Equally embarrassing was the memory of how she’d reacted to the way he’d acted, throwing herself at Stan the way she did, scaring him, weirding him out, possibly jeopardizing his job. What was wrong with her? Why was her behavior so spastic? She just hoped he was on cleanup duty in the kitchen or had already clocked out for the night so she wouldn’t have to face him. At least her mom and Richard wouldn’t be there. Alice had sent her a text a while ago telling her that they were leaving early, asking her if she wanted to come. A text that, by the way, she hadn’t bothered to respond to. Of course she hadn’t. When she was acting like a self-destructive idiot—and not just self-destructive, other-destructive, too, even worse—who thought only of herself and her own needs, she went all the way with it. No half measures for her.

When she got close to the clubhouse, she ducked behind a pillar, peered into the giant bay window. The luau appeared to still be going on, but was definitely in the wind-down phase, only a few stray couples left, the employees subtly starting to tidy up. No sign of Stan, thank God. Charlie went around to the back, creeping up to the porch door. As she reached for the latch, she heard something crunch under her foot. She looked down. A pair of sunglasses. Jude’s, if she wasn’t mistaken, one of the lenses shattered thanks to the heel of her wedge shoe. The glasses had probably flown off his face when he was having wild sex with Lucy in the bushes. Charlie picked the glasses up by the ear-hook part, flung them as far as she could.

She pressed down on the latch, opened the door, entered. Eyes pointed straight ahead, feet moving fast, she made it to the foyer area without seeing a soul. No one was manning the coat-check station. Charlie took a quick look around, then ducked inside, found her bag. After hooking the strap over her shoulder and dropping a couple dollars in the tip jar, she walked out the door, this time the front one.