“I’m scared. I’ll do something wrong.”
“And what if you do something right?”
That had him thinking, and a smallish smile bracketed his mouth. “I do want to see him again. It’s just—”
“Good. I’ll tell him you said so.”
“Along with everything else?” he asked, finally taking a proper bite of his sandwich.
“Yes.” I leaned back and stared at the lightly-clouded sky. Just maybe Hunter was right; I had to make my own luck.
And I would.
I’d make real friends.
I’d wow chief with the best feature article.
And I’d write the best party page column Scribe had ever seen.
Chapter 8
I had a third tea. The chamomile and honey running down my throat soothed me, and it sparked just the right energy in me to concentrate on the essay I had to write on the most influential villains in literature.
I slurped up the last of the tea, catching the gooey honey on my tongue, and got up from the table.
Quinn, lying on the couch with his knees up, peered over his book, Muscular System. “Sneaking off to your room now?”
“That was the plan,” I said, setting my cup in the dishwasher. “Like every other evening.”
He lowered the book to his chest. “Exactly. Like every evening. Don’t you want to spend one evening in the living room with me?”
“Why? You’d just be a distraction.”
He grinned, and I was reminded of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. “Oh would I?”
I wiped my hands on my jeans before picking up the laptop at the end of the table. “Yes, Quinn, you would. And I’d just distract you too.”
His gaze skipped down the length of my dark flannel pajamas. “Somehow I think I can handle it. C’mon.” He sat up and patted the spot in front of his feet. “Work here for a bit. Hard as it might be, I promise I’ll do my best not to distract you.”
I allowed a small smile at the waggle of his brows. Well now, I wanted real friends, didn’t I? This was the perfect opportunity to work on that.
I stepped around the table toward the Quinn-dominated couch. The air was thick with warmth and I had the tingly heat in my cheeks to prove it.
Darting to the air-conditioning unit for the first time since the end of August, I turned it on. Cooler. That was better.
When I returned to the couch, Quinn raised his brow gently, as if to ask about the sudden detour. I ignored it and planted myself at the end of the couch, far too close to his navy-socked feet to be entirely comfortable. But it was a small price to pay in the name of friendship.
Quinn waited until I started my laptop before he resumed his reading. True to his word, he did his best not to distract me. His toes sometimes wiggled and slid against my thigh, but other than that, there was just the sound of my fingers clacking over the keyboard, his chi-lip sound as he turned a page, and our quiet breathing.
For half an hour, Quinn said nothing, and I barely made a dent in my essay.
Ten minutes later, I gave up, closing my laptop and laying it on the glass coffee table in front of the couch. Elbows on my knees, I scrubbed my face as I thought of something to say. We were roommates after all, yet I didn’t know much about him.
I sneaked a peek at him from the corner of my eye and jumped when I found him looking at me.
“Gah!”
He shoved a bookmark into his book, shut it, and laid it next to my laptop. “What’s up, Liam?” he asked, tucking his arms behind his head.
Obviously I hadn’t adjusted the temperature low enough. The air in the room was positively smothering. Or maybe trying to make friends did that to someone.
My glasses were slipping with the sweat beading out of me. I pushed them up. It was a simple question, so it shouldn’t have been a bother. And yet, somehow this time was much harder than any other time. “Do you want to play cards?”
I carefully watched every nuance of Quinn’s reaction, the bobbling of his Adam’s apple, the quiver of his lips, the slight angling of his head in my direction, the jiggle of his foot at my side.
Without realizing it, I’d held my breath, which was now very noticeable as I expelled it and gasped for more.
Quinn unlocked his hands from behind his head and pushed himself into a sitting position, pulling his feet nearer to him. “No,” he said slowly. “I’d rather not lose again.”
“Oh. Okay.” Suddenly my bedroom seemed to be calling me. It promised that the air was cooler and I wouldn’t have any problems concentrating on work. And work was better than cards, anyway.
I sprang off the couch.
But I didn’t make it a step before Quinn grabbed my hips and tackled me onto the couch. To be more accurate, he landed on the couch, and I landed in his lap. His arms tightened around my waist. “Why on earth are you running away?” he growled into my ear.