The Twenty-One (Emerald Cove #2)

by Lauren K. McKellar

  I don’t feel the nausea I did days ago.

  I don’t feel a damn thing.

  One week later, I’m shut in my room. I haven’t left it to do anything aside from work. My body is a constant fight between how can I keep loving him and how can I walk away? I’m tired, so damn tired of fighting. So damn tired of it all.

  Hope and Lia have come and gone, both trying to get me to talk, to deal with it all, but it’s not that simple. This isn’t just another romance novel. This is the story of my life.

  Then my door swings open, flying back to hit the wall. My head jerks up from where I’m reading on my bed.

  “Get your arse up.”

  Dani.

  “I don’t feel—“

  “I’m not taking no for an answer.” Dani strides over to me and pinches the corner of my shirt as if it’s dirty laundry. “And change. We’re going clubbing.”

  I look up at her. Clubbing is the second-last thing I feel like doing right now.

  The last thing is leaving the house.

  “I’m not clubbing with you.” The words sound foreign to me, my throat hoarse. Maybe it’s because speaking isn’t something I’ve done a lot of recently.

  Dani huffs out a sigh and flops down beside me on the bed. “You are clubbing with me.” She pauses, then picks up a strand of my hair and lets it fall limply to my back. “I don’t know who you are and what you’ve done with my nerdy sister, but this”—she gestures up and down my body with her finger—“simply will not fly. I get it. The guy you were dating is dying, but guess what? Shit things happen. You have to deal with them anyway.”

  I rub across my eyes. The lids are heavy, so heavy, and all I want to do is sleep. “I am dealing with it.”

  She shakes her head. “No. You’re doing what you did with Dad.”

  I blink my eyes and shoot up from where I’ve been lying, my book falling to the floor. Goosebumps prickle on my skin. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, you’re shutting off. Closing down.” Dani shakes her head. “Come out with me. We’ll have a few drinks, hang out ... just get out of the house. It’ll do you a world of good.”

  The words sink in around me. It’s the last thing I feel like doing.

  “Come on, Ellie.” Dani reaches out and gives my arm a squeeze. “I know you’re strong, and this is your thing, but ... how is being strong working out for you so far?”

  They’re all the words it takes to rip me out from between the sheets.

  ***

  “Four tequila shots and two vodka sodas, please.” Dani slams a fifty down on the counter, right in front of her cleavage revealed in her super low-cut top, and I raise a brow at her. I don’t ask how she got the money. For once, I don’t want to think. I don’t want to be responsible. I just want to be.

  Is there anything so wrong with that?

  “Coming right up.” The bartender gives her a wink and walks away, collecting some glasses as he goes

  “Isn’t that a lot?” I chew my lip. I want to forget, sure, but I’m not a big drinker. I don’t want to end up in hospital.

  Hospital.

  Where Joel will end up.

  Where Joel will die.

  “Actually, forget I said anything.” I paste on a smile, just like I pasted on some bright red lipstick and smoky black eyeliner a few hours earlier. According to Dani, if you look good, you feel good.

  I’m just waiting for the second half of the promise to kick in.

  “You are going to have fun tonight, missy.” Dani pokes me in the ribs, a wicked glint lighting her eyes. “They say the best way to get over a guy is to get under another one. So ...”

  “I think they also say that’s the best way to get an STD.” I poke my tongue out, but manage a laugh.

  “Whatever.”

  Four shot glasses thud against the counter, and the bartender places four wedges of lemon and four tiny packets of salt, like you’d get at a fish and chip shop, on the wooden countertop. He twists the top off a bottle of tequila and starts pouring from high above the glass, his arm muscles bulging underneath his tight black tee. Stubble lines his jaw, and he has that whole Mediterranean sex god thing going on.

  You know. If you like that kind of thing.

  If you’re not hung up on a guy with soul-destroying blue eyes.

  “So what brings you ladies out tonight?” he asks, as the liquid falls into the final glass.

  “My sister is broken-hearted.” Dani looks prettily at me, and then bats her eyelashes at the bartender. Her pupils seem funny, as if they’re smaller. Or maybe bigger. I frown. Is that a drug thing?

  The bartender responds by pulling out a fifth shot glass and filling it with tequila, too. “Well then.” He raises his glass. “Commiserations to the poor sucker who doesn’t have a hottie like you in his life any longer.”

  Dani rips open her salt packet and licks along her hand, never breaking eye contact with the bartender. For just a second, his suave veneer drops as her tongue meets her skin, but he covers it up and brandishes a cocky smile again.

  My sister pours the salt onto her hand, then takes mine and pours salt along that, too. Thank God she didn’t try to lick it. I might have died.

  We both lick our salt. It’s grainy and intense on my tongue. I hold my glass and get ready. I guess this is it. This is what it’s like to grieve normally.

  “To Ellie.” Dani raises her glass.

  “To Ellie.” The bartender brings his glass to ours, and when they connect, a sliver of tequila runs down the back of my hand. The other two bring their glasses to their lips, knocking the potent liquid back, but I just stare at mine for a moment. Is this really the best idea? Is drinking going to make Joel any less on my mind?

  His eyes, burning into mine.

  His lips, crashing against my skin.

  Memory flashes into my mind in vivid Technicolor, and it’s all the prompt I need. I take the shot and knock it back. I relish in the burn as it slides down my throat. I crave the pain that flames through my lungs.

  Some things you’ll always remember.

  They’re what I’m drinking to forget.

  I slam my glass back on the counter and take the next one, not pausing to suck on the lemon wedge or restack my salt.

  “To the truth.” I knock the alcohol back, and it burns just the same as the first. It burns in a way that lets me feel something that’s not just heartache. And for that, I am eternally grateful.

  For that, I think tequila is my new best friend.

  “Two more!” The glass lands on the counter.

  Dani giggles and does her own shot, placing it down beside mine. “Easy, tiger. You don’t want to burn out too quickly.”

  She’s wrong.

  That’s all I want.

  Still, I take the vodka soda when the bartender hands it over, and Dani leads me deep into the crowd of people moving on the dance floor. Sweaty bodies slide against sweaty bodies, hips pressing against hips, hands running over backs, bums and boobs. The music is seductive with a thrumming bass line that pulses through my body.

  Joel.

  His laugh.

  “I’ll catch you if you fall.”

  “Hey!” Dani yells into my ear, her hand hot on my shoulder. “Forget about him. You got this.”

  I pull back and look into her golden brown eyes that glint against the flashing strobe lights. Her face, so similar to my own, bears a soft smile. She raises her glass, her hand steady. “We have each other. That’s enough. Remember?”

  My own words to her echo in my ears. I said that so many times when Dad first died.

  I suck up the vodka soda through my straw in one long hit. It doesn’t burn like the tequila—I barely taste it at all. All I know is that when I’m done, my knees tingle. My hips tingle.

  And I’m one step closer to numbing the pain.

  “Go Ellie!” Dani grins and knocks back some of her own drink, then starts moving her body to the music. I join her, and soon we’re dancing in amidst the sea
of people.

  The words to a familiar song become me. They writhe through my body, pull up my emotions and suck me dry. Soon every I love you is my I love you, soon every I hate you is my condemnation of the boy who broke my heart. The boy who stole my life.

  Sweat sticks my tank top to my back, and my zip-up leather pants feel looser around the waist. For the briefest moment I wonder if it’s so damn hot in here I’ve lost weight, then heat presses to my back. A frisson of electricity fires over my arse, and my hands fly back to clasp my zip.

  It’s done up. Now.

  I spin around. Zy stands there, a self-satisfied grin on his face.

  “Really?” I fold my arms across my chest, then stop when I see his gaze drop to where I know my cleavage peaks out of my top.

  “Just making sure these other guys didn’t see ...” Please don’t go into details. “Your black lacy G. I got your back.”

  I press my eyes shut, and a part of me dies.

  And then, dies.

  Because that’s all it takes to shock you from the present to reality. One little word.

  One little heartache.

  “Go dance with my sister.” I flick my hand and gesture Zy toward Dani, a scowl twisting my lips. Dickhead. What an obnoxious, self-entitled, egotistical—

  The beat of the bass line changes to an upbeat Taylor Swift number. Shake It Off. Oh! I love this song.

  I bounce my body up and down, my movements reflecting the lyrics, and for some reason Dani laughs at me, but I make like Tay-Tay says and shake it off. I don’t need her judgment. I don’t need her pity.

  After a while, Dani raises her hand to her mouth in the unmistakable symbol for more drinks, and I nod and follow her obediently to the bar. We wait in line with Zy and a throng of others, five-people deep, and when we finally muscle our way to the front, it’s an achievement. I pull my credit card from my wallet, the one I used to monitor oh-so-carefully, and slam it on the counter.

  “Nine tequila shooters, and three vodka sodas,” I say.

  The bartender, the same one as before, furrows his brow at me, and leans in closer, as if he can’t hear me.

  “I said, nine tequila—”

  “We’re after nine tequila shots and three vodka sodas, please.” Dani smiles, her jaw ticking, and it seems she must speak his language because he nods and gets to work preparing glasses.

  “What’s wrong with him?” I ask. The bar bears the entirety of my body weight. Somehow, I’m all chest, arms and head. How did that happen? When did I lose weight in my legs?

  “Take it easy, Eleanor.” Zy’s hand rests on my arm, and I flinch.

  “Hands off, you.” I brush away his fingers, but they’re not there. Were they ever? Did I imagine him just touching me?

  Zy’s hands fly in the air beside his head, and I keep a close eye on them. I’m watching you, hands.

  “I’m just saying, take it easy. I don’t want you getting hurt.” His face clouds with a shadow of darkness.

  Sickness lurches in my stomach. Anger lurches in my throat and I open my mouth, prepared to spew it all out, to retch it all over him when—

  “Ellie, right?”

  I spin around.

  She’s tall. Brown hair. Brown eyes. Pale skin.

  You’d think she’d be so ordinary, but she’s not. She has this fight for life burning deep within her.

  And a best friend whose heart is entangled with mine.

  “Hi.”

  She nods at me, and narrows her eyes. “It’s Fiona.”

  As soon as the name rings in my ears, I know it. I know it as well as I know my own birthday. As well I know my own address.

  “You’re seeing my friend, Joel.” She tucks an errant curl of chocolate hair behind her ear. “Well, you were seeing.”

  The words cut me like a knife. Even though it was a choice I made, it hurts so bad.

  “We’re camping at the Basin tomorrow,” Fiona yells in my ear. Her breath is hot—everything is hot. I pull my tank from my sweaty body. God, it’s hot in here. “You should come.”

  I balk. “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Hey, your stupid friend”—Dani pokes Fiona in the chest—“broke her heart, you dumb bitch.”

  Fiona raises her eyebrows, and her gaze runs from Dani’s toes to her face, to her jaw clicking, back and forth, and back. “Okay, lady,” she says. “Maybe try chewing some gum or something.” She ruffles in her handbag and produces a pack of Extra. “It might stop you from chewing off your face.”

  “Fuck off.” Dani flicks the pack and sends it catapulting through the air into the throng of sweaty, writhing bodies to the side of us. “I’m outta here.”

  She grabs Zy’s wrist and then mine, and charges toward the dance floor.

  I want to go. With every cell in my body, I want to follow my sister, because out of everybody I know, she is an expert when it comes to forgetting. She truly understands what it means to escape. To feel good.

  And even though Fiona’s words tick all the warning boxes lodged in my brain for drugs and danger and dumb-arse decisions, I follow.

  Because I’m tired of playing the big sister for once.

  We find a spot on the opposite side of the club, right next to the emergency exit doors. The three of us form a loose circle here, where the air is a little easier to breathe. Where everything is a little simpler to digest. We jump, we laugh, and for one tiny moment I’m not just a girl whose ex-boyfriend is going to die, or who’s looking after her sister.

  I’m Ellie Mayfield.

  And I’m kind of enjoying that.

  We dance, and when Dani asks me to come to the bathroom with her, I know exactly what it means. And even though I’m gone, so far gone that I can’t quite feel my legs and all my thoughts blur into one big, beautiful rainbow of thought, I know I don’t want to go with her. I know I want to remain on my own.

  Zy looks at me then at Dani, as if trying to decide who he should stay with. I shake my head, laughing. Of course he should go with Dani.

  He leaves, and I raise my arms up in the air and swirl my hips to the music, loving the way it owns me. How this DJ somehow understands every iota of emotion travelling through me at this very moment.

  The song changes, and a sexier, dirtier beat vibrates through the room. I scoop my hips low, my hands travelling up my thighs, over my hips, up my waist.

  And then, they’re not my hands.

  They’re not my hands at all.

  Lips press against my neck, and I’m so tightly strung. The sensation sizzles across my skin, and it reminds me of everything I want. Everything that’s been burning within me for too long.

  My arms reach up and wrap around his neck, his smooth skin. I grind my body back, loving the contact of skin against skin. Of man against woman. I inhale, and the scent of sweat and spicy aftershave hits—

  This is not Joel.

  It’s not so much a realisation as a reminder. Because did I ever really think it was?

  I spin around, and my hands run across short spiky hairs on the back of this man’s neck. His face is pockmarked from acne, his eyes the wrong blue, his jaw the wrong set. His frame is bigger than Joel’s cancer-ridden body.

  Everything about him isn’t Joel.

  And yet, there’s a part of me still hearing my sister’s words from earlier. Wondering if the best way to get over the boy I thought I’d love forever is to get under another one. If life truly is that black and white.

  The boy leans forward, and a whiff of vodka pauses my breathing before he passes my face and hits my ear.

  “You’re hot.”

  His breath is warm. Clammy, like a rainforest.

  And worse? It smells like tuna. Cat food. Intense, fishy, and uncompromising.

  From our up-close-and-personal position, I see the sweat marks that stain his white T-shirt.

  Still, I try not to push him away. Because he could be what I need. He could be my salvation.

  His hands wrap around my
waist and he thrusts his hips toward mine. The jolt of our private parts making contact isn’t so much an explosion as a train derailed. It’s painful, clumsy, and not at all where you want it to go.

  Sadly, my admirer doesn’t seem to realise. “Yeah,” he whispers into my hair, circling his hips. Much to my irritation, I can feel his growing erection blossoming against my thigh. A good indication of how short he falls, both in the height and the turn-on department.

  He leans forward, his blue eyes locked with mine. I’m definitely boozy, but I’m starting to see the funny side of this. After all, he’s managed to do one thing successfully tonight—convince me that going home with a random is the worst idea my sister has ever had.

  I lock eyes with his, waiting for him to provide whatever other fascinating insight into my life he might have—

  Lips crash against mine.

  Big.

  Warm.

  Wet.

  It’s as if someone doused a lump of jelly in hot water, rubbed a frog’s butt all over it, and then pressed it to my face.

  I pull my hands up to shove against his chest and push him away when I’m jerked back, hands on either of my shoulders pulling me against a warm, hard chest.

  “Fuck off,” Zy growls. I turn to look up at him as he pushes me behind him and faces off with the guy who had tried to kiss me.

  “Hey, man.” The guy’s hands fly in the air. “She started it.”

  “Don’t take advantage of girls who—”

  I tug on Zy’s shirt. “He wasn’t. I’m an idiot. I ...” The room spins before me. I grab onto Zy’s shirt again, this time to stop myself from falling.

  He turns to me and grabs either arm, holding me up. “Are you okay?”

  And in that moment, I know.

  I know that kissing someone isn’t going to make this go away. I know that hiding from it won’t change anything either.

  And I know that I’m going to be sick.

  And I am, all over Zy’s black skate shoes.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The drive to the beach is deceptively easy. I spent a week trying to avoid him. Four days throwing myself into work to keep him off my mind. One night trying to forget he ever existed.

  But when push came to shove, when I woke up feeling shady as all hell and hungover as a bitch, finding him was the only thing on my mind. Finding him was the only way I could think of sorting out my headspace.