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But there were a shitton of cars in the lot.
I pulled into an empty spot, then watched as Cali unfolded from the car, gave them a wave, then reached to something at her neck I’d missed before.
In a second, it flashed to light. A pulsing neon purple and yellow necklace.
Then, one after another, each wrist and ankle lit up before, finally, she marched her way up toward the side of the warehouse, moving inside without so much as dealing with any sort of bouncer.
Great.
Just great.
Some unknown, underground kind of party without any proper security.
“Wish you’d have told me she’d grown into such a handful,” I said, talking to Clay as if he was sitting there in the car beside me.
Then I tucked my keys into my pocket, grabbed some cash, and climbed out of the car, following a crowd toward the door.
“Heeeeyyy!” a bubbly green-haired girl said, turning to walk backward with her crowd as she beamed at me.
“Hey,” I said, nodding at her. “What’s the fee here?” I asked, glancing down at the bracelets that went nearly up to her elbows and the dozen or so necklaces sitting on her chest, made of those little bead things we played with as kids that our parents would use the iron to melt into the molds we’d put them into.
That much jewelry wasn’t a fashion statement.
Kandi.
That was kandi.
This was a fucking rave.
“Thirty-five if you bought tickets. Fifty at the door,” she told me, reaching to slide one of the bracelets off her wrist, holding it out to me.
“I don’t have anything to give you,” I said, shaking my head.
“That’s not the point,” she insisted, thrusting it at me, then turning to follow her crew into the warehouse.
I glanced at the letter beads.
Delulu is the Solulu.
With little smiley face beads between the words.
I slid it on my wrist, figuring it was the only thing that would make me look like I even remotely belonged, then followed the girl and her friends inside.
“Ticket?” a tall, skinny guy with white spiked hair and blown out pupils asked as I moved toward him.
“Cash,” I said, grabbing the money and passing it to him.
He pocketed the cash, then waved over toward a long table where a shitton of headphones were sitting, each with different neon lights lit up on them.
I grabbed the blue, the least offensive shade, and slipped them around my neck, but didn’t put them on my ears.
There was an almost eerie silence as I followed the crowd from the stage area and into the main room of the warehouse.
I didn’t know much about raves.
But I knew they were usually loud and flashy.
In front of me, everyone slipped their headphones on, their bodies immediately starting to writhe.
It was a silent rave.
I guess that made sense.
Since I was pretty sure none of us were in this warehouse legally.
Inside the main area, yellow, pink, and green strobe lights flashed across the room.
Like Cali, almost everyone in attendance had something on them that lit up. Flashing necklaces, bracelets, and rings. Others had those glow stick necklaces we used as kids that you cracked to make them light up.
Everyone had on their headphones, and now the bright lights on them weren’t steady, but flashing.
Against the far wall, neon images were projected on the wall. The largest of them being a big old school boombox.
Toward the back of the building, a woman was set up as a DJ station, her one arm thrown up as her other spun a record.
Beside her, several other women had giant glow in the dark balls that they were tossing out into the crowd.
It was… a lot.
Apparently, though, I was the only one who thought so.
Everyone else was into it, arms up, bodies swaying. A woman had a large circle around her as she did some impressive moves with a lit-up hula hoop.
From around my neck, I could hear the almost frantic pulsing music blasting as my gaze scanned the crowd.
There were hundreds and hundreds of people.
Finding Cali in this crush wasn’t going to be an easy feat.
“Christ,” I hissed, watching a girl walk up to another random girl, her tongue sticking out, a pill nestled at the tip of it. The other girl leaned in, her tongue teasing the pill off and into her own mouth.
This was a rave.
So that was likely MDMA, GHB, ketamine, or LSD.
A growl moved through me at the idea of Caliana being reckless enough to possibly take some unknown pill from a random stranger.
I mean, contrary to what the prospects might think of me at the club, I wasn’t a fucking prude. I didn’t care if someone wanted to smoke weed, try shrooms, or even pop party drugs.
But you had to be safe with that shit.
Know your dealer.
Be with friends.
Know you weren’t going to end up drugged, assaulted, and left for dead somewhere.
