After filling up my cup, I went to look for Kori. Walking through the thickest part of the crowd, I felt a little wad of panic—part claustrophobia and part fear that I wouldn’t be able to find her—churning inside me. But people moved aside and made space for cool currents of air, scented with pine and bonfire wood.

I searched for Kori, managing to catch only glimpses—her black hair being whipped over her shoulder, her hand thrust high in the air to keep from burning someone with the glowing tip of her cigarette.

The mass of people around her was thick. I circled around it, finding a less crowded path. Just as I was about to elbow my way in, I heard a voice say, “What’s your damage, Heather?”

I turned to see Parker Walsh sitting with his back against a tree, flashing me a puckish smirk. His hair looked mangled and his eyes were thin little slits, as if he were looking up into the sun instead of the pitch-black night.

“Are you talking to me?” I asked, annoyed by the delay as well as the delayer.

“Yeah. What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“Sure there is. Kori’s all in a freak too. What is it with you girls?”

“She was fine earlier.”

“Whatever. She’s all worried about something.” I thought I heard sincerity in his otherwise mocking voice.

I glanced toward Kori; she was smiling and laughing. “Kori’s fine.”

“Is she?”

“Yes, Parker, she’s fine.”

“Are you?” he asked, the agitating sarcasm back in place. Why did I even bother trying to talk to him? No doubt his brain was in some alternate universe where my messenger bag was a killer unicorn or something. I drank my beer, nearly finishing off the full cup.

“Yeah, she’s fine and I’m fine, okay?” I said, finishing off my beer as I started walking toward Kori. I just wanted to go home. And the sooner I could get to Kori, the better.

About halfway in, the crowd seemed to close around me. Tighter. An awful trapped feeling came over me. Too many people, too much heat. And then the weight of an arm dropped over my shoulders. My eyes slanted to find a hand with a silver thumb ring dangling over my right boob. It was attached to none other than one very fine Anthony Beck.

“There’s my dangerous girl.”

My heart danced.

“If not tonight—when?”

With three plastic cups worth of keg-pumped liquid courage already in me, I was a lot less shy about the whole “bare sighting” as it were. I smiled and held up my hands. “I’m completely unarmed. Look, no books.”

He eyed my messenger bag. “I think, just to be safe, I’m going to have to keep you next to me all night long,” he said, tucking me closer against him.

I laughed. “You’re afraid of my empty cup?”