“Hi, Hades. I mean, Tyler.” She giggles. “What are you doing here? Did Sera invite you?”
“Where is she?” Glancing over her shoulder, I survey the sprawling apartment again. It’s packed with bodies, but I don’t see Sera.
“Chill.” Abby rolls her eyes, twirling a lock of copper hair around her finger. “I saw her not too long ago. She’s around here somewhere.”
Her blasé attitude only pisses me off further. I hate knowing Seraphina has a friend this shitty.
“How long ago?” I demand. “She just called me freaking out.”
“Sera did? Why?”
“Because she’s high as fuck and she’s scared.” Another scan of the room leaves me frustratingly empty-handed. My irritation spikes, and I turn back to face Abby. “Don’t you have some kind of girl code? Aren’t you supposed to look out for each other?”
She waves me off. “Sera’s a big girl. She’s been to plenty of parties before.”
“Hopefully not like this.”
“It’s no big—”
I storm away from her mid-reply and stalk through the apartment, yanking open every door I can find. Three bedrooms, one closet, several couples in various states of undress, and no Seraphina. The more I search, the more worried I become—because I haven’t seen Rob yet, either. If I find him anywhere near her while she’s in this state, I’m going to kill him with my bare hands.
Finally, I reach a locked door at the end of the hall with a light pouring out beneath it. Tentative hope sparks within me. Please let her be in here, and please let her be alone.
“Ser?” I knock on the door, putting my ear against it. “Are you in there? It’s Tyler.”
The lock rattles, and the door swings open to reveal her standing on the other side. I heave a sigh of relief as all the worst-case scenarios I’d been imagining dissolve into thin air.
Before I can get a good look at her, she launches herself at me and wraps her arms around my waist. Her perfume surrounds me as her body radiates heat through my clothes.
She buries her face in my chest, sobbing. “Thank you.”
“Of course.” I return the hug, rubbing her back to calm her.
A few people are staring at us from the other end of the hallway, so I slowly walk her backward into the bathroom and close the door behind me to get some privacy.
“I’m sorry…” Seraphina draws in a jagged inhale, tears seeping through the cotton fabric of my shirt. “I felt so sick, and I didn’t know what to do.”
“You don’t need to apologize.”
Her breathing slows after another minute or two. She gradually relaxes in my arms, but she doesn’t let me go. Resting my cheek on the crown of her head, I inhale the tropical scent of her shampoo and wait until I’m confident her panic attack has passed.
“Look at me for a sec, Tink.” Tilting her chin, I gently angle her face up to mine so I can see better in the bathroom lighting.
Her pupils flicker, darting back and forth as she tries to focus on me. “You’re scaring me,” she murmurs.
“Just making sure you’re okay.” There’s a pang in my gut as I study her face. The whites of her eyes are bloodshot, and her skin is red and blotchy from crying, remnants of black mascara trailing down her cheeks. She looks terrified.
And she’s still beautiful—ruined makeup and all.
I’ve drifted from assessing her into admiring her. Not the time or place, Tyler.
“Hold on. I don’t want you to rub makeup in your eyes.” I grab a tissue off the counter, wet it under the tap, and carefully remove the dark streaks marring her face. Once I’m finished, I reluctantly drop my hand. “How are you feeling?”
Seraphina takes a fresh tissue from the box and wipes her nose. “Awful. I wanna go home.”
“Come on,” I tell her. “Let’s go find your coat.”
Opening the bathroom door, I place a hand on her lower back to guide her into the hall. She teeters in her heels, and my arm wraps around her waist to keep her steady. Rob glares at me as we leave, clearly pissed. As the elevator doors slide closed, I throw him a middle finger with my free hand. Sera is too out of it to notice.
“Did you mix the joint with anything else, Tink?” My gaze flicks over to Seraphina, trying to gauge her sobriety level. She’s curled up using a spare hoodie I found in the backseat as a pillow, and she hasn’t said a word for the entire fifteen minutes we’ve been in the car. I’ve tried to let her rest, but I also need to know.
“Um… when I didn’t feel good, Abby told me to go see Rob and he gave me a vodka seven. It tasted strong. Might’ve been a double.”
My jaw clenches, but I hold my tongue.
“Is that bad?” she asks in a tiny voice.
“Not ideal, but you’ll be fine. We’ll need to hydrate you once we’re home, though.”
Silence cloaks the interior of my vehicle. In addition to the bloodthirsty vendetta against Rob that I’m fostering, I’m concerned about her because I’m not sure what drove her to do this in the first place. Judging by how things went down, it seems like she was way out of her depth. She’s bold; a little wild, even, and I like that about her. Putting herself in a situation like that verges on reckless.
There are a few possible explanations for what happened. She’s inexperienced and simply smoked too much. There was something else in the joint. Or someone—potentially Rob—spiked her drink. With the kind of people she was hanging out with, it’s anyone’s guess. And without any form of proof, that’s how it’ll stay. A big fucking question mark that’ll haunt me.
Slowing to a stop at a red light, I glance at her again. “What happened earlier today, Ser?”
Seraphina doesn’t look at me. “Like I said, I was having a bad day.”
I don’t want to upset her, so I drop it.
She leans against the window and falls quiet for a few seconds. “Question twenty-one: Have you ever done any drugs?”
“I’ve done lots of things,” I say, giving her a pass for misnumbering the question; we’re up to twenty-two now. “But not anymore.”
Much to my relief, the house is completely dark when I pull up. Hanging out upstairs obviously isn’t an option, so I shuttle Seraphina into my bedroom as soon as we get inside. I’m not sure what my longer-term plan is for tonight, but I’ll worry about that later. Right now, I’m in triage mode.
Steering Seraphina across the room to my bed, I hang her coat on my computer chair and light the desk lamp on the way by. She perches on the edge of my mattress, still wearing her gold heels. Sympathy washes over me. Something tells me she doesn’t have the coordination to undo the tiny buckles holding the straps together.
“Let me get your shoes off, Tink.”
She nods wordlessly and leans back, bracing her palms behind her on the bed. I kneel on the carpet in front of her, and when I glance up, she’s watching me intently. Soft brown eyes fix on me, full lips slightly parted. Even with me in a subservient position, she seems vulnerable; defenseless.
Making a point to be gentle, I take her left foot in my hand and prop it on my knee to hold it steady. Her foot is perfectly pedicured, her toenails painted light pink. Fuck, even her feet are pretty.