“Absolutely the fuck not.” Jemma took the invitation out of my hand and waved it around. “We are going to the ball and the awards ceremony. You are going to strut your stuff after you’ve submitted your first draft of your next book, and we are going to enjoy ourselves. Who cares if we don’t have any arm candy for the event? We’ll have each other.”
I laughed, and a small amount of weight lifted from my shoulders. She wasn’t wrong. With this being the fifth anniversary ofLeague of Witchesand it now being rankedthetop video game in the world, I had some massive bragging rights.
“You think I can write this?” I asked, bringing attention back to the impending deadline I needed to meet.
“Yes.” Jemma sat up straighter in her chair. “Write a masquerade ball where you find your prince charming, but then get kidnapped, and he has to find you.”
I rolled my eyes again because that was definitely not what I wrote. While I wrote romantasy, I had a high focus on the fantasy element.
“You can make him a dragon shifter if you need it to be a little less real.” Jemma winked at me, and I belted out a laugh.
“Fuck, I actuallymighttake that idea.” My brain started working, thinking of how I could make up the scene and who these characters were. The cogs were turning in a good way. “Fine, but just because we are going, it doesn’t mean that I’ll have a good time with the sheer number of people that are bound to be there.”
I had a hard time with crowds and being in them for too long. With what I did for work, though, there wasn’t getting out of it most of the time. I paced myself at each event, broughtheadphones or earplugs—whatever I needed to do to make it through—but I was always anxious in the lead up to the events.
“Lies.” Jemma scoffed. “You tell yourself that, but there will be gamers there that you can get your hands on. You’re worried about your love life, but you’re about to walk into a whole pool of people to choose from.”
“Absolutely the fuck not.” I threw her words back at her.
I was not going to get myself involved with another gamer. The last one I allowed into my life had fucked me up enough that it took me almost three years to start dating again.
“You can’t let one man ruin your view of a whole selection of eligible candidates.”
“You mean I can’t let oneboydetermine the dateability of others who also play games. It’s not just boys, Jemma, who can ruin your life.”
Jemma spit out her tea with a laugh before responding.
“When you put it that way, you’re not wrong.”
“Of course I’m not.” I stood up and took both of our mugs back into the kitchen, setting them in the sink. “And I no longer let that one boy ruin my life.”
“For which I am proud of you, because he was the fucking worst.”
Jemma had been in my life during the end of my relationship with my ex. She saw the downfall of it all and didn’t judge me leaving someone I had been with for almost six years. She’d worked hard to help me through a lot after getting out of the relationship, working through trauma, and trying to figure out who I was by myself again.
I looked down at the stove to see it was well past nine now, and while I’d been on a date a few hours ago, I hadn’t really eaten much and didn’t bring leftovers home.
As if on cue, my stomach growled.
“Food?” I asked Jemma.
“You know what?” Jemma stood up and left the room. When she returned, she handed me my cardigan and purse. “It’s still early enough that we can go get a frozen margarita and some chips and salsa.”
My eyebrows knit together, concern coursing through me.
“What’s up?” I questioned Jemma. She wasn’t much of one to head out this late to go to dinner. I anticipated us ordering in.
“Oh, nothing.” Jemma walked over to the kitchen table and grabbed her phone and wallet that she’d set to the side.
“I call bullshit.” I walked over to her. “You only take me for chips and salsa when you need to break something to me and it’s quite late, so it’s got to be something big.”
Jemma turned away from me and walked to the front door, where she stopped before she finally spoke up. I could see her shoulders finally sag when she accepted the defeat of silence.
“Melody called.” My eyes went wide at the name that crossed Jemma’s lips. That was Parker’s assistant.
My ex, Parker.
The gamer boy.
