Teddy comes up beside Serena and smacks his hands down on the sticky surface. “And me.”
He doesn’t slur nearly as much, but he wears mischief in his eyes.
I rush the task before anyone else can demand a crappy margarita mixed with awful, cheap tequila, triple sec, and bottled lemon juice.
The moment the cups are filled, I steal two for myself, down one, then nurse the other as I dip back into the crowd.
Leaving them behind, I follow the beat of the music. Music that isn’t ever played at Elcott Abbey, a kind never found on my MP3 player.
I’m derailed, thoughts and body, as Landon comes tumbling into me.
A violent wave of margarita lurches out of my cup and splashes all over the front of his shirt.
Landon doesn’t notice.
His hands are gripped onto my shoulders, his nose too close to mine. “You’ve got to help me.”
That’s all he says, with the stink of cigars and booze and brews, before he yanks me out of the crowd.
My fluffy stilettoes clack on the floorboards, all the way to the window in the corner with panes painted black.
Landon spins me around to face him.
I don’t get the chance to ask him what happened or if he wants a breath mint.
“Dray wants James,” he spills out the stress, his face twisted in frowns and creases. “He said you suggested it.”
My expression is wiped clean. “I… I didn’t. I literally said the opposite.”
His hands on my shoulders tighten, urgency in his dark eyes. “What did you say to himexactly?”
The wonder of ‘what does it matter?’ crosses my mind, but I doubt that’ll go down so well right now.
“Dray said to me,” I enunciate, firm, “that James might make a good… well, not his primary assistant, but someone on the payroll, for his print.”
Landon doesn’t blink, doesn’t nod, doesn’t breathe.
“But I said Dray already has the sense—”
He blinks. “What?”
“The sense. Like Amelia, his makut… it’s all prints, isn’t it? Just fainter.”
A crease knits between his eyebrows.
This is news to him.
Not a thought he had before, not something he considered.
Can’t judge him for that.
I didn’t figure it out until over the break.
“Because he has that,” I go on, “he doesn’t need James. I said to leave him for someone else—like you. Someone who could use his print.”
For a moment, he just stares at me. Hazy eyes and a potent breath.
Then his hands slip from my shoulders, and he falls aside to slump against the wall. “Dray will never give up a print like that. James is too valuable—and he proved it in front of everyone.”
