avoid Micah and Ev’s friends completely.

That’s more than enough. Way more. Maybe more than I can handle.

My hands are shaking, and I sink down on the sofa. Something crinkles under my ass, and I cringe, pulling out a plastic spoon.

Rolling my eyes, feeling a bit better, I chuck it into the trash bag and sigh. Why can’t I chuck my fears in there as well? How can the past keep me prisoner after so many years? How can I break the chains? How can I fight something that is supposed to be over?

“God, I’m beat.” Kayla drops on the couch next to me and leans back, closing her eyes.

Her blond-streaked hair is caught in a messy bun on top of her head, strands escaping and falling in her face. I barely recognize her dressed in sports shorts and an oversized T-shirt, a far cry from the slinky dress she had on last night.

“So, what did you think of the boys?” She nudges me with her elbow, and I flinch. She doesn’t seem to notice. “That’s some seriously hot eye-candy, girl. I’d love me one.”

“Any?” I lift a brow at her, trying to figure her out.

“Gawd, that Jesse’s sexy. Love his eyes. And his body. And his lips.” She giggles. “I don’t think there’s anything about him I don’t like, actually. And I’m not the only one.”

“Oh?” A fiery blush is climbing my neck. Crap, am I so obvious?

“Cassie, the girl working with Ev,” Kayla says. “She has a crush the size of Texas on Jesse.”

Oh. Okay, awesome. I nod, trying to process this. “So… they’re together?”

“Who, Cassie and Jesse?” Kayla laughs and wiggles her bare toes in the air. Her nails are painted a bright pink. “You don’t know Jesse. I mean, you just arrived, so it makes sense.”

“Yeah?” My curiosity gets the better of me, and I turn to face Kayla fully. “What about him?”

She shrugs. “It’s not a secret. He’ll fuck anything with tits and a vagina. And Cassie, well…she’ll sleep with anything that has a dick. Sorry to be crude, but it’s the truth.”

I fall back on the sofa cushions, letting the trash bag drop to the floor.

Of course I knew that about Jesse. I mean, hello. Talk about an introduction. He’d practically fallen out of the bathroom after doing whatever it was he’d been doing with that blonde. A blonde whose name he didn’t even remember thirty seconds later.

And then he’d been with another. Jesus. “And you still want him?”

“Uh-huh.” Kayla sighs dreamily.

“You just said he’s a manwhore.”

“Pfff.” She waves a hand. “Nothing wrong with ogling him, is there?”

“Ogling.” I shake my head, fighting a smile. “I see.”

“And the occasional touch. Doesn’t hurt, does it? I just want…” She wiggles her fingers and makes grabby hands. “Want to feel his abs, you know? They look, like, rock-hard. And his pecs. Wouldn’t mind feeling his biceps, either. I’d totally grab his ass, too.”