CHAPTER 4
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I check myself in the mirror and smooth my hand over the cute black dress that’s showing just enough skin, but at the same time looks classy. Perfect. Sliding the last pin in my dirty blond hair to keep it up in a messy style, that’s meant to look effortless but actually took me forever to get just right. I like having my hair up when going out. Nightclubs tend to get hot, and I dislike the warm feeling in my neck when my hair is down. I finish my outfit with some cute shoes with a small heel that I hope I will be able to dance on for a couple of hours without my feet killing me. I presume we would go dancing anyway. Gil has invited me for drinks, but having drinks in a nightclub means dancing, right?
The whole going out scene isn’t really my thing. I’ve been to some nightclubs, usually in the very brief periods I was single between relationships. After I would’ve gotten into a new relationship, going out to nightclubs quickly turned into going to restaurants, or even staying home and just watching a movie. I’ve been to some fancy cocktail bars, but it’s still different. While I’m not opposed to going out to nightclubs, it just isn’t my regular scene.
I bend over to check my eye makeup in the mirror. A touch of mascara and some light shimmery eyeshadow. I can apply makeup like the best of them on account of all my YouTube influencers, but I always find that going with light makeup that stays in place as opposed to heavy makeup that ends up on my chin, wins out. Happy with the result, I go downstairs, grab my phone right beside my keys, and put it in the little clutch I’m taking with me. Grabbing a shawl to put around my shoulders, I go out the door. I make a mental note to look into how to fix the lawn when I see the damage I’ve done by dragging boxes across it.
O opens the door a few seconds after I knock on his front door. He’s wearing dark jeans and a grey t-shirt that fits him perfectly. It shows off all the goods and I force myself to look him in the eye instead of ogling his body. When I finally reach his face, the bastard smirks at me. He takes a step back and lets me in.
“You look gorgeous,” he tells me, making me blush a little.
“Thanks,” is all I manage to say.
I follow him to the kitchen while once again catching myself staring at his ass. It’s like leaving a kid with a jar full of candy without supervision, asking for trouble.
Gil and Dean are sitting at the bar in the kitchen with their backs to the door. Gil wears a tight-fitting tank top he fills out splendidly. His arms are covered in tribal tattoos, and I check them out. Most of the times I dislike tribal tattoos, finding them a little tacky, but the artist that has done Gil’s arms has done a wonderful job, clearly a custom job. I wonder if it covers more of his body than just his arms. Both men turn around when they hear O and me stepping through the door.
“You came,” Gil says while giving me a friendly smile as he looks over his shoulder, his dark eyes scanning my body, which I find I like, a lot. I can’t blame him for looking, seeing as I’ve just done the exact same thing to him while he had his back to me, so it’s only fair.
“Of course I came, we’re going out for drinks and I’m not backing down on it.” The look of these boys in their clubwear does things to me I don’t expect. Or would have expected if I hadn’t been so busy with my book. All my brain capacity had gone towards my deadlines and my characters, and I had forgotten about the living-my-own-life part somewhere along the process. Had I not done that, I might’ve remembered I was going for drinks with four gorgeous men. Then again, I thankfully didn’t get the chance to freak out about it.
“I’m glad you’re not wearing a blanket. The dress is way hotter,” Gil smirks at me.
O laughs out loud and Dean gives everyone a questioning look,obviously missing the joke. Nobody tells him anything though.
“I’ve even managed to put on some shoes this time,” I offer, while sticking one of my feet out and showing it to the boys. I suddenly feel three pairs of eyes zoning in on my foot and feel weirdly conscious aboutshowing my shoes. Why was I doing this again?
“So, where’s Jonah?” I ask them to get the attention away from my feet.
“He’s already at Tempest. He’s always there before opening and stays until closing time on the weekends,” O explains. “Tempest is Jonah’s baby. When he’s in boss mode he’s hardly recognizable for the fun-loving jokester he normally is.”
Jonah has always been the life of the party when I knew him before. While growing up, O and Jonah had become instant best friends. It was a match made in preschool heaven. For as long as I could remember, the brown-haired boy was always playing at O’s. And since I played a lot with O when I was a kid, I played a lot with Jonah too. When I was younger, I never gave it any attention as to why Jonah always played at O’s but they never played at Jonah’s. When I got older it dawned on me that Jonah didn’t have a very stable home situation. I never found out the particulars, but when Jonah’s mother got sent to prison when he was twelve, he moved in with O and his parents. The only thing that really changed was that now he stayed there during the nights as well. The weird thing was that you never would’ve said he didn’t have a stable home if you didn’t know. He was always nice, always kind. Well, maybe except for the times he pulled my ponytails when we were six. That was just rude, although he was definitively smiling about it. So while I could see him as the owner of a nightclub and being the life of the party, I had a tough time picturing him as the boss. And that’s exactly what I say.
“I think I have to see that to be able to believe it.”
“Let’s go check it out then,” Dean says while he gets up from his bar stool, straightening his pants as he stands up. The boys all move into action as we leave the kitchen to head out. I rearrange the shawl on my shoulders and follow them to the front door. When we’re all standing on the porch, O starts locking his front door with a lot of different locks. Odd, because we don’t lock our doors in Charlington. Our security consists of all the nosy neighbors watching out for each other. O’s door has always been open when it was still his parents’ house. Three locks on a door that shouldn’t be locked seems like overkill. Perhaps it’s something he picked up on from being a realtor. I can totally see him having the crime rates memorised and using it as a selling point for his clients. He catches me staring at what he’s doing and something changes in his demeanor. He seems a little self-conscious and the look in his eyes darkens. I smile at him and grab his arm as we walk to the car. There must be a reason why he’s doing it, a story there, but I don’t have the balls to ask for it. So I shut my mouth and just go along with it as we walk to the car.
It’s a half hour drive over to Kinseltown. The town is big compared to all the other towns in the area but is nothing compared to what I was used to in Berkeley. Gil has driven us to Tempest in O’s jeep. The guys told me they rotate who drives and stays sober and I find myself getting a little turned on by such responsibility.
Tempest is in a busy part of Kinseltown. There are a lot of clubs and bars on the street where the nightclub is located. The upside of knowing the owner is that we get to park directly behind Tempest on the private property that comes with the building. It is a whopping thirty second walk before we’re at the front doors. I don’t know why, but it surprises me to see a line in front of the door. They’re literally waiting around the block. There are two bouncers keeping people out and I’m a little intimidated by them. These guys are huge. I’m half convinced that if someone would dare to try and stab them, the knife would just bounce off of them. Both even have a bald head, which fits perfectly in my prejudice of how all bouncers must look. Maybe it has something to do with not being able to pull their hair? It must be in the bouncer manual.
The guys walk me straight to the front of the line and the dirty looks I get from the people that are waiting make me a little uncomfortable. Dean shakes hands with one of the bouncers, who opens the door for us, leaving the waiting people to call profanities.
“All well, Steve?” Dean asks. The bouncer is even called Steve! That is such a bouncer name if you ask me. It might have something to do with Steve from Jerry Springer that I thought all bouncers should be named Steve. He does look a little less intimidating now that he seems to know the guys.
“It’s a good evening so far,” Steve says while we enter Tempest. “You have a new addition to your group of friends?” he says while he looks me over. “I thought you promised to let me apply when you finally had an opening to your crew?”
Dean smiles. “We considered you, but this one’s hair is prettier,” he jokes while he winks at me. Steve laughs, and gestures to us to walk along.
Tempest is an actual, honest to God, nightclub. I don’t know why that surprises me so much. They had said it was a nightclub, but somehow my mind hadn’t processed that fact. My mind has made up its own story of small town Charlington charm and a nightclub doesn’t fit in that picture. I have a hard time catching up with it. Tempest has a modern, dark interior with gold accents. If I have to say anything about it, it is classy. Sure, there are several neon-colored lights that are bound to induce epileptic episodes if you stare at them for too long, but I figure that is mandatory in a nightclub. The bar is painted all matte black with golden letters spelling Tempest on it and the DJ booth is painted the same color. I like it. The music has the same funky and hip vibe as the interior of Tempest is giving me. People are already dancing all over the place and they seem to have a good time. I don’t recognise the song that is playing right now, but it makes my feet want to move.
The guys take me over to the busy bar. People are standing all around it trying to order their drinks. They part like the red sea when O, Gil and Dean walk over. It's like magic, and I intend to make full use of this trick. The bartenders are all dressed in black uniforms that once again shout classy to me. Jonah did a really excellent job in setting up this club if you ask me, the nightclub expert.
“What’s your poison?” O asks with his mouth close to my ear so I can hear him over the music. He holds his hand on my lower back and I like the weight and the heat of it.
“Um, rum and coke please?” I answer with my mouth to his ear. He nods and turns to the bartender who’s waiting to take his order. I watch as he makes four different drinks and hands them over to O. Gil gets a long drink glass with what seems to be coke and a tiny golden umbrella.