The girl’s eyes glowed. She was pretty, Orion’s age, maybe a little older. Orion wasn’t the best at judging that kind of thing. Girls wore so much makeup and so little clothing. They were adept at trying to look older than they were, and they didn’t know how dangerous that was.
“You’re one of them,” she stage-whispered. “Orion, right?”
Orion stiffened, sobering too quickly to be of any real use to herself.
April reacted, of course, but she’d had just as many tequila shots and twice as many margaritas. “You need to move it on, girlfriend. We have no idea what you’re talking about.”
It might’ve been more effective if April hadn’t almost fallen off her stool trying to say those words.
As it was, it didn’t dissuade the girl. She wobbled on her heels but caught herself before she fell. Orion was pissed that the girl didn’t land on the floor and break her nose.
“Oh my God, it really is you,” she whispered, eyes wide. “I, like, am so inspired by you. Here, living your life. After going through all of that.” She waved her hand dismissively beside her head. Then she leaned in farther, so Orion smelled her cheap perfume and sickly-sweet breath. “That’s crazy you were, like, tortured and shit.”
Orion launched herself off the stool and at the girl. A drunk twenty-something in heels was never going to stay vertical when another drunk twenty-something pounced on her, so they both went tumbling to the floor.
It was a sudden transition, sitting on a stool, enjoying corn chips and light conversation with April, to taking out all her aggression on a stranger, but Orion found herself unable to stop. She was so angry at this girl for interrupting the one moment she’d had in ten years where she didn’t feel like a victim, where she could pretend she was never taken at all. She was angry at the damn world.
She vaguely noted people yelling things, weak attempts to break them up, but she was in a world of her own. A world of fists, nails, hair pulling. She’d give the girl credit, she was a fighter too. Orion tasted blood from where she’d punched her in the mouth, and she was happy about it. It was the first time she’d felt something since the chain came off her ankle.
But then someone was more successful at breaking them up. Someone that smelled like leather and tobacco held Orion, speaking in her ear, carrying her out of the bar.
Maddox.
“Eric is taking you home.” Maddox’s voice punctuated Orion’s haze.
She blinked the world into focus, unsure if she’d actually passed out, or whether she just hadn’t been paying attention.
He had arrived at some point during the fight that had turned into an all-out brawl, April taking on the girl’s friends. Maddox had either known they were there and had the police scanner on, or it was just luck.
Orion was not lucky, so it was obviously the former.
She came back to herself in the parking lot, being half-carried by Maddox. His hands were on her. His touch was all over her. That should’ve been bad. It should’ve been a disaster.
It was uncomfortable, it was painful, but Orion did not feel the need to fight like a banshee to get away from him.
She must have still been drunk.
“I’m not leaving Orion,” April protested, leaning heavily on Eric whose face was blank, but Orion suspected the lightness in his eyes was due to amusement. And maybe something else. Maybe he was enjoying having April leaning on him that way. Surely, he was too noble to act on any feelings he might have, even if she was sober. Maddox was his partner and it should’ve been against guy code or some shit.
So fucking stupid.
Eric was the one man who would be good for April. From what Orion had heard, she’d been treated badly by shitty guys.
“Yes, you fuckin’ are,” Maddox hissed at his sister, too angry to be aware of anything else going on. His grip on Orion tightened as his anger leeched into him physically. “You’re the reason she’s here. She’s drunk and she’s fucking bleeding. So you’re going to get your ass home and we will talk later.”
April folded her arms and readied herself to square off with Maddox. Orion recognized the gesture from all those years ago when they were all kids and the two of them fought about everything.
Orion waited for the battle to begin.
But she hadn’t factored in the handsome, calm, strong, and perhaps infatuated man beside April.
He leaned in, his hand on her hip, steadying her. Eric spoke quietly into April’s ear, and whatever he said calmed the wildness inside of her with a quickness Orion had never seen. No one had been able talk April down before.
“Orion, I’ll call you when you get home. We’ll go out tomorrow night,” she said with a smirk.