Page 51 of Double Standards
“Hey,” I murmur, barely managing the word as a cab turns the corner and crawls toward me. I flag it down, heart pounding, sliding into the backseat as the driver mumbles a greeting.
“What’s going on?” she asks, the teasing in her tone quickly replaced by concern.
“I need somewhere to crash.” My voice is quiet as the cab drive awaits my instructions.
There’s a pause—only a second—but it’s long enough to make my breath hitch. Then her voice comes, light and certain. “Of course. You know you don’t even have to ask.”
A small smile tugs at my lips, but it doesn’t reach my eyes. For now, I just need somewhere safe to fall apart. And tonight, Lexie’s my lifeline.
“I’ll see you soon,” she says gently, just before I hang up.
Reeling off Lexie’s address to the cab driver, I let my head fall back against the seat, letting the motion of the vehicle lull my mind as the city blurs past my window. For a moment, I pretendeverything’s fine. That I’m not coming undone. That I’m not running away from a war that started in my own kitchen.
But the silence is loud. Too loud. The kind that fills in all the cracks you’ve been trying to plaster over. The longer I sit here, the more the weight of what just happened presses down on me, curling around my ribs like smoke. Shame, guilt, rage—they twist together in a slow, suffocating tangle.
I should feel relief. I walked out. I stood my ground. But all I feel is this aching pit in my stomach. Because Cooper didn’t even try to stop me. He just stood there, eyes cold, like I was already a stranger to him. Maybe I have been for a while now.
I swallow the lump in my throat and close my eyes, whispering the lie I wish I believed:It’s going to be okay.
Chapter Eighteen
“Trigger, you order that bottle or just flirt with the waitress for twenty minutes again?” Ryder throws a peanut at him across the table.
Trigger catches it in his mouth, grinning. “Multitasking, asshole. I’m not a savage.”
Hunter snorts into his glass, slouching deeper into the corner booth. “You’re literally the definition of a savage. Didn’t you piss in the alley last week instead of going inside?”
Trigger shrugs. “It was an emergency.”
Ryder lifts his beer and toasts mockingly. “To emergencies.”
We’re sitting in a back booth of Club Palma’s VIP lounge. Low lighting, high end whiskey, and too much cologne clings to the air. The beat of the music pulses through the floors, the crowd below us already sweating under the strobes.
It’s supposed to be a relaxed night. No deals. No blood. Just drinks, noise, and the guys. Trigger remains sober and Max doesn’t come out for these nights. Not unless there’s business, and this isn’t that. This is just a break. Just a reach for some normalcy.
If there’s such a thing.
Hunter eyes me over his glass. “You good? You’ve been quiet.”
“I’m always quiet,” I mutter, taking a sip of my drink.
“Yeah, but tonight you’reextrabroody. Like Batman if he lost his favorite batarang,” Trigger adds.
I give him a look that shuts him up fast.
“Gonna hit the head,” I say, pushing away from the table before one of them tries to psychoanalyze me.
The hallway off the lounge is dim, quieter, a welcome break from the throb of bass and the haze of perfume and sweat hanging over the dance floor. It smells faintly of pine cleaner and vodka—sterile but sharp, the kind of scent that cuts through the fog in your head. My boots echo against the tile as I head toward the bathroom, jaw tight, fingers twitching at my sides.
I need a minute to clear my fucking head.
Maybe splash some water on my face. Shake off whatever this is—the tension that’s been crawling under my skin since last night. Sinceher.
Cassie.
Her voice still echoes in my mind. The sharp bite of it. That look in her eyes, the one that said she hated me even as her body begged to be closer. The way she trembled when I leaned in, when my chest brushed hers, when I watched her cheeks go red like I’d reached right inside and flicked a switch she didn’t want turned on.
And then, she pushed me away.Told me off like I was nothing.
