“I noticed that. What with this being a bar and all, I figured it was down to either drinking or darts, and I remembered you’re not very good with small objects when you’re loaded, and I could smell the alcohol on you from across the bar.”
He squinted at me. “Wait, what?”
I let out an impatient sigh. “I was a making small penis joke.”
“Oh.” He frowned. “That’s not very nice.”
“You were expecting nice from me? How hammered are you?” He shrugged and I tossed a thumb toward the bar. “Can I talk to you?”
He wobbled in his seat but managed to stand, casting a look back at the men behind him. “I’ll be back in a minute. Don’t go anywhere without me.”
“They won’t,” I said. “Where else are they going to find an idiot to buy them free drinks all night?”
Scott nodded. “It’s true.” He shrugged at them. “Back in a few.”
I led him over to the bar and he pushed himself onto the stool and made a motion to the bartender for two drinks. The bartender, already filling his last order, nodded, stopped and made his way down to us with shot glasses. “Drink with me, Sienna,” Scott said as the bartender put the glasses in front of us and poured an amber liquid into them.
“That doesn’t seem like a winning idea to me,” I said as I looked at the drink, the strong smell of alcohol hanging over it like a cloud, almost causing my eyes to tear up. “Maybe I’ll stick with water.”
“Boooo,” he said, slurring. “It’s bad luck to toast with water.”
“Do you feel like there’s been an overabundance of luck that’s come our way of late?” I looked at him with what might have been a wry smile once upon a time, but now it felt more like a leer. He stared at me, and I saw the smoky hint of something in his eyes. “You know, don’t you?”
He looked away, took the shot from in front of him and downed it in one swift motion, his lips pulling together in a grimace after he was done. “Jackson came over to drink with me a day or two ago, told me about what went down.” He looked at me out of the corner of his eye as he motioned for a refill. “Sorry about Zack.”
“I’m sorry about Kat,” I said, not really sincere. “Did you ever hear how that one turned out?”
He looked at me with a frown. “I heard she and Dr. Perugini are missing and presumed dead in the destruction of the campus.”
I eyed him, then nudged the shot glass from in front of me to in front of him. “She’s alive and well, and a full-on Omega lackey.”
The shot glass was almost to Scott’s lips when he dropped it out of his hand. He didn’t bother to step back as it hit the floor and splattered whiskey all over his jeans and shoes. “She what?”
“She’s back to who she was before Kat,” I said. “Back to working for Omega, I guess. She betrayed us.”
Scott leaned forward, putting his elbows on the bar. “Jackson didn’t … mention that.” I saw a waver of uncertainty. “Does she remember me?” I caught the note of hope.
I didn’t pull the punch. “No. Not really.”
He let that sink in then looked at me sideways. “How did you find me?”
“Ariadne,” I said. “She was tracking you for some reason.”
“Nice,” he said with a look back to the bottles behind the bar. “Probably trying to figure out a way to make me drown my ex-girlfriend so she could send me over the edge.” I flinched and he caught it, and gave me a look of apology. “Sorry.” The barman sat another shot in front of him and he took it, fast. “But in all seriousness, I doubt I’d need a ton of motivation to do her in at this point, especially if she’s working with Omega now.”
We stood there in silence for a moment. The bartender refilled Scott’s glass, and at his urging put another one in front of me. I thought about waving him off; I didn’t like the taste of alcohol, didn’t like the effects, didn’t care for any of it. Ultimately, though, I let it lie there, looked at the glass, smelled the pungent aroma, and listened to the jukebox keep going in the background of the near-empty room. “I’ve been in and around a lot of bars lately. What do you make of that?”