“He seemed to think...he was worried about seeming so.”
Stryker hesitated “it’s none of our business.”
“But he shouldn’t be here if-”
“Theo” he shook his head, scolding “he’s here to fight. And it makes no difference to me if he’s gay or not. If it disturbs you so much...I dunno, suck it up.”
“Fine.” I mumbled dully.
“Good lad. Come on, time for lunch.”
We’d been marching all day to get to Zeltron, and once we got there it was only to find that the army headquarters was pretty much the same as the Draelon one. I didn’t spot Matthew during the march. I did, however, spot him as soon as I got to the pub: he was sitting at the bar talking to the bartender, but he only seemed to be drinking water.
“What do you want to drink?” Stryker asked over the rowdy chaos.
“Don’t mind. Whatever you have.”
I ended up with a whiskey sour. I could feel Matthew’s eyes on me but resolutely ignored his gaze. I jumped when an arm landed across my shoulders.
“Hey there.” Jack had appeared.
Stryker smirked at him “hey.”
“Want some shots with that?” Jack asked us both.
“Gladly.” Stryker answered.
I didn’t bother commenting that twenty five shots of vodka, even between three of them, was considered quite a lot. I downed a shot and turned back to look at Matthew, who was watching us with a small frown. He caught me looking and raised an eyebrow.
I turned away, feeling flustered all of the sudden.
“Matthew not drink?” I asked Jack.
He turned to look at his mate, smirking “he likes people to believe that. He thinks I'll get hammered and do something foolish, is all.”
“Huh.” I responded simply, downing another shot.
Stryker clapped me on the back “see that girl over there?”
“Mh” I followed his gaze. She was a pretty blonde wearing a showy black dress, laughing with a group of her friends.
“That’s who I'll be with if you can’t find me at the end of the night.”
I snorted, doing my best ‘are you serious?’ face at him. “I thought you ‘weren’t that bad’”
“I’m not.” Stryker shrugged “but if I'm going off to look at dead bodies tomorrow, then I'm at least having fun tonight.”
“Fair enough.” I muttered, agreeing with his point. I watched Jack follow Stryker, downed another shot and turned, only to find Matthew behind me. He gave me a mini heart attack.
“God, no need to pop up out of nowhere like that-”
“You want to finish them all?”
“You hoping I do? Want me to get alcohol poisoning or something?” I sneered back for no reason in particular “how stupid do you think I am?”
“Very, actually.” Matthew replied smoothly “seeing as that was your seventh shot on top of that fancy drink you gulped down before. Feeling a little woozy?”
Now that he mentioned it, I was. But instead of conceding him an answer I settled for scowling and knocking back another.
