by Anyta Sunday
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 t
hese 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.”
CHAPTER 11
Brrrriiiing.
I woke to the ear-splitting screech. I lurched toward my phone, twisting off the bed with a loud thump!
Groaning, I felt for the phone and brought it to my ear. “Liam here.” I rubbed my head and sat up, peeling off the blankets that’d twisted around me.
“Dude, it’s midday. Are you still asleep?”
A pulse throbbed in my head as I stood up. “Midday?” No, it couldn’t have been more than eight—
A glance at my alarm-clock radio confirmed Hunter’s announcement. I closed my eyes and shook my head. So much for my plan to be at the office wrapping up a first draft. Seemed like I might need one of my disgusting hangover remedies first.
Hunter cackled down the line. “Damn. Sounds like you had quite the night. So do you know the news already?”
“What news?” I flung my blankets over the bed and semi-straightened them.
“It’s all over Twitter, Facebook, and I caught the gossip on Tumblr: our vigilante made an appearance again.”
I swapped the phone to my other ear and sat at the end of my bed, running my heel down the corner leg to satisfy an itch. “He did? What happened? When? Where?”
“That’s the thing, it happened just a few blocks from the mansion. Our guy might have been there the whole night, right under our noses.”
“Who got attacked?”
“No one knows. The victim isn’t coming forward.”
“So how does everyone know about it?”
“That’s the thing.” Hunter paused and I stiffened, waiting for the response. Somehow, I was nervous for our vigilante.
“The attacker got hurt. The vigilante broke his collarbone throwing him to the ground. He had to go to hospital. Now he’s telling everyone the assault came out of the blue, that he wasn’t hurting anyone.”
“What?”
“It’s a lie, of course. But if the victim doesn’t speak up, it’s looking really bad for The Raven.”
Grabbing my notebook and pen, I asked, “Do we have any idea what time this happened?”
“Around two in the morning.”
I’d been comatose by then. “What’s the name of this guy?”
“It’s ridiculous. He’s calling himself The Night Warrior.”
The Night Warrior? What did the guy think he was, a comic book hero?
“Look,” Hunter continued, “I have a feeling this is going to cause some bad press for our vigilante. If we could find the victim and convince him to tell his side of the story, we might be able to derail the activists that want to make him pay for all the black eyes and bloody noses he’s doled out.”
“I can slip a public plea for information onto the opinions page.”
We wrapped up the conversation quickly. Hunter needed to get to his basketball game, and my bladder felt as if it would burst.
I dashed to the bathroom, relieved myself, took a shower, and popped a couple of painkillers. With my towel wrapped round my waist, I darted back to my room.
Quinn sat on the straightened bedcovers. A tray holding a plate of omelet, toast, and what looked like freshly-squeezed orange juice rested on his lap.
He blinked, shifted quickly, and hurriedly refocused on the food. “Thought you’d be too hungover to get up.”
“It smells delicious,” I said. With Quinn’s back to me, I made quick work of dropping the towel and slipping into my boxers and a clean but crumpled shirt.
“How are you feeling this morning?” Quinn asked tentatively.
I scrambled over the bed to my pillows and motioned for the tray. “Can I?”
“Sure.” He passed it to me and watched me stuff a buttered piece of toast into my mouth.
I chased it with orange juice and, once I’d swallowed, spoke. “I can honestly say I’ve felt better.”
Quinn smirked. “Was last night worth it?”
I recalled scraps of the night before. I remembered the punch. Dancing. Jack and Jill laughing. Quinn shoving Jill. And then Quinn carrying me into the apartment. “Yes. Just seeing Jill thrown to the ground was worth every stab of headache I’ll have today.” Thankfully, my painkillers seemed to be working effectively.
Quinn nabbed a piece of my toast and scooped some of the egg onto it. “Trust me, he deserved it.”
“I don’t remember it all. What else happened last night?”
That made Quinn grin, his ears rising slightly. With a teasing lilt to his voice, he ripped the crust of my toast off and said, “You wanted to kiss me.”
I chewed the bit of toast in my mouth and swallowed. “Did I kiss you?”
He shook his head and waved the crust at me like he was waggling a finger. “No. But you really wanted to.”
I leaned forward and bit the crust to just before his fingertip. With my mouth full, I said, “Quite obviously that was a drunken anomaly.”
Quinn stared at the remaining pinch of crust between his fingers. “You’re kidding, right?”
I shoveled one more forkful of egg into my mouth and rested the tray on the bed. My cellphone was ringing but I couldn’t see it. Likely it had fallen behind the drawers when I tossed it and rushed to the bathroom. I scrabbled off the bed and felt for the phone on the carpet as I answered Quinn. “I’ve only kissed girls, so—no. Definite anomaly.”
Ah ha! I lurched upright, triumphant, cellphone in hand. But before I could take the call, Quinn grabbed a fistful of my shirt and tugged me forward, between his legs.
I dropped the phone as Quinn’s hand reached up behind my neck and drew me down. “Quinn? What on earth—”
He fell backward on the bed, bringing me with him. A roller-coaster thrill zipped through my body as I lost my balance and came crashing against his chest. Both Quinn’s arms slipped around me, holding me firmly in place.
Quinn’s deep green eyes stared intently at me. He brushed the tip of his nose against mine, tilted his head upwards, and kissed me.
The first sweep of his lips moved warm
and softly. I gasped in surprise. Quinn’s mouth sealed over mine, and his tongue twisted and pushed. He was an expert. I liked how he took control, led the entire dance of our tongues. All I did was follow along and enjoy the ride.
Quinn pulled back, resting his head against my mattress and grinned wickedly. “Still an anomaly, Liam?”
He was warm and comfortable to lie on, so I didn’t bother moving. I linked my fingers and rested against his chest. “Technically, since kissing a guy is a deviation from who I normally kiss, the answer is yes.”
Quinn roared out with laughter. “God, you’re impossible.” He slapped me on the ass and rolled me over. We nearly knocked over the breakfast tray, but Quinn steadied it and climbed off me. “I’ve got to get to my self-defense class. You can think about things, and we can chat over dinner tonight if you want.”
I propped myself up on my elbows. “How do I join one of these classes?”
“Shannon and I are starting a beginner’s course. Seven o’clock Wednesdays at the Rainbow Rec Center.” He stepped back slowly toward the door. His face glowed, as if the idea of me learning self-defense pleased him. Perhaps he thought it would free up his weekend evenings, but that seemed fair enough to me. “You can come along then if you like.”
I pushed myself into a sitting position. My lips still tingled and tasted of Quinn. I ran a tongue over my bottom lip as I watched him slink further toward the door. “Good call with that kiss, Quinn.”
He paused, squinting at me like he wasn’t quite sure what to say. He scratched his ear. “You don’t need time to think about it? Fret? Go and pretend it never happened?”
I pushed myself off the bed. The warm carpet under my toes rubbed the soles of my feet nicely. I slid over to the jeans that lay in a heap in the corner of the room. “Pretend it never happened? Why would I do that?” I pulled on the jeans and found the phone I’d dropped on the bed. “Now I have some investigating to do. I think I’ll call Hannah and ask her out after all.”
Quinn opened his mouth to say something, but shut it immediately. His eyes lost their glimmer, dulling into a dark green. He stormed out of my room, murmuring as he went.