With ease, I gripped the bottle. The sound of the cork popping made her flinch. I said, “Yes, we do.” Lifting an eyebrow, daring her to stop me, I filled her glass.
Like we were in some unbreakable bubble, the rest of the group hovered nearby, not getting too close.
Staring Lola down, the champagne fizzing in her glass, I waited. I didn't know what I was waiting for.
“Hey,” Colt said, nudging me and shattering the moment—whatever that moment really was. “Share the stuff, Drez.”
After I filled their glasses, grabbing one for myself, I abandoned the bottle on the table. There was no need to explain; I lifted my drink, they all copied me.
Even Lola.
Looking her dead in the eye, I said my piece. “Cheers to a new guitarist who won't be found with her cock buried in some random girl in the bathroom while we're supposed to be playing on stage.”
They all laughed. Well, everyone but Lola. She just looked away, a delicious red heat crawling up her neck. There. That was what I'd wanted.
Why the fuck did I need that so badly?
We finished our toast, which seemed to give the two waitresses hovering by the door enough courage to sway the rest of the way inside. The one with long, onyx hair spoke first. “Can we get you boys anything to drink?”
Brenda's scowl had us all smiling again. “This boy will take a vodka tonic,” she said with false, sugary sweetness.
Tugging a chair out, I sat towards the end, furthest from Colt and Porter. The way the girls were staring at me was familiar. They knew who I was, they smelled money and fame. Beyond that, they were ogling my chest as it peeked through my open hoodie.
I said, “I'll take whatever beer is on tap.”
The scrape of another chair, right across from me, made me look up. Lola settled in with her eyes lowered. I wanted to see into her head, to know what she was thinking. Is she being shy, or is she nervous she'll get carded in spite of what Colt said? I doubted anyone would bother. The restaurant was happy we were here, if they said a peep about Lola not being twenty-one, they risked us leaving.
They wanted our business more than they feared a single underage drinker in a private room.
Corruption is a funny thing.
“I guess I'll have what he's having,” Lola said, glancing up at me, then to the dark haired waitress. She only relaxed when the other woman nodded, scribbling the order down in her tiny notebook.
The girls moved down the line, talking to the other two men. The chair under me creaked as I leaned towards Lola. “I figured Brenda had done her research, making sure you could legally sign that contract, but please tell me you're not secretly a preschooler," I teased.
“I'm nineteen,” she laughed, pure blue eyes landing on my greens. Then, like water on oil, she her eyes back to the menu on the table. “I'll be twenty in four months.”
Nineteen. She's getting her break pretty early. I was twenty-one now, but I was only seventeen when I'd started foraying into the music world seriously. A chance meeting at eighteen had been the start of my rise to fame.
Squinting at Lola, I studied the top of her head. She had her nose near touching to the menu. Not sure what to say next, or if there even was anything to say to her, I took her cue and looked at my menu.
By the time the waitresses returned with our drinks, I hadn't figured out what I wanted.
No, that wasn't right. I knew what I wanted.
She just wasn't an option.
Flicking the plastic sheet up so the dark-haired girl could take it, I met her smoldering stare. “Just give me what you like best.”
“I—what I like?”
Taking hold of the chilly glass of caramel colored beer that she'd handed me, I put on a half smile. “Yeah. Your favorite food, whatever you'd eat here. Get me that.”
Tossing her hair back, clearly enjoying the envious glare of her fellow waitress, the girl giggled. “Alright, I can do that. I'm Scarlett, by the way.”
“Scarlett,” I repeated back. The name sounded fake, but who was I to judge? “I guess I should introduce myself, I'm—”
“Drezden!” she blurted, her smile wide as the moon. “You're Drezden Halifax. Yeah. I know.”
Of course she knew.
I hid my smile behind the beer, the crisp and bitter liquid refreshing on my throat. I caught Lola watching