The club floor was busy, bass vibrating through exposed brick walls as bodies pressed together in the dark. Stella lounged on a velvet chaise, her fingers tracing the rim of her champagne glass while her gaze cut through the crowd. The air smelled of spilled whiskey , expensive perfume , sweat and desperation wrapped in silk.
Across the room, Damien stood stiffly near the bar, his usual composure fraying at the edges.
The ice in his bourbon had melted into a watery swirl, forgotten as his gaze kept drifting toward Ethan's fluid movements behind the counter. When Stella's fingers stilled against her glass, the sudden silence in their private code made his skin prickle before he even turned his head.
Their eyes met through the haze of cigarette smoke and people.
Damien's fingers tightened around his glass, knuckles whitening as Stella's subtle nod sent a jolt through him. The bourbon burnt his throat when he swallowed, but it did nothing to quench the heat pooling low in his gut.
He pushed off the bar, the wood leaving a damp imprint of his palm behind. Every step toward Ethan felt weighted, deliberate—like walking toward the edge of a cliff. Stella's gaze followed him, her fingers now tracing idle circles on her thigh, slow and knowing.
Ethan's smirk was already waiting for him, wicked and inviting. "Rough night, handsome?" His voice was smoke and honey, barely audible over the thrum of bass.
Damien averted his gaze, the guilt a bitter taste in his tongue. He busied himself with the condensation on his glass, swirling the remaining liquid like he could drown his conscience in it. "Just...complicated," he mumbled, the word barely audible above the music. His fingers trembled slightly against the glass, betraying the tension coiling through his body.
Ethan chuckled, a low, throaty sound that sent a shiver down Damien's spine despite his internal turmoil. "Complicated is my specialty." He leaned closer, the scent of his cologne—something dark and expensive—mixing with the sharp tang of gin on his breath. "Tell me about it." His eyes glinted with amusement and something else—a genuine curiosity that disarmed Damien completely.
Damien exhaled sharply through his nose, fingers flexing against the bar's edge. The crowd pulsed around them—laughter too loud, bodies too close, the scent of spilled gin and skin overwhelming.
Ethan's grin widened as he leaned in, close enough for Damien to catch the citrus bite of his cologne beneath the whiskey on his breath. "You look like you could use something stronger than bourbon." His knuckles brushed Damien's wrist, feather-light and deliberate.
A shiver raced up Damien's spine. He should pull away. I should walk. But the weight of Stella's gaze pinned him in place.
"Fuck," Damien muttered, dragging a hand through his hair. The strands were damp with sweat, the room suddenly too hot. "I don't—"
"Don't what?" Ethan's thumb traced the inside of Damien's wrist, pressing against the frantic jump of his pulse. "Don't want this?" His other hand slid a fresh glass across the bar—amber liquid, a single ice cube melting at its center. "Or don't know how to ask for it?"
Damien's throat worked. The drink blurred in his vision, the edges of the room with it. He could feel the moment Stella moved—the shift in the air, the way Ethan's eyes flicked past his shoulder, darkening.