Page 10 of Maybe This Time
She looked at it for a moment before letting out a sigh and placing her hand in mine. Despite the skeletal gloves I wore, I could still feel the warmth of her skin sinking into mine and skating goose bumps down my spine.
Get it together, Ezra.
Without wasting a second of the next precious hour—which I was hopeful turned into more—we moved across the club, weaving through couples and parties who’d become bolder as the night went on until we reached the large velvet drapes that led to the VIP area.
I’d only been to Mystique once at the Paris location with Jude—my old roommate and best friend I’d met in culinary school—but they had the exact same layout. The elite club wasn’t normally my cup of tea, but Jude had fooled me into thinking it was a regular bar we were going to for his twenty-seventh birthday.
You could imagine my surprise when we walked inside the room after being escorted by some oversized bouncer and I’d discovered Jude had omitted quite a few details about the place. Particularly about the fact that it was a sex club.
“Where are you taking us?” I heard Talya ask over the music.
I glanced back at her, my mind still in disbelief that she was really here. “You’ll see,” I finally replied after a beat.
I moved to push past the curtains when I felt someone’s heavy gaze watching us. I already knew who it was, so when I looked past Talya at where I’d been seated all night, I found Jude staring at us with a shit-eating grin plastered on his face.
Normally, I wouldn’t have agreed to set foot in this place again, but after Talya’s sister practically forced my hand, I’d reluctantly caved. Not that I had much of a choice.
I’d been going over the plans for the pastry shop I was set to open in six months when Josie started blowing up my phone with messages demanding I call her. Thinking it was an emergency—or worse, something had happened to Talya—I’d called her back right away.
Which had been a big mistake because she’d then spent what felt like hours talking my ear off about how I needed to get out more just as Jude had walked into my new place after his morning run.
He and I had an open-door policy, so when he’d shown up unannounced a few days ago, claiming boredom and saying he’d figured I could use help getting my first place off the ground, I hadn’t thought much of it. He’d already been helping when I’d started the process in Paris.
I’d originally planned to openT’s Sweetsthere. But when it came time to turn my lifelong dream into reality, none of it felt right.
Not when the dream had started here, in Boston.
Josie and Jude usually couldn’t be in the same room without biting each other’s heads off, but apparently, my “pathetic moping”—as Josie had kindly put it—was reason enough for them to join forces.
Josephine had suggested Mystique,and the moment Jude had heard the name, he’d made a few calls and secured us last-minute invites for tonight. He was a regular at the Frenchlocation and the one back in his hometown in Colombia, so getting in hadn’t been much of an issue.
Plus, I’d figured having somewhere to be tonight was better than my original plan of camping outside a certain someone’s house because it was the only way I could be with her for her birthday. I’d never missed one and it was killing me not to be able to ring her doorbell and forget the fact that she’d broken my heart.
So I’d spent the evening sipping on my whiskey since I couldn’t have my phone to distract me while I watched Jude entertain the group of women that had sat at our table—including the dark-skinned model he’d charmed within minutes of us stepping into this place.
Which meant he’d left me alone for the major part of the evening.
UntilI saw Talya walk in.
Jude had instantly picked up the shift in my mood and after watching me glare at the bar for far too long, he’d told me not to waste the opportunity or he’d try setting me up with one of the girl’s friends still sitting by his side.
Not that I’d ever be interested. The only girl I’d ever had eyes for might had been the last person I’d expected to see here, considering this was far from being her scene. But my Talya was right here, and I’d be a fool to let her slip away.
I’d already done it once, driven by the pain of her rejection, but I wasn’t about to make the same mistake twice. This time, if she told me she didn’t feel the same way I did, I needed to hear it from her lips.
I finally led us past the curtains and down the dimly lit hallway, never letting go of her hand. She hadn’t tried to pull away, and I intended to savor every second her hand stayed in mine.
Once we reached the room I’d been assigned, I pulled the golden key from my pocket and unlocked the private room. It was my first time in one of these rooms, but it looked exactly how I’d imagined it would be.
The walls and floors were dark, with tufted, leather banquettes arranged along the perimeter of the room in a U shape—all in a deep shade of red, like most of the club’s decor. Beside the door stood a large mahogany chest of drawers, and at the center was a raised dais, wide enough to host a pole.
Most rooms had beds, or so Jude had told me, but I’d specifically requested one without. I hadn’t planned on doing anything in here besides hiding out once Jude left my side to go do whatever people did in these rooms.
The lighting was low and sultry, casting shadows that clung to the corners. The music from outside still bled through the walls when I closed the door. It was the kind that sank into your blood with a thrumming, decadent beat. It coiled around the thoughts I was already trying to push away and sent my pulse into a more gripping drumbeat of want.
The door had barely clicked shut when Talya stepped away from me, moving deeper into the room, like she couldn’t put distance between us fast enough.
“All right, you have one hour.”
