He faltered in his step as he noticed the magic-wielders eyeing him.
“Winter!” I called out.
His head swung toward the sound of my voice and relief flooded me when a great deal of that unease that had taken him over slipped away when he caught sight of a friendly face.
I gestured for him to come over.
He reached me and stopped beside the booth. “I should’ve gone to my usual place. The one my mom frequents. This was just closer to campus. Note to self: stick to the usual next time.”
“No. Don’t let others’ stupid, uneducated reactions dictate your movements. And—hold on, your mom frequents a place like this?”
“Exactly like this.Vantiqebars are all over the supernatural world now. Thanks to Father actually. After discovering her love for them, he invested and helped create a whole chain of them.” He smiled fondly. “He’s really romantic like that toward her. With Pops too, actually. Dad… not exactly his thing.”
It hit me then. “That’s how Zayn knows about this place? From you and your family?”
He frowned. “Zayn?” I saw the moment he realized the bigger picture. “He brought you here on a date.”
“Yeah.”
A huge smile spread over his face. “This is… it’s really something.”
“You’re happy about it?”
“This is him being a sweetheart. Being open. Being thoughtful. To the both of us. Just believing I wouldn’t know about it on my end. Even more thoughtful with that a factor.”
“You see it?”
He rolled his eyes, then slid into the side of the booth opposite me. “Yes. Of course I do.”
“That’s what I thought. What I told him actually.”
“In the past, he’d do one thing, then go right back to his previous ways with me.”
“Ah, I see.”
“This time, though, that’s not the case.” His eyes twinkled at me. “Some of that is because of you. And also, Vax.”
“Vaxan thinks it’s a balance that’s been struck—between our four personalities, I guess.”
“You check him. Vax softens him.”
“Huh. I figured it would be seen as the other way around.”
“No. You’re fierce and uncompromising with how people treat you. Especially now you’ve dealt with the Keuric of it all, and now you’re outside the limits of the Dracoryn Realm. And Vax with that aura of dominance melded with understanding gives space for Zayn to lower his defenses and all his abrasive—often false—dominant energy.”
“Wow, that’s the nicest thing you’ve said about me in ages,” a voice rang out.
I jolted and Winter swung his head to see Zayn just a few feet out from us.
Because I’d tuned out my senses earlier when I’d heard those jerks talking about Winter, I hadn’t even felt his arrival.
He stood there, his vibrant pink hair perfectly styled with a whole lot of mousse and sticking straight up. He had on a studded black leather jacket with a metallic shirt beneath that was open at the collar and pulled taut across all that toned muscle, even highlighting those sexy abs of his. It was untucked over a pair of pink and black striped jeans. It was punk-rock meeting date-level effort attire.
He grinned out at Winter. “The jig is up, huh? You do stillloooveme, then?”
“There was nojig.”
“Sure, big guy.”
