Chapter 41
Harrisford
We walk out of the restaurant slowly. My pulse is racing and my palms are clammy because tonight has been perfect and I really do not want it to be over.
I hadn’t realized how far Gwendolynne and her friends had got in the investigation.
While I was moping around, worrying about Nathaniel’s threats, she was busy sneaking into clandestine meetings, breaking into high-security mansions, and uncovering unethical, underhanded agreements between Magecorp and the medical establishment.
In all honesty, Gwendolynne deserves to come first—she puts me to shame, quite frankly.
I turn to face her. “That was…” I start, but then stop. The degustation was delightful, but in truth it was an appalling lack of food. Every course was artfully arranged, the flavors delicate and nuanced, the ingredients fresh and seasonal. But put all together, it just wasn’t very…well, filling.
She stares at me, and then her lips curve into a smile. “Puny? Minuscule?”
I break into an embarrassed laugh. “Infinitesimal.”
She laughs too, and relief washes through me. And then she’s grabbing my arm and tugging me along the street, saying, “Come on, Briggs. Let me show you my version of going out to dinner.”
Twenty minutes later, we’re standing on a street corner, devouring greasy burgers. Honestly, I’m impressed at how quickly she can cram that thing into her delectable mouth.
“This is amazing,” she says, her voice muffled by the food.
“Agreed,” I say, though I’m not talking about the burgers.
When we’ve finished, we scrunch up our wrappers and toss them into the rubbish bin that’s right outside the burger joint. She’s still in the baggy shirt and jeans she wore to the exam, her lips all slick with burger grease, and I think that she is perfect.
“I’m sorry you had to do all that on your own,” I say. “Investigate the surges, I mean. Truly, I am.”
She sighs. “It’s okay. You were right.” She scrunches up her nose. “Magecorp is evil. Whether or not they’re causing the explosions, they’re still exploiting people.”
“Yeah.” My tone is morose. “You can see why I don’t want to work for them.”
Gwendolynne is still silent, regarding me. She reaches up and touches a finger to one corner of my mouth.
At first, I flinch—my instinct is to duck away. But I hold my ground. The pad of her finger is scalding hot against my skin. My lips part, and I actually hear the breath hitching in her throat.
“You have something,” she whispers. “On your lip.”
I stand still as a statue as she swipes it away. I too am holding my breath. “Is it all gone?”
“No.” She keeps dabbing at my lip, and eventually her movements slow, as though she’s contemplating something.
“Is something the matter?” I say, alarmed, because her expression has suddenly shuttered.
“Is it strange for you? Standing out here, on the street, eating a burger from a greasy spoon? It’s hardly what you’re used to.”
“I can honestly say that it was the best burger I’ve ever tasted. Why do you ask?”
“Because…” She takes a step back, folding her arms tightly, then flashes me a look. “I sometimes feel like you judge me. You know, for being poor and all.”
I frown. Her words sting, deep within my chest. And it’s because I know that she’s not entirely wrong.
I was a snotty little snob for most of my time at Seamere—but over the past two years, ever since I’d started noticing Gwendolynne in a way that was not strictly as an academic rival, I’ve been trying to slowly dismantle those prejudices.
And while I might not always get it right… I am trying.
“Listen.” I run my hand through my hair, trying to figure out how best to articulate my thoughts. “I might have done…Once. But I don’t think that anymore. The truth is, Gwendolynne, I find everything about you utterly perfect. I wouldn’t have you any other way.”
Her gaze slides off to the side, and then she shrugs. “I guess it’s mainly Percy, then, who judges me.”
I reach out, gently tugging her arms away from her body, until we’re standing face-to-face, her hands clasped in mine. “Percy,” I say, drawing her closer to me, “doesn’t know how lucky he is to have found such an exceptional human.”
The deep mahogany of her eyes fixes on me.
I can almost see myself reflected; I can see the mirror images of the mage-powered streetlights dancing across her irises.
For a moment, I’m transfixed, almost as though I’m outside my body.
An observer, watching us from the outside in, as we teeter on the cusp of our pasts and our future.
It feels like a moment that could go in a number of different directions, lead to an almost infinite number of possibilities. So heavy and so significant…that I freeze.
It’s Gwendolynne, not me, who breaks through. She rises up on tiptoe, her hand lifting to my face. Her voice drops, until it is but a whisper. “I think, Briggs, that you might still have something…right here.”
And then she’s drawing my face down to hers, and I’m not fighting it, because my god this is what I want, it’s what I’ve wanted for years, it’s what I now realize I’ve wanted since that time in fifth year when Isla insisted I put a glamour on her as part of a role-playing game and I’d accidentally turned her into Gwendolynne Chan…
Gwendolynne’s tongue touching the corner of my lip sends all my blood rushing to my lower body and it only takes a minor shift of my head position to be finally, finally kissing her again.
At first, it’s slow, sensual, exploratory—but then she lets out a little sigh against my lips and I groan, curling around her, clasping her harder against my body so her chest is crushed against mine.
Our kiss turns desperate, passionate, my hands roaming anywhere and everywhere and all over her body.
I can barely think because all I want to do is touch her, see her, be inside her. Worship her.
I’ve booked a hotel room for the foreseeable future because exams are over, and I don’t wish to go back to Heywood Hall—or my father’s mansion—unless absolutely necessary. Both of them hold too many painful memories.
And more than anything, I want Gwendolynne to join me. At the hotel. Tonight. But it’s her choice. It must always be, absolutely, enthusiastically, one hundred percent her choice.
So I break the kiss, crushing my lips against her temple.
“Gwendolynne,” I murmur, my words vibrating against her skin. “There’s no pressure either way. But…will you stay with me tonight?”