"We've been here for twenty minutes and you're already wasted?"

"No," Jorden claps back, "I'm having fun. You should try it sometime."

I love her, I really do-I just can't match her energy all the time. Definitely not without significantly more alcohol in me.

She, on the other hand, doesn't need a drop of the stuff. Even when she's sober as a judge, Jorden is a ten out of ten. She laughs loud, loves loud, lives loud.

It's miraculous, honestly, because she's been busting her butt to make ends meet for as long as I've known her. She was raised by a single mom off food stamps, working in diners like Quintaño's long before she was actually old enough to do so legally.

She's right: she does deserve a break. Life is hard.

"You go dance," I say sheepishly. "I'm gonna go find another drink first so I can keep up with you."

She shrugs and flips her hair over her shoulder. "Fine. But if you find me grinding up on some hot young thing when you get back, it'll be your loss!"

I grin and kiss her on the cheek. "I hope I find you grinding up on two of them."

"Don't tempt me, girl. I just might. I really just might."

Laughing, we separate and I go back inside the house in search of a bathroom. I put on a brave face while Jorden was watching, but as soon as I find a bathroom, I shut the door behind me, lock it, and draw in a huge, shuddering breath.

This is too much. It was a bad idea to come here. Back to a place like this, around people like this... I turned my back on this world. I never wanted to return.

As soon as I get out of here, I'm going to double down on that vow.

When I touch the back of my neck, my palm comes away soaked with clammy sweat.

"Midnight," I swear to my reflection in the mirror. "Just a couple more hours, then the clock will strike midnight and you can say goodbye to these people forever."

Midnight.

We're almost there.

I rinse my sweaty neck and step out of the bathroom, ready to brave the rest of the party. Through the distant double doors, I catch a brief glimpse of Jorden in the crowd. But before I can even get a step in her direction, I feel an unexpected hand on my waist.

A voice accompanies it. "Hey there, gorgeous."

I follow the sound of the slurred greeting to a rumpled man with a damp forehead. He's swaying from side to side.

"Hi." I give him a tight smile and retreat towards the wall.

"I came over because you look lonely." His words are breathy, arriving on a cloud of alcohol fumes. "Thought I'd keep ya company."

I wrinkle my nose. "'Oh, that's nice of you. I'm fine, though. But thanks!"

If he understands the implied goodbye, he doesn't show it. He steps closer, his belly pressing against me. "Who are you with?"

"My boyfriend," I lie reflexively. "He's getting me a drink right now."

He hesitates for a second and then cackles. "Bullshit."

That throws me for a loop, mostly because he's so certain. "I don't-I mean-How would you even know?"

"Because you're here to meet him. Just like the rest of them." He says it with more of that same finality. Like he knows something I don't.

I have lots of questions, but none I want to sit and discuss with this charming fellow. I try to edge past him. "I'm just going to-"

"He isn't that great, you know." He shifts with me, blocking my path. "Everyone is here for Ivan, but I'll show you what a real man can do for you. There's no line to get to me."

"Gee, I wonder why," I mutter to myself. To him, I say, "I have literally no idea what you are talking about. You probably don't, either. You're drunk. So if you could just let me go-"

Suddenly, his sweaty, meaty hand slaps my ass.

Distantly, I hear threads of my dress popping. But it's like paying attention to a dripping faucet when your house is on fire. I have bigger fish to fry.

Anyone who's ever worked in the food service industry knows that customers do jaw-dropping things. Married men leave their phone numbers on the receipt; friendly-looking grandpas pinch your ass; their wives hiss that you're a slut beneath their breaths.

And anyone who's ever been stuck working in the food service industry, even when they're so sick of all those things, knows that there are two choices: you can take it all on the chin and keep your job-or you can live out the fantasy of every server ever and show the motherfuckers who crossed the line that they messed with the wrong person.

Today, I'm the wrong person.

And this is the motherfucker who crossed the line.

2

IVAN

I'm bored out of my fucking mind.

Everywhere I look at this party, I see the least interesting person I've ever met. And the next, and the next. For a bunch of scumbags and criminals, you'd think they would have something engaging to discuss.

But they don't. The furthest thing from it, in fact.

Because just about every soul under my roof tonight is here for the same irritating reason.

To get me to marry.

Whether it's them I'm meant to be marrying, or their daughter, sister, cousin, mother, whoever, they aren't too particular. They just want to get closer to me. To my empire. By any means necessary.

I don't even blame them. The Pushkin Bratva is the biggest shark in a sea full of them. We have the money. The power. We decide who gets what and when, and the usual answers to those questions are "us," "all of it," and "right fucking now."

"These things will be the death of me," I mutter.

"So why are you here?" asks Yasha, my best friend and right-hand man, as he snares a toothpick of cheese from a passing waiter.

"Because Anya will be the death of me if I bail."

He snorts through a mouthful of brie. "True. That sister of yours owes you one for what she's putting you through tonight."

"That she does," I agree.

But even that is a massive understatement. I wouldn't be here, subjecting myself to this bullshit, for anyone but her.

If it weren't for me, though, she'd be going through hellfire right now. Our father was furious enough when he found out what she'd done. Rebuffing half a dozen decent marriage proposals in order to elope with a lowly Bratva foot soldier? It's blasphemy in the eyes of the old bastard who birthed us. Daughters, in our father's mind, are pawns to be moved around the board as he sees fit. God forbid they should marry for love.

I think she should do whatever the hell she wants. That being said, I'm not exactly big on the concept. Marry for love: fine, if that's what Anya desires.

But I will not be doing the same.

If I'm going to be forced to marry, I'll be marrying for business. Nothing more. I'm marrying to take the heat off my sister's transgressions. I'm marrying to solidify the Pushkin Bratva as the preeminent force in the American underworld.

Love has nothing to do with it.

A sudden sound from behind me draws my attention. Yasha and I turn as one, conditioned by years of fighting alongside one another to be ready for whatever comes next. It wouldn't be the first party we've attended that ends in gunfire and bloodshed.

But there's none of that to be seen.

Not yet, at least.

A woman I've never seen before is baring her fangs at the drunken nephew of the Greek Genakos mafia don. Stefanos is his name, I think. He's coarse and sloppy, which matches his reputation. Even now, his eyes are rolling in their sockets, loosened by too much of the free booze on hand. His claws are reaching out toward the girl.

"Keep your fucking hands to yourself," she spits at him.

"Aw, c'mon," he mutters through clumsy lips. "I was just tryna be friendly."

"By grabbing my ass?"

"Tryna appreciate you, too," he mumbles. "You don't gotta be a bitch about it."

Her jaw drops. "I know you did not just call me a bitch."

"I said you're bein' a bitch, not that you are-"

He doesn't get to finish the sentence before she cracks him across the face with a vicious slap. Those freewheeling eyes of his go blank and he stumbles backwards. He bumps into a wall and wobbles.

Then he rights himself and his unkempt smile twists into something far meaner.

"Listen here, you fuckin' whore..." He advances on her. Those hands of his suddenly don't look so limp and harmless. He goes to paw her again. She tries to bat him off, but he's bigger and stronger than her, so he just swallows her up with his bulk as he backs her into the corner by the bathrooms.

And with that, I've seen enough.

I'm not here to be anyone's white knight. But I'll be damned if this inebriated moron is going to go around groping unwilling women in front of me.

When I was a boy, I saw my father do far too much of that. I couldn't do anything to stop him then.

But now? Now, I'm perfectly capable of ripping this motherfucker to pieces.

I cross the distance, find the back of Stefanos's collar, and rip him to the ground. He shrieks and hits hard enough to shake the nearby sculptures on their pedestals.

A champagne flute crashes to the floor and shatters in a million directions. One of the jagged pieces cuts Stefanos's ear. His blood starts to pool out onto the white marble.

I plant a knee on Stefanos's chest and bend down close enough for him to hear every word I breathe in his face. "I think you are the one who ought to 'listen here,' my friend. The lady told you no. She asked you to keep your hands to yourself, but you did not. So now, I'm putting my hands on you, and I won't stop when you ask me to. I won't stop when you beg me to. I won't even stop when you scream and plead and cry for me to please God just have some fucking mercy."

Stefanos's eyes are wide and still now. His lower lip quivers. The cold fear sweat beading in his mustache disgusts me. "P-p-plea-"

"Shh." I press a finger to my mouth. "I just told you that begging won't help." Then, sighing, I release my weight from off his chest and stand again. I pull my tuxedo cuffs into place as I look down on him from above. "But I don't feel like getting your blood on my suit tonight. So for now, I'll let you go. Get the fuck out of my sight."

He doesn't have to be told twice. He scrambles away on his hands and knees, leaking blood, until he can gather himself back upright. Then he goes bumbling away, down the corner and out of sight.

When he's gone, I turn to the girl.

3

CORA

I'm still standing where that asshole left me backed into the corner. My hair is mussed and sweaty and my jaw is aching from biting down so hard. I'd like to get out of here, but I'm stuck for two main reasons.

One is that the man who just rescued me from Mr. Handsy Douche Bag is currently smoldering down in my direction. He looks like if testosterone had a face. Pure, rippling masculinity. Eyes like preserved honey. Hands that, even now, are flexing and unflexing like they're capable of doing so much more.

The second reason is that, if I move out of this corner, Prince Testosterone and all the rubber-necking onlookers will get an eyeful of my bare butt.

That's because, when the douche bag tried to paw at me, he ripped my dress all the way up the back seams. I can feel the cold breeze of the air conditioning blowing where I really wish it wouldn't.

Not good.

So that's my predicament in a nutshell: hottest guy I've ever seen plus one hell of a wardrobe malfunction. I'm a waitress, not a mathematician, but even I know that that doesn't add up to anything great.

"Relax," he rumbles. "You don't have to worry. I handled it."

"Yep. Relax. Working on it." It's difficult to talk, given how hard I'm trying not to move for fear of ripping the dress further.

I have a delirious mental image of just staying planted right here for the rest of the night. They can use my arms like a coat rack. The clean-up crew will have to get a crowbar to pry me out of the corner in the morning.

"I'd advise you to start by inhaling," he suggests. "In through the nose, out through the mouth. That sort of thing." There's an undercurrent of dark laughter in his voice.

I wrinkle my nose. "Which part of this is funny to you?"

He doesn't seem bothered in the least by my sharp voice. "The part where you look like you're about to have an aneurysm if you don't take a breath in the near future."

He's right-I really am clenching dangerously hard. For medical reasons, if nothing else, I sigh and take a big sip of air.

As I do, I feel another stitch in the seam give way.

Things are going well.

"You know, you look like a busy, important man," I say, doing my best to keep my ever-growing desperation out of my voice. "I'm sure other busy, important men and women would very much like your attention somewhere else in the party, right?"

He shrugs. "Maybe. Hard to say."

"But easy to find out! You could go...over there, maybe!" I jut my chin in the direction of the back lawn. "Or there. Or there. Anywhere, really. Lots of people are no doubt extremely eager to ask you about, uh, world politics or the economy or who you think is gonna win Naked & Afraid this season."

Unfortunately, Prince Testosterone doesn't take any of my suggestions. "Then they can wait." He inches closer, which I really, really wish he wouldn't do. "What's your name?"

"Who, me?"

"No, the other girl cowering in the corner."

I force a laugh. "Oh, I'm nobody. Not busy or important in the least, and I don't even watch Naked & Afraid!"

It feels like the walls are closing in. I'm making silent oaths in my head and hoping that some deities above are listening and will take mercy on me. I'll wear only pants for the rest of my life if you get me out of this mess. Just please, for God's sake, help me!

If anyone up above hears, they show no sign of it.

He edges closer still. I can smell his cologne now. Cedarwood and sage. It's making my head spin.

Over his shoulders, most of the other attendees have turned back to their conversations, though I still feel a few stray eyes drifting in our direction here and there. It's hard to look anywhere but at him, though. He's just got this confidence, this magnetism, that brings me back to his gaze again and again.

For his part, he doesn't seem to have any problem blocking out the whole world to focus on just me. "You're a strange one."

"You don't even know the half of it," I promise him. "Seriously. I'd run if I were you."

I'd run if I were me, too, I add silently.

He still doesn't smile or show any signs of a departure in the near-future. "I'll ask you one more time: what's your name?"

I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel as far as lies and distractions go. Between that and the tickle of cold air on my bare skin and the tick-tick-tick sound-slash-sensation of more stitches giving way and my ever-growing terror that somehow, some way, this terrifying man knows who I am-who I really am-I'm about this close to just telling him the truth.

Or maybe I'm just sick of lying. Of hiding. Of running. It's been years of it now and it's starting to get old.

So I open my mouth. My real name is right on my lips. "I'm-"

Then someone taps the man on the shoulder.

He straightens and turns with a scowl on his lips. The person interrupting us is slender and tall, with a wiry frame and a shock of brown hair. He's got the same kind of serious composure in his face that Prince Testosterone has. A do-not-fuck-with-me-ness.

The new man whispers something urgent in his ear. Both their scowls deepen. Their eyes flit out to the lawn.

I see that for what it is.

A window of opportunity.

With one last prayer to the heavens above just in case any of those celestial assholes have decided to tune in, I clamp the ruined halves of my dress together as best as I can, pirouette on my heel, and take off waddle-running down the nearest hallway before the two men turn back to realize I'm gone.

My plan is simple: I'm going to find somewhere quiet to fix my dress. Then I'm going to find Jorden and we're going to get the hell out of here.

With any luck, I'll never see that man again.

4

CORA

Bad news: this place is a labyrinth. I feel like I've been running for hours, twisting and turning down hall after hall. The one silver lining is that at least I'm leaving the super Hulk behind.

I shiver at the thought of him. He was too perfect to be real. His bone structure was brutally sharp. Those lips had a cruel slant to them. And those eyes-Lord have mercy, those amber eyes could hypnotize a girl if she's not careful.

He hadn't laid so much as a finger on me, but the way he looked at me was a physical touch in and of itself. It stroked the deepest parts of me.

As if I didn't already feel plenty naked with a gaping rip in the backside of my dress.

I shake off the memory just as a door with a thin slice of light at the bottom beckons. It looks like a bathroom, so I push through-

And come to a screeching halt.

A trio of girls is clustered around a hand mirror balanced on top of the sink. Their hair is expertly curled, their dresses flawless, their manicures glistening in the candlelight.

Two of them don't notice me enter. The third looks up from where she's bent over the mirror with a straw pressed to her nostril. Her face is reflected on the surface below, although it's broken up by five or six neatly arranged lines of white powder.

When she sees me, she frowns. It's not a frown of surprise at being barged in on, though.

It's a frown of recognition.

"Cordelia?" she says in shock. "Is that you?"

Cordelia. A dead name. A nobody name.

My heart jumps into my throat. One thought blares through my head like a tornado siren: run.

This time, I hold nothing back. I run and run and run. High heels be damned. Ripped dress be damned.

I keep running, down hallways and up stairs, until my breath burns in my lungs. Then I burst through the nearest door I see and slam it shut behind me.

Inside the darkened room, I keel over, elbows on my knees, and try to inhale. I'm so tired I don't give a rat's ass about the fact that anyone who comes up from behind me could get a high-def view of where the sun don't shine.

I stay there for a while. Even when I catch my breath, though, my heart continues to pitter-patter in my chest.

She saw me. She knew me.

I shudder again. Cordelia. God, I hate how that sounds.

I'm Cora now.

Cordelia is dead.

Eventually, my heart calms down, though the tang of fear never truly leaves my mouth. When I'm as at ease as I'm gonna get, I look around the room.

I'm in an office of some sort. Very masculine, dark palette, brooding. It's shadowy in here, though there's light coming through a set of French doors. When I walk over, I realize the attached balcony looks out over the rear lawn. Most of the crowd has shuffled outside, so it's a maze of bodies. The sound of laughter and clinking glasses rises up to meet me. There's no sign of Prince Testosterone or his friend.

I turn my back on the balcony and fish my phone out of my purse. I press Jorden's contact and hold it up to my ear. It rings and rings, and then:

"Heeeey! Girl, where'd you go? This party is crazy!"

Oh jeez. Jorden is blitzed beyond belief. I know that looseness in her voice, that cackle. The girl is D-R-U-N-K. She isn't coming to save me.

I'm all on my own.

"Uh, never mind," I mumble into the phone. "Butt dial. I'm coming to find you. One sec." I hang up and drop my phone onto the nearby couch.

I find a lamp in the corner and click it on. The rip is in the back, so I need to get this dress off and try to finagle some kind of safety pin stopgap solution good enough to get me out of here without mooning every partygoer in attendance. With a grimace and a prayer, I start trying to peel off the dress while doing the least damage possible.

The back where the drunkard's hands went is pretty ruined, but if I can just wriggle out of it carefully and find a safety pin around here somewhere, there's a chance I'll be able to-

Riiiiip.

Never mind. I'm screwed.

My oh-so-careful efforts have just extended the rip even further. As soon as I let my hands go limp, the dress parts in two like wilted flower petals and pools around my feet. I'm left standing there, in the middle of some stranger's office, in nothing but high heels and nipple pasties.

Which, of course, is when the door opens.

For a second, I hold out hope that it's Jorden, here to provide backup.

But it's not Jorden.

It's not Jorden at all.