Page 91 of Marked By Shadows
“Micah, babe, I’m here for you. This costume thing, this fabric thing, it’s only fun because you’re here. Would I do any of this without you? Not a chance. I hate crowds on the best of days. Show off something I made? No. Too long out of the game of wanting to be the center of attention. If life as a soldier taught me anything, it was that standing out got you the wrong sorts of attention. Would I have done the show? Sure, but only because you wanted me to. Because your eyes lit up with the idea of making something and showing it off. So don’t tell me you don’t like cosplay anymore. You love dressing up, creating characters, and being seen.”
“Not half naked,” I grumbled. Even my newer stuff, which was sort of pin-up sexy, was more about the curve of a hip or butt than showing skin.
“No, and you don’t need to be half naked to be sexy. Hell, I wore that ice king thing you did for me, more covered up than I could recall being outside of a uniform, and felt sexy as hell.”
“You were sexy as hell,” I said recalling him in that chair, half hard, and outlined in stretchy leather-like fabric. “Fuck, you’re so hot.”
He laughed, and it was a sexy sound. “So let’s go get our stuff, settle into the hotel and have a night in, yeah? Away from the group? All to ourselves?”
And didn’t that sound like the most incredible idea I’d ever heard?
Chapter 26
The trip back to the B&B was uneventful. No one was there. We loaded up the car in silence. Triple checking every nook and cranny for stuff. I didn’t want to leave anything behind. Alex was texting someone off and on. I suspected he was letting Lukas know we would be on our way home tomorrow.
Fitting everything in the car was a bit of a jigsaw puzzle. We had gone a little nuts with the fabric. But we got everything squeezed in and still had enough room to see all the way through the car.
“We should drop the computer off at the main house,” I said. Grace would probably be there working on dinner. There were lights on inside. I wondered about the ghost cat. Had it been a sign of bad things to come? Perhaps responding to Freya’s moods? Maybe Freya was the killer. Though I couldn’t imagine why. Her fame surpassed everyone in the group, and it sounded like she had plans to branch out into more than an influencer roll. Was she eliminating competition?
“Freya says to keep it. Says I won it fair and square. She said she used part of the group registration fees to pay the prizes so everything was covered,” Alex told me. He held up his phone. “I wanted to make sure she knew we were leaving.”
“I don’t want to talk to her,” I said, anger not really faded at all. “Can you ask her where my costume is? I’d really like it back.”
He nodded, texted and waited a minute. “She says she doesn’t know where it is, but will find out.”
I let out a long sigh.
“Let me run in and check the craft room for it,” Alex said.
“You don’t have to.”
He patted my knee and got out of the car. “I’ll just be a minute.”
I got into the passenger seat and put my seat belt on while I waited for him. He raced up to the front door and opened it. Instead of letting my mind stir up more rage with overthinking, I opened my phone and browsed Pinterest, saving costume and quilt ideas I liked. Alex returned a few minutes later empty handed.
“It wasn’t there. Grace said she hasn’t seen it,” he said a bit breathlessly. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine. It’s just a costume. I can make more.”
“But you worked hard on it,” Alex said. “Unfair of them to keep it.”
“The least of our worries right now. I should probably drive,” I said again, feeling bad for letting him drive without a license.
“Let’s worry about that tomorrow, yeah?” He started the car and drove us toward the directions on his phone. The hotel was less than ten minutes from the B&B, a tiny thing in a short row of retail type places. There were only two floors, and Alex darted inside the main entry to grab our key while I waited.
He returned and handed me the little envelope. “Normally, I would have requested the second floor,” he said. “But the guy told me which window we are on the first, and I can park right in front of it. That way if anyone messes with the car, I’ll hear it.”
“Had a lot of car break-ins in your life?”
“Yeah. Before I left for the Army it happened at least once a month when I was at my part-time job. Lukas got his broken into all the time while he was at school or college. Even when we never left anything in the car. I think it’s why he still owns an older vehicle. No bells and whistles to tempt people. Especially since his car is parked most of the time.”
“I’ve never owned a car,” I confessed as Alex parked around the side and in the last spot right next to a window. “Most places I lived had good public transportation. And the rest were short-term, so I borrowed a car from a family member.”
Alex shrugged. “Cars are stressful. You don’t own a car. A car owns you. Repair costs, gas costs, insurance, it all adds up, even if you don’t have a car payment. But I’d like to get my license back, so I can drive if I need to.” He motioned to the car. “Legally. But I think Lukas will let me borrow his should we need to go anywhere we can’t get to by trolley back home.”
He got out of the car and dug through to find his duffle bag. “I stuffed clothes and bathroom stuff in here for tomorrow. Anything else you need for the night from the car?”
I blinked at him as I got out, pointing to the quilt we’d brought. He grabbed it, and my laptop bag, and handed them to me before locking the car. We made our way inside through the keycard access side door and down the hall to our room. It was basic enough, bathroom, queen-sized bed, TV on a big dresser, and a table shoved in the corner. I put my computer on the table. Alex opened the curtain for a second to confirm the car was parked right there, and it was. Then he stripped the bed of the blankets and laid out our quilt.