Striking

  Striking

  Forged in Fire #1

  Lila Felix and Rachel Higginson

  We want to dedicate this to our families.

  Thank you for understanding our midnight hours.

  And for ignoring us when we call you by a character’s name.

  And to friendship.

  Without which we never would have begun this journey.

  Chapter One

  Cami

  “So I said to him, ‘Sure, Dane, just as soon as you figure out how to turn that into billable hours.’” The guy across from me, I suppose you could call him my date, laughed at his own joke while I barely lifted my eyes from my empty Cosmo glass to shoot him a pained smile.

  He took that as encouragement and launched into another story about Dane. As in the comedian? A friend? A dog? I still didn’t know.

  And honestly, I didn’t care.

  But I did know I had been stuck on this god-awful date for the last three hours with no end in sight. I was sufficiently drunk but still tragically bored.

  I glanced around at the trendy LA restaurant we were supposed to be enjoying and wrinkled my nose. It was as boring as Bryce, the Ivy League investment banker douche my sister set me up with. Everything was white, the chairs, the tables, the booths, the walls, the floor, the light fixtures, the waitresses’ outfits, the hostesses’ tacky short skirts, the bartenders’ shirts, Bryce’s pants. Oh god, I was on a date with a guy who wore white pants.

  It was like a living mural of heaven gone terribly wrong-with weak drinks and pretentious assholes.

  Speaking of pretentious assholes….

  “Do you want another drink?” Bryce looked over the rim of his fusion cocktail something or other, and raised an eyebrow.

  Oh yeah, like he had a right to judge me.

  Granted, I was maybe a little bit sloshed. But it was his fault for being so boring.

  No, I take that back.

  It was my sister’s fault for setting me up with him. Just because Katelyn was living an f-ing fairy tale, with her perfect fiancé, her perfect art history degree and her perfect dream job as an assistant curator at The Getty, did not mean we shared a taste in men.

  Damn her. It was like it was her mission in life to make me miserable.

  I should have known better than to agree to, “Hey, Cami, I have the greatest guy for you!” But I was bored and mom and dad had been riding my ass about getting my life together and it was brunch. One does not f with my sister at brunch.

  “Sure, why not?” I slid him a slinky smile that I could feel looked forced. He rewarded me with a twisted smirk and a finger in the air to flag down our waitress.

  He probably thought he was well on his way to getting lucky. Good for him.

  And even though he was painfully mistaken-in fact, if I had to listen to one more of his pointless tales of his rich friends, richer father or stupid car I might choose alcohol poisoning over life-who was I to judge? He was just living the American dream: life, liberty and the pursuit of getting laid.

  Or something like that….

  Ok, maybe I wasn’t being fair.

  It wasn’t Bryce’s fault I found him utterly awful. It was my sister’s and more specifically my parents’.

  If I were a better person I could probably see the need to grow up a little bit, to settle down as my father always begged me, to have some goddamn drive in life as my mother preferred to lecture. But I was not a better person, nor did I have any aspirations to be one.

  All I really wanted in life was the new Jimmy Choo silver pumps my mom just got in her store. That was it.

  Oh and the white Balenciaga bag.

  I looked around the restaurant, took in all the white and changed my mind.

  Ok, not white.

  But mostly I wanted to be left alone, to not be on the receiving end of another brunch-version of Intervention. I just wanted to figure out life in my own way. Even if my way meant sucking down cocktails like every night was happy hour below Sunset and the casual use of recreational drugs. There was nothing to worry about. I had my life together. I had a life plan, kind of. And most importantly, I knew what I was doing.

  Except for what I was doing on this date? That even I was still trying to figure out.

  What my family saw as a cry for help, I saw as a cry to leave me the f alone. I didn’t want Katie’s life. I didn’t have my mother’s ambition. And I sure as hell didn’t want to just give in and “let daddy set me up with something more suited for a girl like me.”

  Which meant a receptionist job at one of his offices.

  A girl like me, a girl with no direction, no self-control and no prospects of making something of herself.

  Oh like, Katie’s Art History degree actually meant anything.

  And my mom and her couture boutique that only bought off the runway. God, mom and her ambition. More like a social-climbing-materialism-addicted-desperate-attempt-at-finding-some-kind-of-worth way to feed her fashion obsession.

  And the idea of spending my days waiting on self-absorbed people-people with image issues desperate enough to pay my dad gazillions of dollars to give them a different body entirely-made me want to take one of his pricy scalpels and jab it through my eye.

  Then see if my renowned plastic surgeon father could cosmetically fix that.

  I giggled into my glass. Bryce saw this as a good sign and continued his story about investment futures with more gusto.

  One more time with feeling….

  I sighed into my now empty glass and then glanced down at my phone, displayed prominently and unashamedly on the table. This was LA for godsakes, nobody was out of eyesight from their phone, ever.

  Katie had texted to see how the date was going.

  Like she didn’t know.

  I rolled my eyes, but when Bryce quirked a professionally manicured brow at me I shrugged a shoulder and tapped out a reply.

  How do you think? He’s the same as the last one and the one before that. God, K, I’m so tired of these boring assholes. Remind me not to let you set me up ever again.

  Her reply was immediate and scolding. You’re not going to marry him Cami. Just date him until mommy and daddy stop threatening to send you to rehab.

  Ugh. As if. And what was she? Five? Mommy and daddy?

  I was sneering at my phone, but let out a loud laugh. I could be really funny sometimes. This had to be a sign that the cocktails were doing their job.

  Thank God.

  But she was right. They did keep threatening to send me away. They never exactly said where, but we all assumed rehab. That’s where anyone ever went if they were making too much of a scene. It didn’t matter if there wasn’t actually an addiction problem, although more than likely there were several…. Rehab was just where everyone went to reinvent themselves, or find themselves or come back to themselves.

  Which would have been great if I could figure out who I was to begin with.

  Oh no, I was becoming as boring as Bryce! God, no! Banish the existentialism now, before it’s too late.

  Bryce noticed my cringing expression and leaned forward to find out if everything was alright. I could tell that’s what he was doing by the drawn eyebrows and frown.

  Or maybe he wasn’t doing that at all, maybe that was just the preventative care Botox. He was only twenty-eight, but you couldn’t start too soon.

  I smiled at him, encouraging him to get back to talking about money. Maybe Katie was right. I could try with him; I could give this another shot-or at least pretend to.

  I knew my parent’s patience was drawing thin. Still, three months away at what basically came down to a twenty-four-seven spa did not sound that bad. And maybe it wouldn’t hurt to get away from all this…. monotony.

  Whit
e everything.

  Bryce’s tie was white. How did I miss that before?

  The waitress finally dropped off my cocktail and I picked it up before it could even settle on the table. I tipped my head back and downed it like a shot. Like a champion.

  See and my parents thought I had no ambition?

  Fine, Bryce was the youngest associate at his firm and well on his way to being partner. Good for him. It always helped to have a parent in the business. But no way could he hold his liquor like me.

  He simply didn’t have the hours logged.

  The room suddenly tilted to the left before righting itself, all that white swirling about in a merry-go-round of mind-numbing douchebaggery.

  That’s right, I was twenty-one and exhausted with this life. Bored to the point of destructive. Cynical to the point of apathetic. Exhausted to the point of…. who cares? I didn’t. I didn’t care anymore.

  “So are we going to party tonight or what?” Bryce leered at me from across the table. It took a long squint, but I could definitely make out the way his crooked smile seemed to want to eat me and his eyes were raking over me like he’d already seen me naked. I shuddered. The thought of his boring, pretentious fingers groping me suddenly made the half bottle of vodka in my stomach pitch violently.

  I swept my long, surfer blonde hair-a necessity here since I lived on the Planet of the Blondes with Beach Bodies-over my shoulder and gave him a look of pure confusion, “I thought that’s what we were doing?”

  “Oh we are, baby,” his voice dropped an octave to what I assumed he thought was a sexy timber. The vodka moved again in my stomach at his really bad Barry Manilow impression, “so how about we move this party to my place. I have more of those,” he nodded at my empty martini glass, “and other fun treats.”

  “More” probably meant drugs. Or sex. Or both.

  Probably both.

  And as devoid of morality as my vapid mind was, I was so not into both. Or either. Or any of that with him.

  “Mmmm, sounds nice,” I said plainly. “But instead of doing that, let’s not do that.” The idea of him humping me with his pretentious white pants around his ankles, literally made me want to vomit.

  “Alright, baby,” Bryce didn’t look daunted at all. In fact, he only looked more determined. “Then what do you want to do? Let’s turn this party into an after party.”

  Oh no. He actually thought he was sexy too. This night was only getting worse. It was nice for Katie that her fiancé was only half the douche this guy was and that she didn’t mind when he humped her. But honestly, where did these people come from? And why the hell did Katie think I could actually use this guy for anything more than a way to show off my Marc Jacobs mini and fresh spray tan?

  Honestly.

  “Actually,” I started slowly, so he would understand every important point I was trying to get across, “I appreciate dinner, but I have this thing that I need to do. Tonight. So… next time, for sure.”

  I hoped the whole “there wouldn’t actually be a next time” part was pretty obvious.

  Bryce’s cocky smile faltered and he looked around the room like someone could interpret my let down in a simpler way.

  “You’re joking,” Bryce bit out. His smug, prick-ish expression turned demanding and scarily angry.

  I tilted my head back and drained the last drops of my latest Cosmo before meeting his eyes again. “We both know this isn’t going to go anywhere further. Let’s end on a high note, yeah?” I smiled sweetly and noticed I couldn’t feel my gums anymore. Nice.

  “I think we have different definitions of high notes,” Bryce growled, leaning forward so our conversation couldn’t be overheard by other tables.

  I sighed and slid my hand forward on the table. I thought about patting his hand comfortingly but changed my mind at the last second. “I bet you’re right about that. But here’s the thing. Despite the way I pounded back drinks tonight I actually have some self-esteem. So a quick lay back at your bachelor pad that is guaranteed to leave me grossed out and desperately unsatisfied sounds like the opposite of a high note to me. Plus, let’s not forget the fact that neither of us can be sure when you were tested last and I am not about to contract something communicable or venereal from your tiny, little pecker.” I let that sink in for a moment and then ended on a dramatic whisper, “So I think that settles that.”

  “Sweetheart, there’s nothing tiny about-“

  “I’m going to stop you right there,” I held up a gorgeously manicured hand. “It’s the white pants. They leave very little to the imagination.” I winked at him suggestively.

  Bryce grabbed my elevated hand and slammed it down on the table, making our plates jump and clatter between us. I winced at the shooting pain that fired up to my elbow, but knew it would have hurt a lot more had I not been so tipsy.

  “You little bitch,” he snarled, spittle collecting in the corners of his mouth. “Do you know who my father is?”

  I blamed the liquid courage for this next one, “Yes, Bryce. The whole f-ing restaurant knows who your father is at this point. But what does he have to do with your insignificant dick?”

  Bryce’s face turned to the color of an angry eggplant and he crushed my hand in his iron grip. I twisted in my seat, trying to free my poor hand, but he only squeezed harder. I squeaked in pain, and this time when my vision went blurry it was pain-induced.

  “We obviously have different ideas of where this night is going, so let me explain to you what exactly is going to happen.” Bryce’s voice dropped to a low, demanding octave and I started to wonder if maybe I went a little too far. “You’re going back to my-“

  I so did not need to hear what his freak-o plans were for me tonight. I picked up my full, untouched glass of water with my free hand and threw it in his face. He let go of my now-injured hand immediately and shouted in outrage. While he was trying to brush the water off his three thousand dollar Armani jacket I grabbed the valet ticket still on the table and my Derek Lam clutch and sprinted to the host stand.

  “The guy I came here with is refusing to pay his bill,” I huffed to the stuck up hostess that could barely spare me an eye roll.

  Thankfully my waitress was standing nearby, “He’s doing what?”

  “It was a blind date!” I gushed with real horror. “And now he won’t pay! He wants me to meet him outside.” I finished the last in a conspiratorially dramatic gasp that drew the waitress’s eyes into narrowed slits.

  “I’ll take care of him,” she promised and then motioned to her manager.

  I shot her an appreciative smile and then wobbled to the right. Damn it. Now was so not the time to start feeling all those drinks. I ignored my shaky ankles and the way the ground kind of sloped and spun whenever I took a step and rushed out the main entrance to the valet stand. I passed the valet the ticket and then stood there bouncing on the balls of my pointed Louboutins until the Porsche something, something, something was delivered right in front of me.

  They valet stepped out, a huge grin marking his face. And if I was a guy, and not currently being pursued by a psychopath I could probably have appreciated the whatever kind of car this was too.

  As it were….

  I glanced back and noticed Bryce pushing his way through the manager and waitress, his livid, terrifying eyes locked on me.

  Oh god!

  I slid onto the buttery leather, thankful the valet kept the thing running-because honestly I highly doubted I could have figured out how to do that right now-and then jammed the clutch into gear.

  Here’s the thing…. I knew how to drive a stick shift, kind of. The son of one of my dad’s golf partners had taught me two summers ago. Or had tried to teach me, I had been a little distracted by the wicked things he could do with his mouth and the Ambien we had been experimenting with.

  And even though I could reason that being drunk was a little like being high and probably that would make things easier, this car was a few classes above the tricked out golf cart I had been
learning on at the time.

  But the semantics were the same, right?

  The car moved forward with an ugly sound and stuttering movements but soon I was back on the main road and pushing the car past the trendy boutiques and designer shops that lined both sides of the street.

  What an asshole.

  For real this time, Katie was never setting me up again! All that to prove to mom and dad that I had a tiny piece of my life together?

  So not worth it.

  The car lurched right and then left as I tried to focus on staying in the right lines. At least I had leveled it out. My thin heel caught in the floorboards though and my foot pressed down on the gas as I tried to dislodge my foot from where it got stuck.

  I glanced up just in time to swerve out of the way of a Mini, and threw them the finger, while pounding on the horn, for getting in my way. I stomped at the pedal, accelerating further, but frustrated my heel was still caught under the pedal.

  My mom’s shop was coming up on my right, Catti-get it, it’s like a play on Katie and Cami and sums up all the rich bitches that shop there-and I wanted to drive by slowly and make a crude hand gesture; but I couldn’t do that if I was speeding by.

  The engine revved with the need to shift, but it was going to have to wait until I could free my foot from the death grip the slim ankle strap had on me. I leaned forward to rip it apart if I had to and when I lifted my eyes there was a biker in my path. Not like a real biker, like biker-gang-biker, but like a bicyclist. Who let them drive on the real streets anyway? Weren’t there sidewalks for their kind?

  I swerved even further to the right and then stomped my foot down to avoid a parked car. My right tires hit the curb with insane speed and the car was launched forward, up over the sidewalk and into the front of a store.

  Glass crashed around me and metal groaned and screeched with the impact. The expensive car I had officially stolen and then totaled released the airbag painfully into my face and chest and then sputtered to death in a high pitched whiny noise while the tires still spun.

  I screamed, frustrated and angry with my luck and then pounded against the stupid airbag pinning me in place. Despite the carnage around me, I felt fine, but was lucid enough to know that probably had something to do with the life-giving power of booze.