Page 194 of Swallow Your Sorries

“Yeah, well, my friends don’t get it either. Of course, they don’t. They’re already bluebloods.” He sighs. “I thought that they, of all people, would help me out. But they don’t believe in me either. A bunch of turncoats.”

“I had a turncoat once,” Rie Rie says thoughtfully. “You could wear it on either side. Plaid, or solid.”

“What am I going to do? I need like fifty minimum to get this place looking even halfway decent and the opening’s next month.”

“We could have an event.”

“An event?”

“I’ll just get my tits out,” she says, shaking her shoulders stiffly. “Solved.”

“How on earth do you think your tits are going to make us fifty grand in one day?”

“Fifty grand! I thought you meant fifty bucks.”

“Be serious right now, Rie. You couldn’t get usfiftybucks.”

“I did last night.”

“That was a fiver. In Monopoly money.”

“Damn,” Rie Rie sighs, continuing to make the glass even dirtier.

“Haley?” Stassi asks, taking a tentative step closer to the bar.

When he whips around, his eyes are bloodshot, his normally immaculate, tousled brown hair dishevelled, as is his collar and wrinkled suit. He must’ve slept in it.

“Stassi?” His fingers fly to his hair and rake through it.

“Stassi?” Rie Rie whispers way too loudly before fixing his collar and trying to smooth out his wrinkled blazer.

“What are you—” He freezes, his eyes flying to me before narrowing. “What are you guys doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” Stassi says. “What do you mean you need money for renovations…don’t tell me youownthis place?”

Hale looks sheepish before holding his hands out and feigning pride. “All mine.”

Stassi shakes her head. “You bought a club, and no one told me?” she asks incredulously. “Zedd didn’t say anything.Youdidn’t say anything.”

Hale’s smile falters and he drops his arms, sticking his hands into his pockets. “Would you scream from the mountaintops that you owned this place?”

Stassi looks sympathetic, but Hale avoids her gaze and turns his eyes back to me.

“What’s with the coat?” He pauses, his eyes trailing to my fishnets, peeking out at the bottom before a shit-eating grin spreads over his face. “You’re here to audition.” It wasn’t a question.

I’m about to protest when Stassi nods. “Yeah, she is. She’s been practising bartending, haven’t you, Elle?”

I look at her like she’s insane as another mouse scampers into a corner and Rie Rie pours bright green dish soap into a shot glass before tossing it back.

“That isnotabsinthe,” she mutters, turning the bottle around in her hands, hopelessly trying to locate the label. I doubt she can read it, regardless.

What’s with everyone and Absinthe around here?

“You know she can’t, Stass. Gant would kill me.”

Stassi smiles. “Exactly. Didn’t you say they were a bunch of turncoats?”

Hale stares at me, his expression flickering from dismissal to appraising curiosity. “They didn’t want to chip in with the club, not because they can’t but because they don’t want to. They have no faith in me.”

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