Page 44 of Did It Have To Be Gnomes?!
Chapter Fourteen
Winter
Of course it would be the cellar. Why wouldn’t Lyric lead us over to a creepy as hell cellar door? I mean, obviously if there was dark fucking magic somewhere, it’d be inside a dark, dank, scary place, right?
All three of us stood there, staring at the cellar door with frowns on our faces.
It was old, metal, and covered in rust, looking like it didn’t belong anywhere near the neat and beautiful mansion it was attached to. The door was so out of place, I couldn’t help butwonder if someone stole the real door and replaced it with this monstrosity as some kind of weird joke.
Of course, that was absolutely ridiculous, and luckily, I was able to keep my mouth from blurting that out—yay, mouth!—because I was sure Miles would think I was even weirder than he already did.
The one good thing about this wild situation? When I tugged Miles along, keeping one of our hands together, he didn’t pull away. So here I stood with the guy I was crushing on holding my hand and debating whether we should go inside the dark cellar where we’d probably be ax-murdered together.
Great. Now Lyric had me thinking about being ax-murdered too. Lovely.
Miles sighed. “Um… maybe we should see if I even have a key? We can’t just break in.”
“I’m sure there’s a way in from inside the house—mansion, whatever.” Lyric gestured to it. “We just have to find the basement door.”
I shook my head at them. “No way. We’re not going back in there. Not unless we figure out why they’re attacking us. We have no idea where the door to the basement even is, and I’m not letting either of you traipse around a giant house with tiny, half-naked demons attacking us.”
Miles snorted. “Half-naked demons? I like that. I’m totally calling gnomes half-naked demons from now on.” I shoulder-bumped him, and he sent me a smile before turning back to Lyric. “I agree with Winter.”
“That’s because I’m always right.”
“Okay, slow your roll, there, Mr. White Knight, before you get a big head.”
I almost saidOh, I’ll show you a big head alright, but managed to keep my mouth shut. Again.Two for two, mouth. Woohoo!
Somehow, even though Miles didn’t know me very well yet, he saw right through me.
He pointed at my face. “Don’t even say it.”
Lyric burst out laughing. “He has your number already, boo.”
I flipped them off, shot Miles a wink, then reached into his pocket. His eyes went wide, but all I did was fish out the keys the client gave him. With a grin, I reluctantly released his hand, turned to the cellar door, and started messing with the padlock.
It wasn’t difficult to find the right key, and I was relieved when I managed to get the lock open. I half expected a zombie or something to jump out at me when I pulled the door open, but nothing happened.
I looked at my best friend, then at my… Miles and gave them both a nod.
“We stick together and watch each other’s backs. If we see a group of gnomes, we retreat, okay?”
Lyric sighed dramatically. “Why does it sound like we’re going into battle?”
“Because we kind of are?”
They rolled their eyes. “I’m usually the more dramatic one out of the two of us. Stop taking my lines.”
Miles and I both snorted at them, then I waved them off and looked at Miles, holding my hand out again. “Together?”
He blew out a tense breath, then slipped his hand in mine. “Yeah, together.”
“Don’t even think about leaving me behind,” Lyric said.
Miles looked at them very seriously and said, “I would never.”
They stared at each other for another beat before both of them laughed, and my heart warmed at the sight of my favorite person in the world and someone I was hoping would become another favorite person getting along.
