Crave for Me Read online

  He grinned. “Don’t worry, Kevin. You won’t even miss ‘em. Besides,” he added, gesturing to me. “We’ll still have Chris. He’s not a hook-up guy.”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” I protested. “That’s not true. I hook up as much as anybody.”

  “Bullshit,” Joshua said flatly. Everyone looked at him, and he shrugged. “Truth, man. You haven’t been on a date in six months, have you? I don’t hook up much myself, but compared to you, I’m another Thomas Dixon. Pre-Lori, of course,” he clarified.

  Thomas punched him in the shoulder. “Fuck off, dude,” he said lightly. “You make me sound like a shag bandit.”

  “Nah, more like a friend of the ladies,” Kevin corrected. “Make ‘em happy and send ‘em home, right? No hard feelings.”

  Thomas’ face grew serious. “Yeah, that about sums it up. Except they weren’t always happy and there were plenty of hard feelings,” he said wryly. “I can be a truly self-centered asshole. But that was the old me,” he concluded, shaking his head. “Thank God I’ve got Lori now and she calls me out on all that shit.”

  “Lori’s special, though,” I said. I nodded to Kevin. “And so is Sabrina. Anyone in their right mind would give up stranger candy for women like that. Anyway, if there’s anything to be learned from our friend Thomas here, it’s don’t be an asshole. Right?” Thomas glared at me and we laughed.

  “I dunno,” Joshua said thoughtfully. “I think people can make up their own minds. Sometimes a spontaneous passion is the right choice, and sometimes it isn’t. It’s all in the situation. I don’t see the big fuss about it. ”

  “I thought that once, too,” Kevin said wryly. “That’s how I got Kim.”

  Joshua nodded. “Point. But having Kim led you to finding Sabrina again, so I’d still say that goes in the pro column.”

  “Yeah, well, despite my stellar reputation with you assholes, I wouldn’t mind finding some female company this weekend,” I said, more to stop a debate from starting than anything. We could wind up sitting here all day, debating the finer points of hookup culture, and never get around to actually doing anything.

  It worked. Three pairs of eyes looked at me, surprise in all of them. The sudden attention made my skin creep and my small hairs rise up.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You’re not a hook up guy,” Joshua said again slowly, as if I were having trouble grasping the concept. “You’re practically a monk. Or you’re a giant teddy bear, looking for the right one. I’m not sure which.”

  I bristled, but tamped it down. It wasn’t Joshua’s fault he was stepping on some raw nerves. “I’m not old enough to go looking for the right one,” I said dryly. I hoped no one could see the memories this conversation provoked, or the phantom ache they caused. “I guess I’ve grown particular about the kind of woman I want to take home.”

  “It can’t still be Angela, right?” Kevin said, then looked abashed. “Shit, man, sorry. That was out of line.”

  The name made me jump. I gave him a look, but shook my head. “You’re fine. No, it’s not Angela. It’s just not high on my priorities sometimes. If the right opportunity presents itself, I’ll consider it.”

  “Um, who’s Angela?” Thomas asked, looking from Kevin to me.

  I blew out a breath and shook my head dismissively. “She’s history long past. We dated pretty seriously for a couple of years, but that was a long time ago. It didn’t end well.”

  Which was a massive understatement.

  Thomas nodded sympathetically. “That can linger a long time, but it was years ago, right? As in, more than two? Maybe it’s time to move on.”

  Thoughts of Angela inevitably triggered sharp, jagged memories. It took an effort to push them away, lock them back in the box reserved for hard, cruel things. Things I couldn’t fix, couldn’t make right. The box held too many things.

  Joshua nudged me with his elbow, holding his hand out to me. “I challenge you to find a woman to spend some time with tonight. No one’s gonna ask questions, no one’s going to know what happens after you leave the bar, but we want to see you with a woman, having a good time. Deal?”

  I hesitated, looking at his hand. I felt inexplicably nervous. Despite my talk about wanting a woman’s company, could I really do it? Could I approach someone in a bar or a club, buy her a drink, maybe even get her in my arms? I looked at Joshua steadily. He was right. I was practically a damn monk. I was thirty years old, and I hadn’t had a date in half a year. Maybe it was time. I shook his hand.

  “You’ve got a deal,” I agreed.

  3

  Katie

  There were two adjoining rooms for us at the Bellagio. We were nearly there. I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the wall of the elevator, willing myself to tough it out. Just a few more minutes and I could find some relief in sleep. It was the only thing that killed a migraine like this, no matter what other remedies I threw at it.

  The flight had only grown worse for me. By the time we landed, made our way through the crowded airport, found a taxi, and fought through bumper to bumper traffic, my vision was clouding on the periphery and I was fighting down waves of nausea. I barely registered the busy boulevard, the hotel exterior, or much about the lobby. All I knew was that I had to get in a room and lie down before I passed out.

  Judith, my roommate for the weekend, looked at me strangely as we stepped off the elevator. “Honey, are you okay?” she asked. I tried not to hear the warmth and concern in her voice. It was just too hard to split my attention between the pain in my head and the pain in my heart. The head, being the most immediate, won out.

  “I’m fine,” I said, my mantra for this trip. “I just need a quick nap. I’ll be good to go by the time we’re ready to party tonight.” I forced a smile. “I’ve never missed a party yet, and I don’t intend to start now.”

  Judith watched me a minute more. Her eyes cooled and she shrugged, walking down the hallway ahead of me. The weird distance appeared between us again, but at that moment I hardly cared. I needed to get in the room. I needed to not be upright anymore. More than anything else, I needed to be invisible for a while.

  Judith pulled out the plastic key card and swiped it through the reader on the door. It turned green and made an electronic clicking noise. She pushed open the door and gestured me in. “You pick the bed you want,” she offered. “I don’t have a preference.”

  Even through my pain, I recognized the olive branch in her gesture. I smiled and scooted past her. What the fuck did I care what bed I slept on? I just needed the closest flat surface. Still, I didn’t want her to think me a bigger bitch than she already did.

  I tossed my bags on the end of the first bed I came to and flopped face down across the middle. I pressed my face against the comforter, creating a pocket of darkness. The relief was mild but immediate. There was a small dent in the pressure inside me. I could have moaned and swore, but I kept it locked inside. I didn’t want Judith to know how bad it really was. She was getting enough of an idea already. My migraines weren’t something I shared with people.

  I heard Judith moving quietly around the room, unpacking her bags and neatly storing her things, despite the fact that we would only be here for two nights. Typical Judith, I thought with hazy affection and a piercing stab of regret. More comfortable when things are just so.

  Before I faded away, I felt her lift my bags from the bed and pull the edge of the comforter over me. I wish we weren’t fighting, I thought. I miss my friends.

  When I woke later, it was dark and I was alone. I sat up, groggy and sluggish. Where was I? This wasn’t my apartment, or my parents’ house. Las Vegas, I remembered, the thoughts coming slowly into focus. Sabrina’s bachelorette weekend. With Lori and Judith.

  Judith. Where did Judith go? My heart felt simultaneously warm and heavy in my chest. Despite our differences, despite the harsh words said on both sides, my friend had covered me when I slept. It wouldn’t surprise me to find she had unpacked my bags, too, and caref
ully arranged my things in the room for ease of use and convenience. It was just so like Judith, so familiar and comforting, I felt tears well up in my eyes.

  Stop being stupid, I scolded myself. There was no way in hell I was going to go find my friends with tear stains on my cheeks. Not after I had already essentially abandoned them for hours to sleep off my headache. They didn’t need more reason to worry.

  I pushed the covers off me and climbed across the bed, my hands and knees sinking into the rich, plush comforter and the soft mattress beneath. I reached the lamp in the middle of the two big beds and flipped it on to look around.

  “Whoa,” I said quietly. It was all pale gray and slate blue, with tailored lines and dark wood. I had never seen anything so elegant in my life. With eyes wide, I tried to remember every detail, impressing it all on my memory.

  What would it be like to travel all the time? I wondered. To stay in rooms like this all over the world? I’ll be able to pull up an actual memory of this room when I’m home, and I’ll remember what it felt like to be here. What would it be like to do that for Scotland, or Thailand, or India?

  “I may never know,” I said aloud, clambering off the bed and over to the window. “But I know what it’s like to be in the fucking Bellagio in Las Vegas! It only took me twenty-two years to get here.” With any luck, it wouldn’t take that long again to visit the next place.

  Even as a little kid, I dreamed of visiting distant and exotic places in search of adventure. Lori and Judith and I had planned so many road trips in our imaginations our freshman year, but we never went on them. It was just fun to talk about them. Judith would pull out her phone and figure out mileage and gas station stops, and Lori would look up hotels and restaurants. My job was usually to find those strange local attractions small towns seem to collect, like the American Museum of Fly Fishing in Manchester, Vermont or the Rodale Organic Farmhouse in Allenton, Pennsylvania. We had never gone on any of them, though.

  Now look at us. On the first real adventure we took together, we were distant with unresolved hurt. All I wanted was to hang out with my friends, have some drinks and some laughs, and maybe flirt with a cute local guy, if one was tempting enough. Now, no matter what we did, it would be awkward and uncomfortable, and we would all pretend our asses off for Sabrina. Or, at least I would. And every memory would have this twin tinge of warmth and sadness.

  I sighed and turned from the window. I caught my reflection in the mirror and appraised myself curiously. I still wore the comfortable leggings and long sweater I travelled in, but that wouldn’t do for the night out my friends undoubtedly wanted. Neither would the frizzy mass of hair falling over my shoulders or the raccoon eyes developing from creeping mascara.

  I headed for the bathroom and laughed when I saw the precisely arranged toiletries in two neat areas. Judith had been busy. I grabbed my brush from my stuff, careful not to disrupt the order. I started tugging at my hair, unraveling the kinks and tangles carefully.Then I wiped off all traces of travelling makeup and began to put on what I thought of as my clubbing face. This wasn’t my first time getting ready to go out on a dime, so it wasn’t long before I was opening and closing drawers in search of my clothes. Judith gave me the drawers closest to the bed I had fallen onto earlier.

  I pulled on a skimpy set of underwear in black silk, then went to the armoire for a layered, frothy dress in a bright grass green. My shoes, a pair of killer black pumps, were lined up neatly on the floor. I slipped them on my feet and ran my fingers through my hair, fluffing the roots for more volume at the crown.

  “Well, you’re not getting any better than this tonight,” I said to my reflection. “Time to find the girls.”

  The door adjoining the two rooms was firmly closed, but not locked. I tapped twice and pushed it open. Sabrina whistled, so I struck a pose in the doorway.

  “It’s all for you, sweetheart,” I said, winking at her. She laughed. Lori and Judith smiled. I tried to ignore how strained we were, how sad it made me.

  “You ready?” I asked, forcing a lightness in my voice that I didn’t truly feel. “You all look pretty smokin’. It’d be a shame to waste all this young, vibrant eye candy stuck in these rooms, right? We should be drinking!”

  Sabrina exchanged glances with Lori. “Are you sure you’re up for it?” she asked me, concern in her eyes. “You looked pretty rough when we got off the plane, and you’ve been asleep for nearly three hours. Why don’t we order room service and watch a movie or something? We can explore tomorrow.”

  I looked at my friends, each one already dressed to go out. Lori wore a strapless dress the same dark green as her eyes that ended just above her knee. Her hair was smoothed back and up in a classic chignon. Sabrina chose a deep purple sheath that hugged her curves without flaunting them. She left her hair down, a dark cloud of curls loose around her shoulders. Judith had opted for a short leather miniskirt and an off-the-shoulder blouse in blood red. With her blue eyes emphasized by her dark makeup, and her light brown hair pulled back in a complicated knot, she looked like sex walking. It wasn’t a look I usually associated with her, but damn if she didn’t pull it off.

  All three had the same worried look they were trying unsuccessfully to hide, and it pissed me off. No way in hell was I going to be the reason we hid in our rooms tonight.

  “We’ve only got two nights here,” I reminded them. “It’s a nice offer, but totally unnecessary. Don’t worry about me. If I needed to stay in, I would say so, okay? But all I want is to find a place with awesome music and enough bartenders so we never have to wait long.” I grinned, shoving away the voice that tried to tell me how absolutely wonderful a night in could be.

  “You sure?” Judith asked, looking doubtful.

  “You think I’m going to be the reason you’re not getting hit on, looking like that?” I teased. It was supposed to be lighthearted, but I could see her trying to decide what I meant and if she should be offended or not. I stifled a sigh. It was going to be a long night.

  We moved out of the room toward the elevators. I let my friends’ voices wash over me, making sure to keep a smile plastered to my face in case anyone glanced over. But no one seemed to take much notice. For now, that was fine with me.

  God. What was I even doing here? Given how today had gone so far, it may have been better if I had stayed in Boston. Sabrina would have had just as much fun, and the rest of us wouldn’t be doing this stupid dance of civility mixed with wariness. That wave of sadness washed over me again, but I did what I could to push it away. It hurt to be on the outskirts, to feel so disconnected and left out. I shook my head. Now was not the time to think about it. I would deal with all of this later, when I was alone.

  We walked out of the elevators and through the lobby, with its high ceiling and funky, colorful glass sculpture hanging from the ceiling. We headed for the casinos on the other side and walked into the wide, elegantly appointed room. There were people everywhere, jammed side by side on the slot machines or dice tables, or sitting elbow to elbow playing cards. My eyes widened. Coming from a city like Boston, I figured I knew what a lot of people in one place looked like, but this was crazier anything I’d seen before.

  “Jesus, it’s like every person on campus is in this one room,” Lori commented, looking around.

  “Where do they all come from?” asked Sabrina. “You wouldn’t think March would be a popular travel month.”

  Judith wrinkled her nose adorably. “Is this the kind of scene we want tonight, ladies?” she asked.

  Sabrina shook her head. “I vote we move the party along. Gambling isn’t really my thing.”

  I turned and led the way out of the room. “There’s got to be a hot bar or club nearby. It’s Las fucking Vegas, for goodness’ sake.” I marched through the busy lobby again, this time heading straight for the doors to the busy street outside. My friends followed behind me.

  We made it less than two blocks before we found it. The music drew us in, a live band with a lot of guitars and an
enthusiastic drummer. They were good. The music pulled me in the door and a tingle of energy started in my center and ran out to my fingertips in a humming, electric zing. This was a place where things happened. I glanced at Sabrina, nodding my head toward the open door.

  “What do you think?” I asked. “Want to hang out or keep looking?”

  Sabrina listened for a moment, her head moving unconsciously to the music. “Let’s hang out,” she decided.

  It was a wide, open space nearly as busy as the casino. The stage was at the far end of the dim room. I couldn’t make out details, but I saw what looked like three guys with guitars, another guy on an electric piano, and a tiny woman playing the drums. There weren’t many on the dance floor, but the tables were packed with people, and more thronged the bar in the middle of the room.

  “Not so many that you can’t talk to anyone,” Judith commented, following Sabrina inside. “But enough to make things interesting.”

  I glanced at her, startled but trying to hide it. What’s up with Judith? I wondered. This doesn’t quite sound like her. Lori and Sabrina didn’t seem to notice, but I thought Judith was acting so strangely. I wanted to pull her aside and ask her what was up, like I would have done before all this tension. I imagined taking her arm and tugging her away from the other women slightly, teasing her until she laughed and told me what was going on in her head. I was just as likely to get a scowl and silence as laughter and open conversation, though, and the realization pierced me with its sharp claws.

  This was such bullshit. I wanted to hug my sisters, to apologize and ask their forgiveness. No difference of opinion was worth the distance and hard words between us. But at the same time, wanting to smooth things over pissed me off, too. Lori could have handled things better all this time, and Judith didn’t need to get involved. Why weren’t they trying to smooth things over with me?

  I started pushing my way through the crowd toward the bar, my friends following closely behind me. I needed a drink, dammit. A big one. I was so tired of thinking about this stuff, pondering the angles and trying to find a solution. I was beginning to think maybe there wasn’t one, and that scared the shit out of me.