Chapter 10 #2
That was the moment Quinn strode up to Shannon. He said something, and then scoured the crowds. When he caught sight of me, he mouthed something and held up a finger, which I assumed meant he’d be back in a minute.
Jill bumped rudely past me and bled into the crowd, calling out to Jack to wait up.
Left standing in the middle of the room in a sea of swarming monsters, I decided a drink might be a good start to proving just how much I could party.
Without anyone to talk to, I easily downed three cups of punch. I was starting on my fourth when Quinn returned.
The zombie he’d been dancing with clung onto his arm, but Quinn searched the crowds until he spotted me. Then, towing his zombie along, he wove through a crowd of dancing elves and closed the distance between us.
His eyes were on me, but mine wavered quickly to the zombie. He wore rags and painted-on blood, but his form was solid and he obviously looked after himself.
I took another large gulp of punch.
“Shannon’s coming back after she drops Hunter off,” Quinn said, stopping in front of me. His gaze dipped to my cup. “Punch, Liam? You know it’s spiked, right?” He took a sniff of the bowl. “Really spiked.”
“I can drink, you know,” I said more sharply than I’d intended. I drained the remainder of the cup and wiped my sticky hands on my leggings. “I can dance as well.”
Framed by thick, dark lashes, his eyes gleamed like I’d just told him I’d been to the moon. He tipped his helmet back and folded his arms. He nibbled on his bottom lip before he smirked and said, “I’d love to see that.”
Mr. Zombie brooded next to him and tugged on Quinn’s arm. “Maybe we should dance some more too?”
My cup crackled as my grip tightened on it. If I didn’t know better, I’d say this was a classic symptom of jealousy.
I chuckled at the thought, dismissing it as a case of the jitters from having Jill in the room watching me party. “You guys go do your thing. I’ll dance after one more cup of this scrumptious spiked punch.” Somehow, a hiccup escaped me.
Quinn drew closer. He plucked the cup from my hand and threw it in one of the bins under the table. “I promised I’d keep close to you at these parties. Keep you safe.”
I shrugged, and a small wave of dizziness passed over me. “I’ve managed to stay safe on my own while you were off grinding away.”
Quinn’s brow furrowed. “Oh, stop it. I’ve been watching you and you know it.”
Mr. Zombie rolled his eyes, let go of Quinn’s arm, and stalked off into the dancing crowd. Quinn didn’t even acknowledge him, just kept staring at me.
I hunched my shoulders and wrapped my arms around my chest at the jolts of electricity that seemed to be thrumming though me.
I’d never had more than two cocktails; tonight was a foreign experience for me.
The alcohol combined with Quinn’s unrelenting stare .
. . well, I got how it could be addictive.
“Your Zombie ran off,” I said, trying to push my glasses up but only prodding the lens. “You should chase after him. Don’t worry about me, I’m actually feeling really confident.” I gestured to the punch bowl. “It’s like magic. No Krueger can scare me now.”
Even as I said it a wave of dizziness clouded my mind. It didn’t help my glasses were smudged. I took them off, but I had no good material on me for wiping them. The shirt I wore was not cotton like Quinn’s looked to be . . .
“Tell me, Liam,” Quinn said, his voice coaxing and soft as it brushed against the side of my face.
“Why do you care so much about me and the zombie?” He lifted his hand and his fingers drew across my jaw and under my chin.
“I know you’ve been watching me as much as I’ve been watching you most of the evening. ”
“I spent just as much time focusing on Hunter and my column, thank you.”
“You don’t deny it, then?”
Why would I? “Of course I was watching you with the zombie. I was trying to figure out what the protocol was. Whether I should let you go home first to give you guys some time in the apartment alone. Whether in the morning if the zombie comes out of your room hungry, I should offer him breakfast or shoo him out for you. I’ve never really been in this situation before, and quite frankly, I’m lost.”
Quinn dropped his fingers, and cool air kissed my skin in their place. I focused on my smudgy glasses between us as the room started a slow spin. Get your glasses back on!
I reached out and tugged on Quinn’s shirt, scraping my knuckles over his stomach as I used his T-shirt material to wipe my lenses. He startled and his tiny gasp tugged on a few strands of my hair. “Christ, how much have you had to drink?”
I pulled back a bit too fast and stumbled. Quinn’s large warm hands gripped my shoulders and kept me from toppling over. “A bit too much, it seems,” I answered him.
“Come on,” Quinn said, looping an arm around mine and leading me toward the balcony. “Let’s get you some fresh air.”
The air helped a little, but it didn’t stop the feeling of being suffocated by thick haziness. The warm night air made me want to spill all my words into it, liberate all the trapped words that weighed me down and pleaded for escape.
A part of me wanted to cry, but for no reason whatsoever.
Quinn stood next to me, bent over the railing with his arms folded against it. I tried doing the same but the jasmine tangled me. Quinn laughed and straightened, tugging me closer to him and away from the trellis.
Hot in my helmet, I yanked it off and tossed it to Quinn. He caught it and set it down next to his in the balcony corner.
“How are you feeling?” he asked as he leaned back.
My mouth felt heavier than usual, like it couldn’t be bothered to form words longer than a syllable. But I forced the words out. “Unusually good.”
He gave me his signature raise of the brow.
“And,” I continued, “I’m relieved that zombie guy is not an issue anymore.”
Quinn bit his lip and faced the cathedral in the distance. “See, it’s when you say things like that, I just . . .” He sighed. “Never mind, it’s pointless talking about this now.”
I touched Quinn’s arm. Firmly as I could, I turned him toward me. “I’m not oblivious, you know.”
“To what?”
“You, hinting at my undiscovered sexual orientation. You’re not that subtle.”
“So it’s already discovered then?”
I hiccupped and half-shrugged. “Kiss me and we’ll find out.”
Quinn darted his tongue across his bottom lip. “Kiss you?” he repeated.
“Yes. It’s quite simple. We touch lips, our tongues lock for a bit . . . I see if I feel anything and we settle this.”
He laughed and shook his head, quickly moving toward our helmets and picking them up. “You’re drunk. The only thing that’s going to be settled tonight is you. In your bed.”
I stepped away from him, raising a hand to stop him from dragging me home. “I can’t go back yet. Jack and Jill are here, and I’m going to party.”
“Jack and Jill. Yeah,” Quinn drawled, rubbing on his ear. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”
“They work with me. They . . . they think I’m a loser who never should have scored the party page. They are probably right, but they are annoying enough I want to prove otherwise.”
Quinn narrowed his eyes toward the double doors leading back inside. “Jack and Jill, you say?”
“That’s why I need to stay. So how about a compromise?”
He gave a small, snorted chuckle. “Guess if you can still use big words, you can’t be too far gone.”
“Oh, I think I’m pretty far gone,” I said, stepping up to him and planting a hand on his upper arm. “But before you take me home, I want to dance. . . .”
Turned out there was a snag in my plan.
I couldn’t dance.
I tried again to mimic Quinn’s moves as he danced beside me with a wizard. I jerked my hips side-to-side and knocked the witch I was dancing with. She cursed me. Well, cursed at me and pushed me backward until I landed on my ass. Certainly it felt like a curse.
Jack and Jill laughed at the edges of the crowd, pointing and sniggering through their tears. Quinn stopped dancing and crouched next to me.
“Who the fuck do you think you are?” he asked Jack and Jill as he slipped an arm around my waist and helped me up. My uneven footing had me pulling on Quinn’s sleeve for balance.
Jill muttered, and suddenly Quinn left my side. In what felt like slow motion, I watched Quinn shove him.
Jill teetered on his heels for a moment before losing the fight with gravity and slamming onto the floor.
Colorful cussing followed Quinn as he charged back to me, hooked his arm around mine and lead me out of the mansion. Stormy shadows clung to him the entire drive home.
When he parked the car, he thumped the steering wheel and continued to stare out onto the road.
“Jill’s a jackass,” I said. I concentrated on Quinn’s mouth as a focal point to minimize my dizziness and churning queasiness.
Quinn’s shoulders dropped as if releasing the tension from the party. He leaned back against the headrest for a moment and sighed. “Let’s get you inside. I have to go back so Shannon can get home.”
“Shannon. Yes, I forgot.” I sounded as disappointed as I felt. But I couldn’t be sure why exactly. Tomorrow I’d have to look into it.
Quinn was already standing at my side of the car as I unbuckled my seatbelt. He opened the door and offered me his hand. Once I was firmly on ground, I pulled on his hand until he looked at me.
“There’s going to be an investigation,” I said, threading my cold fingers through his warm ones and stepping closer until we were against each other.
“Investigation?”
I nodded. “Involving kisses. It’s imperative I settle this question of yours.”
“You are so drunk,” he whispered, coming close to my lips. “Adorable as hell, but still so far gone. I don’t even think you’ll remember this in the morning.”
He gently untangled our hands and slid my glasses up my nose for me. “And, Liam, I think it’s as much your question as it is mine.”
I rummaged into my pouch for my pen and notebook. “Maybe. I’ll take that into consideration as well.”
I turned to the car and used the roof to rest my notebook so I wouldn’t forget all these thoughts and questions—
Quinn plucked away my notebook and lifted me over his shoulder. His laughter vibrated through me as he carried me inside.
I hit his ass all the way up to the second floor and into our apartment, demanding he put me down at once. I even fished my cold hands under his shirt to convince him, but he merely slapped my ass with a stinging clap and took larger steps toward the bathroom, where he—finally—dropped me.
Standing vertically once more, I glared at him. “I’ll kindly ask you to give me back my notebook.”
He looked at my open hand and grinned. “Nope. You can have it once you’ve gotten yourself ready for bed.” He shut the door and left me to relieve myself—much needed—and brush my teeth.
Once I was done, I struggled out of my knight costume and climbed into bed.
Quinn popped his head around the door into my room.
He seemed to dance his way in, but it had to be an alcohol-induced illusion.
He set down my notebook and a large bottle of water onto my side table.
“You’ll be fine if I go out again?” he asked, shoving my legs over to sit on the side of the bed.
I shifted and shimmied down until my head was on the firm pillow. The room was spinning. “I’ve never been this intoxicated before.”
“Right. I’ll call her and tell her to catch a cab—”
“Don’t,” I said with a yawn. “You looked after me enough when I was really sick. This is nothing, I’ll be fine.”
It was only then I noticed he’d changed out of his costume too, except while I wore only boxer shorts, Quinn had on pants and a turquoise T-shirt.
He also donned an amused expression and looked at me almost fondly.
“Your phone is next to your bed,” he said, the mattress springing up as he stood. “Call if you need anything.”
“Mmm hmm.” My eyelids fluttered shut.
Quinn chuckled and turned off the light before walking out. “Sweet dreams.”
Before sleep clutched me in a suffocating hold, I mumbled, “I thought I wanted a cat. But you’re so much better.”