She flicked my braid with a finger, leaning close. “Not a fan of the short hair?” she asked. “I think it makes you look smoking hot. I can think of someone else who agrees, but then I’m pretty sure he likes both styles. Maybe you’ve met him…”
I slapped at her hand. “I do like the short hair, but the legend of the long white hair saves me from a lot of unwanted attention in Kansas City. Both from fights and men.”
“Maybe it would help if you made some new legends with your short hair.”
“Maybe…” Truthfully, I’d been looking into growing my hair back out. I missed it. Surprisingly, short hair was harder for me to style, and with the Midwest’s humidity it usually turned into a puffy bob, which I definitely didn’t like. I decided to change topics. “So, the ice-cold bitch. What’s her story?” I asked, discreetly jerking my chin towards Quinn.
Othello grinned. “Sooo cold. I love her. She’s got that Catholic upbringing and the same devil-may-care attitude as you, but she’s rougher around the edges. You two really would get along quite well if you got out of your own way. She’s helped me acquire a thing or two for Grimm Tech recently. Quite the thief. But, even better, she’s one hell of a negotiator.”
I watched Quinn slip into the bar after she glanced back at us suspiciously. I tried to smile, but from the look on Quinn’s face, I wasn’t that successful.
Othello sighed. “I’ll talk to her, don’t worry. She’s cagey around new people. Especially girls.”
“I can drink to that,” I said, smiling as I let out a breath. This was supposed to be a fun night for the Reds. I wondered if their mother knew about our little adventure, or if Othello had kidnapped them. Thinking about that further, I probably didn’t want to know.
Plausible deniability.
“She looks ready for a fight. No, not just ready. It’s like she wants to fight,” I clarified.
Othello nodded. “She’s like that. But she’s handy in a pinch.”
I glanced over at her. “We aren’t planning on getting in a pinch tonight, right?”
Othello gave me a crooked smile. “Right,” she said in a way that gave me zero confidence.
We entered the bar to find the Reds already seated on two stools at the far end of the bar. Quinn took a stool near the corner, letting her face the room, leaving her back open to no one. I sighed, brushing my braid back over my shoulder, and put a happy smile on my face as the Reds motioned us over with gleeful smiles of their own.
I joined them, sitting next to Quinn. Othello walked up to the center of the bar and slapped a stack of cash onto the counter, leaning close to speak with the bartender. “How are we doing this?” the Reds asked excitedly, leaning far enough forward that their breasts might as well have had a spotlight trained on them. Several men in the bar took notice, but Othello snapped something at them and they cowered under her motherly glare. I grinned and heard Quinn chuckle beside me.
I turned back to the Reds, an idea coming to mind. “Let’s play Never Have I Ever,” I told them. This could break the ice that was—for some reason—growing between me and Quinn. It could also give me an opportunity to put her in her place. Because, without knowing it, Othello had let a few things slip about our black magic arms dealer friend which I could use to my advantage.
“How do you play?” Aria asked, grinning at me with her dazzling white teeth.
“We take turns making statements like this: Never have I ever robbed a bank. The person speaking can’t have done whatever it is, and anyone else who has done it puts one of their ten fingers down, then drinks. A drink for each finger.”
“Can we say something we have done and then drink, anyway?” Aria asked, licking her lips.
I shook my head. “That would defeat the purpose. You want to find out what you haven’t done that the other people have.”
Quinn studied me suspiciously. “Good way to learn some secrets about each other.”
I shrugged. “Everyone gets a turn.”
Othello suddenly sat down beside me, interrupting the tension. “Drinks inbound, but before we get started, we need to have a toast to Aria and Sonia. If we save it for later, you bitches might be too drunk to remember it.”
Quinn snorted. “Aye.”
As if on cue, the bartender brought over a fucking castle of shots. Literally. A pyramid of shots was divided among us—except Othello only got one. I arched a brow at her. “Oh, really?” I said, eyeing her solo drink.
She shrugged. “I’m playing mother hen.” She pointed at the Reds. “Their mom’s orders.”
The Reds exchanged perplexed glances.
I arched a brow. “I’m not sure she chose very wisely,” I teased. “Nate’s told me stories about you.”
She stiffened momentarily at my comment, but when I didn’t speak she simply picked up her drink. “Toast,” she demanded. What had I said to elicit that kind of reaction? I’d have to ask Nate. Othello cleared her throat as we each grabbed one of our eleven shots. I took a calming breath. Eleven shots were going to kill us. Some mother hen she was.
Othello lifted her glass and we all followed suit, smiling as we realized this signaled the beginning of the fun night ahead. A peaceful night in the bar was doable. Then we could stumble up to our hotel rooms and pass out to sleep it off.
“Here’s to the nights we’ll never remember with the friends we’ll never forget.” Othello said.
“Awww…” the Reds said in unison, blowing kisses at Othello. Quinn had a decidedly awkward smile on her face, as if pretending to like the meal her mother had just made her.
We all grinned madly as our attention turned to our drinks, and we downed the shot.
My eyes widened as I stared down at my empty glass. “What in the hell was that?” I asked in disbelief. It tasted delicious, but I still sensed the heavy, heavy, heavy amount of alcohol within.
Othello grinned, tipping her shot glass in an educational display for the Reds, setting it down in front of her upside down. “It’s called a Fairy Bomb. And no, I won’t tell you what’s in it.”
Quinn looked like she had tasted Heaven for a moment, and I found myself grinning. The Reds' entire understanding of life was about to change. In fact, Sonia was licking the rim of her glass. Aria elbowed her gently, glancing at a pair of older men down the bar who were eyeing her sister with entirely too much interest. Sonia slowly looked up and locked eyes with the men in such a fashion that they instantly averted their eyes. Content, they both tipped their shot glasses before them, duplicating Othello’s movements, and then turned to me expectantly.
Wanting to take advantage of their attention and to take the first question, I spoke. “Never have I ever—”
“Hold on,” Othello quickly interrupted. “I think it’s safer if I start this one off,” she said, eyeing Quinn and I—we were both leaning forward, I noticed. The feisty redhead was just as competitive as me, and she masked a faint blush as she came to the same realization. I shot her a guilty smile and forcefully relaxed my shoulders before turning to Othello. “Fine, Mommy.”
“I’m ready whenever ye are, Othello,” Quinn said, hands splayed. “As long as it’s now.”
Othello sneered triumphantly. “Never have I ever...assaulted a priest.”
There was a brittle silence. “Well, fuck,” Quinn said, looking amused as she gripped a new shot glass. “See if I ever tell ye any more stories from me childhood.” She pounded her shot but set it down with a smile.
I grinned at her and took one of my own shots. “The Antipope in Rome,” I shrugged with a smug grin. “Beat the living shit out of him after he turned into a werewolf.” I mimed a punch to the jaw.
Quinn chuckled and propped one foot up on the bar of her stool. “Callie, I t’ink this may be the beginnin’ of a beautiful friendship.” Othello and the Reds seemed pleased by the exchange, but I noticed the Reds looked disappointed to have avoided a shot of their own.
Guess we’d have to fix that.
Chapter 5 — Quinn MacKen
na, Vegas
I cradled my chin in my hands, two digits outstretched to represent the two shots remaining in front of me. Nine empty glasses and most of my sobriety had already been swiped off the bar top by the industrious bartender, who’d poured our squad forty-four shots, plus one for Othello. I had no idea what was in the damn things, but their name I would never forget: Fairy Bombs. The delicious taste masked the intensity of the alcohol content and made me wonder just what Othello’s goal here was; if she wanted us all loosened up, she’d done her job. If she wanted us even remotely sober, she was totally fired.
“Never have I ever,” Callie began, sitting firmly upright as if trying to fend of the alcohol’s effects, “hit a god. Little g,” she added, with a giggle and a slight hiccup. She glared down at her only remaining finger, as if it was somehow responsible for the slip in her stoic demeanor.
Othello sighed and dropped to one finger, as well, even though she wasn’t actually drinking. “I hit one last night.” Then she, too, giggled.
Callie rolled her eyes. “The Horseman of Death is not a god.”
“Weird, since he makes me say it so often. Oh god, oh god, oh god,” Othello moaned, doing her best impersonation of Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally.
The Reds, who’d given up playing the game in favor of simply drinking the shots, spat out the contents of their final glass onto the bar at the same time, choking with laughter. Meanwhile, I surreptitiously downed my own. I wasn’t sure how many of the creatures I’d put down qualified as gods, but I was betting the cumulative karmic result of beating a demonic fox spirit to death, taking down a millennia-old monster, and smacking around a pinhead of angels was the same.
Basically, I’d been a bad, bad girl.
I watched as the Reds lapped the spilled liquor off the sticky bar top with excessively long, forked tongues, clearly too hammered to fret over things like hygiene, social etiquette, or partially shifting. I didn’t know what kind they were, but the forked tongues gave me a pretty good guess. “Can’t leave this stuff lying around,” Sonia explained, half to herself, half to us.
Aria nodded, her own voice slurred. “Alcohol abuse. Not cool.”
“What are you two doing?” Othello hissed. “This is a casino full of Regulars. And since when can you two partially shift?”
“Oh, the things we can do that you don’t know about,” Aria began.
“Would blow you,” Sonia finished.
“Your minds,” Aria amended. “Blow your minds.”
The sisters glanced at each other and began to cackle. Yes, cackle. Then, before any of us could respond, they plopped off their stools and began wobbling away, skittering across the casino floor on their freakishly tall heels. Othello’s eyes narrowed as she saw them leaving. “Hey, where are you two going?”
“Ladies’ room,” Sonia yelled.
“Or the men’s room, if the lines are too long,” Aria added, loud enough to draw stares.
"How are they walkin' straight?" I wondered aloud.
"Shifter constitution?" Othello suggested.
"I'm surprised their mom let you take them out," Callie said, watching the girls as they left, then the men who were doing the same.
Othello groaned and set her head down on her forearm. “I didn't tell her. Quinn, I think it’s your turn.”
I coughed to cover up a laugh and glanced down at my lone finger, then at the two women sitting before me. Callie and I were drunk. The signs were obvious, no matter how tall Callie held herself. I operated in a perpetually tipsy state a vast majority of the time when I wasn’t working or training, which meant I had the edge when it came to endurance. But soon, I knew, I’d collide with that fuzzy wall we all hit eventually. The wall which knocks our memories loose and sends us careening into a night we can’t forget no matter how hard we try.
“Never have I ever…” I said, drawing out the last word like Squints from Sandlot, “wanted to sleep with Nate Temple.” I watched in grim amusement as the heads of both women jerked up. Their eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed in suspicion.
“Who told you?” Callie hissed.
“What she said,” Othello added.
I grinned and waggled my finger. “A lady never tells.” The truth—that it had been a blind shot in the dark which I’d hoped might nail at least one of them—wasn’t particularly relevant. What was relevant was the fact that I’d won. I’d emerged victorious. Queen Quinn.
“Wait, you mean you really didn’t want to sleep with him when you first met him?” Othello asked, as if the thought of that were like passing on your birthday for no reason.
“The dickhead who hijacked me Uber? No t’anks,” I replied.
“Wait? That was you?” Callie said, liquid dribbling all over her hand from her shot glass that was poised mere inches from her lips. But before I could reply, Othello’s phone rang. The Russian woman snatched the device up and slid her finger across the screen, then hit the speakerphone option.
“Where are you two?” she barked.
A cacophony of noise spewed out from the tiny phone—more noise than I’d thought possible. Mostly cheers and jeers, but also funky, twangy music that might have been bluegrass or old country. “We got lost!” Aria shouted.
“But we found nice people who helped us take our clothes off!” Sonia yelled.
“You what?!” Othello asked, mouth agape. “You’ve only been gone a few minutes!”
The line went dead and the three of us stared at one another, wondering how in the world we’d let the birthday girls get abducted in the first few hours. In Vegas. Competitiveness, maybe? Cattiness? Either way, we had to table our Nate Temple discussion for later. Not that I minded.
That guy was a prick.
Chapter 6 — Callie Penrose, Vegas
I slipped off the barstool faster than I had intended, but Quinn had done the same, and we ended up leaning so that we essentially caught each other in one of those typically awkward stranger hugs. We both froze like startled deer, laughed uncomfortably, straightened, and took unsteady steps back. Othello was frantically punching her screen with her thumbs, muttering under her breath.
“Got them!” she snapped, using her thumb and forefinger to rotate something on her phone’s screen. I shambled closer, learning to work with my new tipsy equilibrium since I wasn’t used to getting drunk very often. I squinted down at Othello’s phone to find a bizarre version of a map that had a lot of numbers, coordinates, and strange icons on it. It looked suspiciously illegal, and there were two flashing red circles surprisingly far away. I squinted closer. No. They weren’t far away. They were in the same building, but a few floors down—apparently Othello’s phone showed vertical, in addition to lateral, distances.
I cocked my head, sensing Quinn doing the same. She even had one of her eyes closed, as if that could help. “That doesn’t make any sense,” I said slowly. “I can’t tell if that’s the same building or not…”
Othello looked concerned. “I think it’s a secret area…” She tapped her screen a few times, pulling up a different angle. She suddenly had a second phone in her hand, revealing…
“Fuck me!” Quinn hissed. “Is that a blueprint for the Bellagio?” she hissed.
Many in the bar glanced over at us, including a trio of young, baby-faced guys sporting the confident look of men who thought they stood a chance with any of us. They were rocking that wealthy, homeless look that was popular with a subgroup of hipsters these days. Strangely enough, I noticed three other men spread about the bar, eyes fixated on the trio—but not in a way that seemed threatening. They were ridiculously well-muscled and had ear pieces in. Shit, building security? No, personal security. Quinn followed my gaze, noticed the men, and instantly set her shoulders, squaring off with all of them.
Not the hipsters or the security personnel.
All of them.
Before I realized it, I was standing beside her, glaring down the security detail—who suddenly looked very interested in us.
“Fuck ye lookin’ at, One Erection?” Quinn spat, eyeing the would-be boy band.
“What did you call us?” the guy in the middle said, sliding a hand along his pompadour as if he were practicing for a shampoo commercial. He stared at us with a crooked smile, cocking his head.
“Ye heard me. And I don’t like to repeat meself,” Quinn warned. “Keep your eyes to yourself, ye hear?”
His smile faltered, and he shot incredulous glances at his pals. “You don’t know who he is?” the bleached blonde kid on the left said, jerking a thumb towards the guy in the middle, his arm layered with a full sleeve of tattoos.
“Of course we don’t know ye. I don’t make a habit of poundin’ ‘em back with high-schoolers,” Quinn replied.
The three stiffened as one, but the one in the center looked especially offended. The security detail began angling towards us like sharks. I flicked my hair over my shoulder, smirking darkly at the three. “And how are you supposed to protect your boss’ son if I send you to the hospital for disrespecting two young women?” I called out, loud enough for everyone in the bar to hear.
I may as well have chucked a full bottle of top shelf liquor to the floor for the reaction it got. Silence fell, and a few of the older men stood from their barstools, slowly making as if to enter the fray.
“Six on two...” I tapped my lower lip and glanced over to Quinn. “I think we’re sober enough for that warm up.”
Quinn grinned, her eyes twinkling. “Eeny, meeny—”
Othello suddenly clapped her hands on our shoulders, spinning us around and pushing us in the opposite direction. “I think we’ve had enough of this bar,” Othello told the men, shoving us again and essentially marching us away before we could respond. “That was Johnson fucking Beaver, you drunkasses!” she hissed into our ears.
“Who the fuck is Johnson Beaver?” Quinn asked, incredulous.
“We could have taken them,” I growled under my breath.
“Not the point! He’s a celebrity. It would be bad if you beat his ass. We’d go straight to jail, no questions asked. And we would be on the news for ruining his concert tonight.”
Last Call: A TempleVerse Anthology Book 1 (TempleVerse Anthologies) Page 3