Nick decided to try his luck with Tara again. Fortunately, she must have liked him a bit better than her sorority sisters because she agreed to meet up with him for dancing and drinks while the rest seemed to have shunned him for going rogue on the Greek Society.

If he was as good as he thought he was with the ladies, then he’d have her back at his place by the end of the night, and on his own terms—not with the effects of Torporia to aid him.

“I’ll be right back,” Tara announced, pointing toward the powder room.

Nick smiled and halted his movement, taking a drink from the beer in his hand, “Don’t keep me waiting too long.”

She only rolled her eyes and grinned playfully.

He fell to the back of the dance floor and leaned against a wall, taking in the sight of what everyone else was doing, glancing between the dancers and the people at the bar. The joint was packed though and it was more than a bit toasty inside from all the body heat.

His concentration was disturbed when someone bumped into his elbow–a woman on her way out from the same powder room that Tara had just entered. He spilled a bit of beer from his bottle and looked at her with an inconvenienced frown but it lifted as soon as he saw who she was.

He was struck with disbelief at first, but it was momentary. He didn’t expect to see her at a place like this but there was no question it was Illyana Sanchez, the girl who had once been his very best friend. She tilted her head with a quick look of apology but he took a step closer to her and leaned forward with a familiar smirk playing on his lips.

“How many years has it been?”


It took her a moment to recognize him as her wide eyes roamed over his features like she was putting a puzzle together.

It had been four.

"Not enough, Nicholas,” she replied coolly, finally discerning his identity. Apparently, she hadn’t forgotten their last encounter when he yelled at her for no perceived reason.

“Do you go to SSU?” he asked, trying to determine why she would be at this place.

“I don't—just driving through and getting drinks with Alarie on the way back to Isla Del Kashmire.”

He looked around and failed to see Alarie Thackery in the vicinity, “So, where’s Alarie?”

“She left with Rafael a while ago,” Illyana admitted. Nick felt a bit bummed that he had missed seeing the one decent bro from the frat.

“So what are you doing these days? Why are you passing through?” He asked.

“Don’t stand there and pretend we’re old pals, Nick. You’ve made it clear that we aren’t,” she said as her brows plunged into a deep frown and she brushed past him.

He caught her arm to halt her, “Ill…”

“Stop,” she bit harshly and stared forward, “Why don’t you go back to pretending that I don’t exist? It’s worked well so far.”

She gave her arm a vicious tug that made him release his hold and she disappeared into the crowd without a backward glance. He looked down at his bottle of beer and felt a lump of regret form in his chest. He’d wondered about how she was doing these past years but never dared to reach out because he had been such a shitty friend to her—selfish, presumptuous, inattentive, arrogant, and a whole bunch of other undesirable adjectives that he’d tried to recognize and change in himself since then. She didn’t deserve any of that. The fact was, that after that summer night, he had thought himself unworthy of her friendship and that’s why he removed himself from her life. Of course, she couldn’t have known his reasons and would only interpret his avoidance as pretending she didn’t exist. She could be dramatic like that.

But seeing her sparked something in him. He wanted to try again—to prove he was worthy of her friendship and show her that he was a better person now.

Tara returned from the powder room then and gave him a sultry kiss, before pulling him back to the dance floor. It was a good enough distraction to keep his thoughts from wandering back to Illyana and stewing too long.

The DJ was on a roll with the house mix. One fast song after another and the beat thrummed through the bodies of the patrons The lights and noise were enough to get dizzy, but the drinks were not enough to get fuzzy. Nick had built up too much of an alcohol tolerance from so many house parties.

“Having fun yet?” Tara asked, twisting her body even closer to Nick to match his idle shuffling that was supposed to be a dance while he half-pondered what needed to be done to get another fight night rolling. There had been double the number of people at the second event—and if that trend kept going then he’d have his tuition ready in time to pay it all back and avoid getting kicked out of college.


In reply to Tara’s question, Nick downed his beer and wiggled it to gesture he was empty and going to get another. Tara made a tepid pout but continued to dance without him. He edged his way through the throng of people toward the bar, laying his empty bottle on the surface, and then looked around to catch the attention of the bartender.

He spied Illyana leaning against the bar down at the other side; some guy was suggestively flirting with her, his back turned on Nick’s vantage. Illyana seemed to like the attention; she was smiling, her eyes weren’t their usual brightness but a bit sleepy-looking, and her posture was somewhat slumped.

When she reached for her drink, her hand made a few grabs at the air before settling on her glass.


“What can I get you?” the bartender finally asked, and it interrupted Nick's attention.

“Another beer,” Nick momentarily stopped studying Illyana and requested. He snuck a few real simoleons into the tip jar and the bartender whisked the empty bottle away, uncapped the new one, and handed it to Nick. Nick lifted his chin in thanks and took a drink.

He nearly spit it out as he turned back to observe Illyana and saw none other than Marshall Cosgrove drape his arm around her waist and pull her a little closer, whispering something into her ear.


Knowing Marshall’s skeevy ways, he had probably slipped some Torporia into Illyana’s drink. Nick clenched the neck of his beer bottle in anger at the thought of Marshall doing that to her. Their proximity didn’t help diminish his suspicions either. If he still knew anything about Illyana, it was that she had a low tolerance for being grabbed by people she didn’t know, and Nick doubted she knew Marshall in any capacity because if she had, he would have been the recipient of one of her infamous grudges by now—on account of Cosgrove being such a raging asshole.

“Hey!” he felt a hand clasp around his arm and turned to see that Tara had gotten bored on the dance floor and had come over to find him.

“Hey,” he replied, putting his arm around her shoulders while giving another glance to Marshall and Illyana before focusing on Tara again.

“Are you tired of dancing already?”

He gave a shrug of one shoulder and looked at the pair again, it was obvious he was distracted and his earlier cheeriness had been taken down a notch.

“Have you had enough drinks to tell me what happened after you dropped the Greek Society?” Tara asked and curiosity was brimming in her voice.

Nick cracked a grin and held up his beer, “I’m only on my second. It takes more than that to get me to spill secrets.”

Marshall suddenly threw his head back in a loud, obnoxious, laugh and Illyana was popping giggle after giggle at one of his lame jokes. The sound directed Nick’s attention back to them and it was almost painful to watch how bad at flirting they were.

“Buy me a drink then?” Tara suggested and Nick flagged the bartender down again, leaving it to Tara to order what she wanted. He absently held out a wad of cash for the bartender to take, not bothering to count it. What was the point? It was mostly counterfeit anyway.

Nick’s glare drew Marshall’s attention. Marshall gave him a smug grin, silently taunting him. Why? Then it happened. In a move that to anyone observing, just looked as if Marshall was putting his arm around Illyana again, he stealthily dropped something small into her drink without her notice. She picked it up a moment later.

Without considering the consequences, Nick gave a shout of warning and shoved a few patrons out of the way before slapping the glass out of Illyana’s hand. It shattered when it hit the ground and a few drops of the drink began to soak into Illyana’s shoes. She made a cry of protest and vacated the spot quickly.

“What’s wrong with you, Calhoun?” Marshall feigned outrage but Nick knew he was just goading him at this point. There was no way he was going to be able to prove that Marshall had drugged the drink when the evidence was dissolved in the spill now spreading across the tiles with a hundred shards of glass in between.

“How many pills have you given her?” Nick demanded.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Marshall smirked and lied. He had no idea of Nick and Illyana’s past, much less that they knew each other. To Nick’s best guess, the asshole just wanted to prove to him he could keep on drugging women and Nick’s little tantrum of leaving the Greek Society was in vain. Nick was no longer one for violence but at that moment he wanted nothing more than to cause Marshall inexplicable pain.

Instead, Nick grabbed Marshall by the front of his shirt and jerked him forward, he was nearly a head shorter and Nick could easily pummel him if he didn’t mind getting slapped with an assault charge and prosecuted by the finest lawyers, “How many?”

Marshall still had on a self-assured grin as he replied quietly, “What does it matter? She’ll have her clothes off in less than an hour.”

Nick felt absolute and utter rage fill him, and he probably would have hit Marshall right in his smug little face if not for the feel of an attempt of a punch to his arm—a familiar coiled fist aimed right for his bicep which would have been downright painful if she had been sober.


“You. Always. Ruin. Everything.” Illyana said angrily, punctuating each word with a hit to his arm.

Plumbobs, she didn’t have the slightest clue about the situation she could have found herself in if Nick hadn’t intervened. How dare Alarie leave Illyana and Marshall alone together, where was that woman’s sense?

“Wanna visit the Nest of Vipers?” Nick ignored Illyana and asked in a low acidic tone that only Marshall could hear. Marshall seemed to immediately understand the implication and held his hands up in surrender and only then did Nick release the vile and cowardly fraternity president.

Obviously, word about the Nest of Vipers had traveled around significantly since the first night, just as Cain had predicted. Not only that but it's violent reputation. Not surprising, considering some of the Greek Society had been present at each fight night. They were all horrible gossips.

Illyana was still attempting to punch Nick’s arm; her fists had unraveled quite a bit and didn’t pack any kind of bruising potential he was used to. He caught her next punch in his hand, slipped his grip to her wrist, and led her away, at least to where it was quieter and cooler. They emerged outside and Nick tried distancing them from the bar and from Marshall especially, now that he knew Illyana was drugged.

She didn’t struggle much, but she dragged her feet in wordless protest. He just needed a moment to explain to her what was happening.

“Illyana…” he took a breath and faced her as soon as they were far enough away, but her opposite fist caught him in the side of the head. Startled, he let her go and watched as she attempted to run back toward the joint. She stumbled over her own feet, and tripped, then rolled across the sidewalk until she was lying on the flat of her back.

He rubbed his head in the spot where she had hit him—it wasn’t a painful blow by any means but he still didn’t expect it. He jogged to catch up until he was standing over her. To his dismay, he saw that she was crying! Her makeup was running down her face and leaving mascara trails. The last time he’d seen her cry was in the third grade when Trent Ziegler threw away her valentine. She probably still had a grudge about that too.

He assumed she had hurt herself on the concrete and that’s why she was blubbering but when he asked her if she was all right he was surprised to find she was crying for a different reason altogether.

“I was having fun for once and you..you…ruined it,” she choked with despair.

“He drugged you,” Nick snapped, “Would you find it fun if he took advantage of you? You wouldn’t even remember it!”

She closed her eyes and continued to sniffle out tears. He realized, in his anger, that he was scolding her and it wouldn’t help anything. This wasn’t the way to get through to her.

Nick rubbed his temple some more and looked away while mumbling, “You probably won’t even remember this conversation."


"Will too!” She responded in obstinate tears, having overheard.

He almost smirked at her familiar stubbornness but instead held out his hand, still doubtful of her claim, “How do you feel?”

“Like I hate you,” she sat up and wiped at her eyes, glowering, and refusing to take his hand again.


“Come on, don’t be like that,” he gently chided and wrapped his arm around her midsection to lift her into a stand. She put her weight on him in objection but lost the battle when both her feet were planted firmly on the ground.

“I’ll call you a cab,” he pulled out his phone and started swiping through it to look for the number. He felt a melancholy tightness in his chest at hearing her say that she hated him. However, he knew he deserved it—how could he hope for anything better from the way he had acted in the past?

“Nick,” he heard her say his name. Her tone had lost all ferocity and it caused him to look at her in surprise. She leaned into his arm and looked up at him, “Why aren’t we friends anymore?”

He gazed into her half-lidded eyes and felt déjà vu because she was echoing a question he once posed to her. Her answer made him realize just how conceited and immature he could be—just how much like his father he could be.

“Because I ruin everything,” he answered in a despondent tone after a moment of consideration.

The memories weren’t a good enough excuse anymore. She had been his best friend when they were children but they both had changed too much; those times had passed and all the nostalgia in the world couldn’t be the foundation that held a friendship together. He just needed to be a better person.

The phone was ringing.

“Hello, Kashmire Taxi Service, where are you headed?” the customer service rep asked on the other end of the line.

“Hi there, I need a lift from the Endless Blue Lounge…” Nick began but a weight slumped into his side and he nearly dropped his phone to catch Illyana, “Sorry one moment!”

She was suddenly dead weight in his arms, “Illyana!”

In his attempt to try and regain balance, he accidentally hung up on the Taxi Service and cursed.

“Illyana!” He called her name again, giving her a hard shake and worried stare, “Are you all right?”

Her eyes flew open after a moment, panicked and wide, darting around as if she had forgotten where she was until she looked right in front of her and saw his face.

“I can’t rem…remember,” she said, her eyelids gradually falling to that same languished state while her speech became sluggish.

He couldn’t put her in a taxi like this.

“Give me Alarie’s number. I’ll have her come get you,” Nick said.

“I cabnt rebember,” Illyana repeated, though it was less enunciated. She swayed and started to pat herself down, seemingly unable to find her cell phone.

“Did you leave it at the bar?” He asked with slight exasperation and also a growing sense of anxiety at seeing how horribly discombobulated Torporia could render someone. Technically he’d been under its influence before, most of the frat and it’s guests had to have been when Marshall started adding it to the party drinks but Nick didn’t remember being so out of it that he lost motor functions. Rafael was right, it just affected people differently and Illyana, unfortunately, had the worst of it and he still didn’t know how much Marshall had given to her.

“I-cbt rrrmber,” she said thrice and seemed to give up and turn in a lost wobbly, disoriented circle, her voice ever softer and downright incoherent.

He wasn’t about to go put her in a car and drive her himself. For one, he didn’t have a car, and secondly, he’d had more than a few—not enough to be wasted but over the limit for legal driving. He shouldered her weight and said, “Okay. Fine. Crash at my place until this junk wears off.”

The house was only six blocks away but it was with immense difficulty that he was able to help Illyana walk and stumble her way down the street while she clung onto his arm and mumbled words he couldn’t understand because they were so slurred. After two and a half blocks of that noise, he gave up and just hauled her onto his back to carry her the rest of the way.


When they entered, the lights were on, signaling Orion and Cypress were either home or had left and assumed the other would shut off the lights. Nick erred on the side of caution and tried to be as quiet as possible. That goal was shattered once he tried to let Illyana down and she fell to the floor onto her rear with a grunt of protest. No movement was heard from upstairs. Orion and Cypress were gone for the night after all.

Nick went straight to the kitchen to get her some water, to at least try to help flush the drugs out of her system. When he returned to the living room with a glass of it in hand he was shocked to find Illyana stripping out of her clothes.

“What are you…?” he asked in alarm but trailed off, blinking several times as his brain processed the sight of her colorful, rainbow heart-shaped patterned panties.


“Toooooohaww,” she whined with limited coherence and pulled her shirt over her head to reveal a supportive white midriff tank top and some kind of hybrid dragonfly tattoo inked onto her waist. The movement also loosened her braid and her hair started to uncurl into dark wavy locks. Nick didn’t know what to do in this situation but when she started trying to tug her tank top off, he bolted forward and pushed her into a sitting position on the couch which interrupted her process.

“Here, drink this—it will cool you off,” he instructed and swallowed to rid the sudden tightness in his throat among other places, trying to avoid staring at her half-unclothed figure as she took the glass of water and started guzzling it. He decided that studying the bookshelves across the room would be less troublesome.

When he started the night he knew he’d have a girl back at his place, but he didn’t expect it to be in this particular circumstance and Illyana to be the one. He didn’t expect to be involved with Torporia anymore.

He’d have to apologize ten-fold to Tara for leaving her at the bar, that is if she’d ever speak to him again. He had abandoned her and left with another woman. He realized that it must have looked really bad.

He decided to text her real quick because he had scored her number when they had met up earlier that night.

Nick: Sorry to bail! Had an emergency!

A second later, he got his response.

Tiara: Drop dead u jerk!

He sighed. Hoping for any more chances with her was pushing his luck.

Illyana took his hand and jiggled it before placing the glass back into it. A signal that she wanted more. He wasted no time walking back to the kitchen to fill it up. He frowned while thinking, hypothesizing that her increased body temperature could have been a sort of secondary side-effect of the drug. A person would certainly start trying to take their clothing off faster if they weren’t comfortable in them and didn’t have the mind to keep them on.

Then it struck him just how those dots connected.

That was the answer to why Marshall knew she’d be out of her clothes within the hour.

What utter scum. He really should have hit that little shit when he had the chance. The least he could do was report the guy to the authorities and have an investigation opened. He never did in the first place because he thought it was futile—Marshall being from one of the most affluent and influential families in the region. But for Illyana’s sake, and any other past or future victim of the drug at Marshall’s hands, Nick would call first thing in the morning and get it done.

When Nick returned to the living room he found that Illyana was passed out in an awkward angle on the couch. He sighed and set the water on the coffee table. He couldn’t leave her here like this.

After a few unsuccessful tries to shake her awake, Nick carefully shoveled his arms beneath Illyana and lifted her. She was more manageable when she wasn’t obstinately working against him. He carried her up the stairs and delivered her to his bed, trying to shift her into a position that looked somewhat comfortable, before stuffing a few of the pillows underneath her head. That movement resulted in some of her long mess of hair falling into her face.


He sat on the edge of the mattress and brushed the loose strands back; his hands lingered there for a moment and ended up cupping her face to study it in its rare state of stillness.

Damn.

Illyana was really…beautiful.

She looked like some kind of sleeping princess with her sooty lashes and sun-kissed complexion, not to mention those pouty lips of hers that had him wondering just how kissable they really were. A princess could always use a Prince Charming and he did, after all, have a lot of charm.

He began to lean forward, drawing his face closer to hers but then stopped himself, his smirk melting into a dark frown. He’d absolutely be no better than Cosgrove, not to mention his own father if he went through with it—just another skeevy asshole who only cared about himself.

He felt profoundly ashamed for even considering such a move while she wasn’t conscious nor consenting and pulled back with a sigh—it proved that even after all these years, he wasn’t a better person after all.

He noticed that there was still a flush in her cheeks, felt the side of her face with the back of his hand, and confirmed her skin was warmer than normal. So, he left her uncovered and cracked the window open, hoping that the night air would continue to cool her. The Torporia would wear off and she would be fine come morning. For now, she just needed rest so the drug could get through her system.

He gave one last look to the sleeping beauty before grabbing his pajama bottoms, shutting the door behind him, and leaving her in peace.