The music was loud. The kind of loud that made your chest vibrate and your voice useless unless you were practically shouting into someone’s ear. The Lynch boys were already half-cut, Johnny was three beers past cocky, and Hughie—birthday crown half-on, half-off—was bobbing his head to the bassline with a goofy grin.

Patrick Feely stood with his back to the kitchen counter, quietly sipping from a red cup, pretending not to listen as his mates talked about her.

“Jiji looks like a goddess tonight,” Johnny Kavanagh declared, nudging Hughie.

Hughie smirked. “Mate, that Padmé costume is dangerous.”

Joey Lynch let out a low whistle. “I’d fall to the Dark Side for her. No shame.”

That twisted something in Patrick’s stomach.

He didn’t say anything. Just kept his eyes fixed on the crowd, where Jiji moved through the haze of strobe lights and bodies like a flame no one could touch. Her hair was twisted into those signature Padmé buns, her dress white and fitted and lethal. Every time she laughed, it reached his chest like a punch.

And she wasn’t even looking at him.

Because she couldn’t.

Because this was a secret.

Patrick gritted his teeth and downed the rest of his drink.

He didn’t remember moving, only that suddenly he was pushing through the crowd, shouldering between two lads who were eyeing her a little too closely. She didn’t see him coming—too lost in the music, in her sway, in being untouchable.

But she wasn’t.

She was his.

“Patrick—” she gasped when she saw him.

He didn’t give her a chance to say anything else. His hand slipped to the small of her back, the other coming up to her cheek, and then he kissed her—right there, in the middle of the dance floor, where everyone could see. Her body stilled beneath his for a second, then melted into him with something between shock and want.

The song thundered on. But the crowd didn’t.

All around them, heads turned.

Johnny nearly choked on his drink. “No feckin’ way—”

Hughie’s mouth dropped open. “That’s not just a party trick, is it?”

Joey just laughed, shaking his head. “Patrick Feely, you sly bastard.”

Patrick pulled back, breathing hard. Jiji blinked up at him, dazed, flushed, lips parted.

“Trick or treat,” he said gruffly, voice low and only for her.

She gave a stunned laugh, half annoyed and half in love. “You just outed us to the entire school.”

“Couldn’t stand them talking about you like that,” he muttered, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. “Not when you’re mine.”