Chapter 33
Quinn
I’d been at the Mixer for over an hour and still hadn’t made it halfway into the room. The food table had long vanished beneath a tide of bodies.
“Quinn,” a somewhat familiar tenor said, pulling my attention back to my front.
Seth emerged from the crowd, polished in tweed and gold, but all I saw was our last encounter. My stomach clenched. I kept glancing at his cyan-blue hair. Why were there so many damn shades of blue? I couldn’t tell how close it was to Xan’s. Did Seth even know he was related to the Architect?
I suddenly didn’t know what I was supposed to do.
Brit put her hand on my shoulder, and my nerves calmed. Neither Seth nor Xan said anything about the other. I needed to relax and pretend I didn’t know.
I patted Brit’s hand. “Rock status confirmed. Thank you.”Brit gave me a toothy grin and gestured toward Seth.
“Um, right.” Seth’s hands fluttered as if he didn’t know what to do with them. “Ah, first off, I’m sorry. I didn’t know Brody was, well, like that. I’ve cut all ties with him. I would never—”
“Except you did,” Brit said, cutting him off.
I put my hands up. “It’s fine. You still owe Cayden an apology for trashing his name, but I’m sure you’ll work that out.”
Seth narrowed his eyes. Before he could respond, a woman came to his side.
Not quite as tall as Brit, her white hair still had hints of its original powder blue.
Unlike Seth, I could see a bit of Xan in her lined face.
I tried to remember Erick’s book and felt pretty strongly that this was Xan’s grandmother’s sister or something like that.
“Quinn Question,” she said. “It is so wonderful to meet you. Seth has said so many good things. I’m sure he’s passed on how lucky the Silvers are to have our stronghold at the core of what was a joint base in BT.”
I plastered a smile on my face and tried not to groan.
“Our brains and inventions have blessed the world...” she continued.
Every single person had a sales pitch for me tonight, and I fought to keep my eyes from rolling.
“And Yorkshire is prized for its grazing. Our wool…”
I bit my lips shut, as Everly’s fear of wool threatened to make me laugh.
“Seth here...”
The poor guy had turned beet red and looked like he’d rather be anywhere else.
“Scarlett Silver,” said a voice I’d know anywhere.
The air shifted, and heads turned as if the room itself recognized Xan before I did. My breath caught. Want and fear tangled under my skin, neither strong enough to drown me, but both impossible to ignore.
I clasped my hands together in front of me to keep them from shaking and turned.
Alexander, the Architect, stood before me.
Gone were the trainee uniform and rumpled hair.
He stood with easy poise. He’d tightened up the short sides of his hair and wore the top longer and slicked back.
A simple, but rich, burgundy tunic with silver detail tucked into his gray practical cargo pants.
Burgundy loafers matching his tunic completed the look.
Understated, powerful, and incredibly dashing. My body remembered wanting him before my brain could argue.
His eyes sparkled under those thick brows. He looked at me before turning his attention to Scarlett. Pleasantries fell out of his mouth like diamonds. If there was tension between these two, it wouldn’t come out here.
Unfortunately, I was not as good at this, and my list of unresolved issues with the man scrolled through my mind. I needed a drink.
As if summoned, Ezra slid in beside me, subtly placing me between him and his lover. The tension between them pressed against my skin like static. Not close, nothing intimate, but deliberate. My heart raced.
He handed me a glass of something as purple as his eyes. “One swallow.”
I tipped the shot back. Harsh but sweet, plum and cream with a nutty aftertaste slid down my throat. It burned like courage, sweet and sharp.
“You’ll need confidence,” he said before linking my arm and dragging me between two stages. “I’ll get you started before Lady Mile demands steps.”
The moment my feet crossed onto the makeshift dance floor, music I’d barely noticed in the background became a wall of sound.
The floor thumped through my heels, every beat a command I couldn’t disobey.
Bagpipers on either stage, perfectly synchronized with a fiddle and a trio of flutes raised up in the center.
Everyone danced, most of them following relaxed steps, swinging each other around and laughing. Ezra kept me at the edge, using his body to teach mine the steps before spinning me onto the dance floor.
As a Midwest girl, I’d never imagined crashing a Scottish ceilidh, but here I was. Ezra swung me around, and I spun only to find myself facing someone new. I danced the steps, only to find myself back with Ezra.
The jig turned into a reel, men on one side, women on the other.
The two on either side of me helped me through a do-si-do.
I swung arms with Brit, who twirled before turning to her next partner.
The poor man blinked as if unsure what to do, and she grabbed him, prodding him into a circle in the opposite direction, as my partner did the same with me.
I laughed. Stepping on as many feet as the floor.
Every mistake drew humor instead of scorn.
Two more songs left me breathing hard. Before I could exit the dance floor, I found myself in Xan’s arms. My world tipped; his hand found my back before my breath did. His baby-blue gaze swallowed the room.
Despite everything. I wanted him to kiss me again. And this time, I wouldn’t teleport him away. As if hearing me, his gaze heated. Just like in the Alun, his hand slowly edged down my back and toward my butt. He started to lean down before pulling back.
“Whatever you want, I will support you, Quinn.” Xan released me and tilted his head to the side. “But, in case I’ve not made it clear enough, happy with me and Ezra is my desired outcome. You will not come between us.” His promise landed between threat and invitation, and my pulse answered both.
“Emotionally,” he added. “Physically coming between us is the goal.”
I bit my lips, and my sex flared to life.
“Architect!” a man called before the next song could begin. “Is this the Quinn you wrote to me about?”
I forced a breath and recited turtle facts in my head, anything to avoid replaying the fantasy I almost lived. Because if I didn’t, I’d drown in the space he’d just left.
Xan winked before turning me around. Dance music started up again, but we left the floor behind.
I caught a glimpse of Ezra, stone-faced, leading a wall of Enforcers through a side door.
My stomach dropped. Duty always came for us, but it shouldn’t have felt like doom.
Something was happening while I spun in circles and smiled for strangers.
“Lady Miles steps?” I whispered to Xan, remembering Ezra’s cryptic remark earlier.
Xan put his finger over his lips. “I’ll fill you in later; no more secrets, I promise.”
Promises were how men like him began wars.
The closest I’d ever been to euphoria was when I let my crazy brain exist in the forest. Just like then, I found myself once again spinning as joy filled my soul.
The music came to a stop, and I struggled to catch my breath. My partner bowed and handed me a scrawl. At least it didn’t come with a pitch. I smiled and tucked it into the stack growing in my pocket-void, probably taller than me by now. Exactly as we intended, I cackled with joy.
I stepped off the floor and froze. Professor Holiday’s skeletal form waited for me. His grin scanned me like an X-ray. Goosebumps prickled across my skin. This was one of the Architect’s monsters, one with a lab that I’d broken into, filled with dead animals and sewn-together body parts.
“I don’t believe we’ve spoken since your placements,” Professor Holiday said.
“Ah.” I managed before Brit emerged from the dance floor.
Cayden appeared at my elbow and stuck to me like Velcro.
“Professor,” Brit said, patting his shoulder.
I flinched, half expecting it to fall off. It didn’t.Professor Holiday’s grin didn’t change, and he didn’t look away from me. “How’s my menagerie treating you?”
“I, ah.” I took a drink of water and controlled my fear. “Why do you keep sending me stuffed animals?”
Holiday laughed, brittle as bone dust. “Oh, Quinn. You will. I know you were in my lab. I fixed you, and we will fix the world, starting with me.” He finished his glass of wine and leaned on his staff, though he wobbled precariously instead of staying upright.
I didn’t know where to start with any of that. Was he drunk?
Chancellor Morgen stepped around a group on our left and let out a huff. “You’ve barely got blood in your veins, Holiday. Ezra’s demanding our presence.”
She scowled at me like I’d been the one feeding him wine, before addressing Cayden. “Sober him, now.”
Cayden raised an eyebrow but drew his rune and sent it toward the professor’s stomach. For a moment, nothing happened, then the professor pressed his hand against his bladder. “I’m not drunk, Morgen. Why are you always where I don’t want you?”
“Let’s go.” The pink-haired chancellor grinned. “Before your dick falls off from holding in your piss.”
Professor Holiday didn’t need much encouragement, and the two vanished back toward The Great Hall. The fear prickling my skin suddenly felt like overkill. Brit laughed first. The sound eased my anxiety enough to join her.
Cayden pulled me close and whispered, “Go, have fun. You’ve got this,” before melting back into the crowd. I watched him with a smile tugging at my lips.
“All right, lover girl, it’s back to the dance floor for us.” Brit tugged my hand, and after a brief hesitation, the music took over my world once more.
I spun through a whirlwind of partners, Rowan’s brother, Erick, Everly, and back again, each with a laugh or a wink that made the world blur. Brit twirled past, dragging some poor boy behind her like storm-tossed debris.