Once inside, boy, do we get stares. And yeah, expected that. What I didn’t expect was to be surrounded by half the store, everyone with their cell phone in Inara’s face.
I was hoping people would treat her like she was the costumed mascot for a store. Maybe smile at her, or give her uncomfortable looks, and maybe snap some covert pictures—but ultimately, give her space.
Their reaction is so much more than that.
“Hey!” I bark. “Don’t crowd—” an idea strikes me “…the talent.” I reach into my back pocket, pull out my wallet, and start passing out a stack of business cards I keep on hand for the escape rooms. “Everybody, meet Inara, the alien for our alien escape game room. The code on the back of the cards will get you ten percent off the cover price if your group is more than five people…”
And just like that, the crowd chills out. They still take pictures because let’s face it, Inara is kick ass. But although they’re dazzled by her ‘prosthetics’ and how ‘real’ she looks, everybody’s won over by their common sense—this is just some employee wearing a suit for a publicity stunt.
As she grants endless numbers of selfie requests by her instant posse of fans, I buy her a waterproof iPod knockoff called an iSquid. The thing is a garish, glittery, mermaid mix of colors. It’s also huge, the size of a small cell phone. But whatever, who cares? I have a hunch she’ll love it anyway.
I collect her, cramming business cards in way too many interested faces, telling them all to stop by Escape Worlds if they want to see her.
“Are you upset?” Inara asks me, her gaze flicking up to my face.
“No,” I bite out, almost feeding a guy a card when he doesn’t seem to see me at her side. “Why?”
“Because you’re growling,” Inara whispers. “I’ve been told this isn’t a natural human trait.”
“Sure it is,” I contend, leaning forward into another guy’s space. I make direct eye contact until he grows uncomfortable enough to glance away, and I show him my teeth in triumph and warning as I take her hand. “Let’s go.”
Inara laces her fingers with mine, and I’d swear she sounds like she’s smiling. “I never thought I’d approve of possessive aggression, but… I’m feeling oddly receptive. Thank you, Matt.”
I’m barely tracking her words, eyes scanning the crowd. The mostly male crowd.
When we’re sliding into my car’s seats, I finally relax. And I remember the whole purpose of the trip. I pass Inara the bag I was death-clutching and largely forgot about. “Here.”
“What is this?” Her gaze bounces from my eyes to the plastic hiding her gift.
“Something I think you’ll like,” I tell her.
She’s overcome with the fact that I bought something for her. “Matt! Oh my stars—you shouldn’t have obtained a gift for me—”
Her shining eyes and awestruck face make me smile. I brush her hands away from the bag and haul out the iSquid. “You don’t even know what it is yet. Here. It plays music.”
Her clawed hand presses to her chest. “I think my hearts just stopped. You got me a gadget to play Earth music?”
“Yeah,” I murmur. “You were having so much fun with my stereo, I got you a little one you can take anywhere. Once I get the effing packaging off, geez. I need my knife—”
Immediately, she’s sticking her tailblade in my face.
“Damn,” I say, eyes flying to hers. “This is handy.”
She smiles at me shyly. “It actually is.”
“No, I believe it.” I hold up the clamshell plastic and indicate where she should slice it. “Get it here and I can peel it open, please.”
Grabbing up the pre-paid song card she’ll need, I’m about to show her how to load songs on the thing—I listened for like three full minutes as the clerk gave me the low-down on how to do it as I also watched with furious intensity as Inara got mobbed by guys who were fawning and slobbering over her (which reminds me... I think we need to switch her into some sort of robe-like costume. Something neck to ankle-length. I’m going to suggest a nun’s cassock.). I’m about to employ my sketchy second-hand knowledge of how to manage the song selection when Inara deftly traverses the menu and gets there all by herself.
“You can read English?” I ask.
“Of course. I was thrilled the day reading abilities became available through the translator upgrades,” she gushes. Her eyes are all for the tiny screen. “Oooh, what do I like?”
“You can probably find a sample off to the side—”
Music starts to play, proving she’s found it before I could get out my suggestion. “It’s like you come from a technologically advanced society and you’ve got this aptitude for gadgets I should probably remember to respect,” I say to no one.
Inara laughs.
My heart squeezes like it gets sucker punched. And it likes the feeling.
Wisely, I do not look over at her. I buckle up and remind her to do the same as I put the car in gear with the intent to back us out of our spot and drive us to work.
Because I’m avoiding the sight of her pretty face as the sound of her pretty laughter bounces between my ears and travels down to the center of my chest like I’m a tuning fork, I don’t see it coming when Inara leans in and kisses me.
Just the side of my face. It’s quick, and there’s no heat—it’s just a peck of thanks. It’s gratitude. It’s… sweetness.
My heart does a weird thing.
It flops like a fish that’s been hooked and tossed on the bank.
I drive all the way to work, but my heart never does make it back into the big lake of freedom. I risk one glance—just one—at Inara, and our gazes instantly lock.
She grins at me, earbuds in her long ears, her reflective eyes shining and bright with thrill.
And the moment our eyes connect, it’s official. I’m a goner for an alien.
Of course, it’ll take me a little time before I fully realize that.
CHAPTER 12
The next forty-five minutes fly by with me in some kind of daze more appropriate for Bambi-the-damn-cartoon-deer than me, Matt, full-grown human man.
Because I think I’m twitterpated.
I don’t remember much of the drive—except for Inara thanking me sweetly. Throatily, in her alien sex-kitten voice. But we somehow arrive at work.
I guess I unlocked the door. I vaguely remember setting up the rooms. But man, everything was a blur. Luckily, the room-setup portion of the day is perfect for when you’re stuck in your thoughts. Thankfully, I don’t have to do any cleaning, because I wouldn’t trust me with so much as a bottle of Pine-sol right now. I’m sure I’d manage to spill it down myself or squirt it into my distracted eyes (yeah, I’m distracted: I’ve caught myself staring at Inara a time or twenty-five since we clocked in. That I kept count of).
Four years ago, the cleaning situation was a different story. I was the lone crewmember in an unsung hero way, playing front man and maid service, absolutely, completely slaving for this place. It was a big job, and I never truly appreciated harried mothers everywhere who mop floors only to watch kids mess them up until I was mopping floors and watching fifty, sixty, seventy pairs of feet tromp on my hard work every night. Now I hire out cleaning to Stillwaters, a company whose workforce is made of men and women who have intellectual and physical disabilities. God bless their hardworking hands, they saved people—I was starting to give death stares to every person who didn’t wipe their feet on the welcome mats, and scowling at paying customers is sort of a frowned-upon as a business practice. So is murder.