Page 69 of Spearcrest Knight

She gives me the middle finger, which is unexpected coming from her and a little sexy.

There’s something particularly pretty about her today: she’s wearing black tights, a short denim skirt and a big grey sweater that looks irresistibly soft. She’s tied her hair back in a low, messy knot, and her cheeks are flushed from either the heat or the alcohol, reminding me of how she looked on the night of the party.

I need to stop getting distracted by her if I hope to get anywhere in this game. Or if I’m hoping to get through the night without embarrassing myself…

Sophie starts off exactly as one might expect: savagely competitive and mercilessly efficient. She pile-drives through the first half of the game with intimidating fervour. I’m not all that bothered about winning, mostly I’m just trying not to seem too stupid and not to let Sophie notice just how tipsy I'm gradually getting.

As the game goes on, however, it becomes pretty obvious that Sophie is getting quite tipsy herself.

She gives me long, glassy looks when I read the questions to her and then starts going off on wild lecture-like tangents instead of answering. When I get the answers to my own questions wrong, Sophie leans over to whisper clues and anagrams of the answers to help me.

Soon, I realise that Sophie Sutton isn’t quite so competitive at all when she’s had a few drinks.

“Come on, Evan, come on,” she says, patting my arm bracingly when I get stuck. “You've got this. You've got this, okay? Look, you’re already catching up with me.”

Just as I predicted, she’s been stuck on Sports for ages now, giving me time to slowly catch up to her. Of course, it’s not too hard catching up with her when she’s practically telling me the answers, but there’s something too endearing about her attempts to motivate me.

While I’m still lying in my initial position propped against a pile of cushions, Sophie has been slowly collapsing as the game has gone on: at first she was sitting with her legs tucked under her, then she went lower, propping herself on one elbow, then she was lying on her side, now she’s lying on her stomach, her chin cupped in one hand.

“Do youreallythink I can win this?” I ask her in my most heartfelt tone. “I’m not as smart as you.”

“Bullshit!” she exclaims, tapping my shoulder. “You’re smarter than you look. You just have to work harder. But I’m here to help, ok?”

“Ok, ok. But what do I get if I win?” I ask her, wondering how much I can push my luck.

“You can have more wine,” she says with a smirk.

“No, no, I’m pretty drunk.”

She laughs out loud, a big goofy laugh that makes my insides all warm and gooey.

“What are you talking about?” she exclaims. “You’re not pretty drunk,I’m pretty drunk!”

“I can see that,” I say, unable to stop myself from laughing. I sit up from my pile of cushions to lean over her and speak before my courage evaporates. “If I win, will you let me kiss you again?”

She shakes her head and sits up to face me. At first, I think she’s going to make one of her usual caustic replies, but she doesn’t. She leans forward, narrowing her dark eyes at me, and her lips curl into a slow grin.

The soft rainbow glow of the Christmas lights halos her pretty face like some strange angel as she speaks in a low, scratchy voice.

“You don’t have to win for that.”

21

Obliteration

Forasecond,I’mtoo stunned, both by her beauty and by her reply, to process her words. I blink at her, my heartbeat pounding in my throat.

“I don’t have to win?” I repeat faintly. “What do you mean, I don’t have to win?”

She gives a low laugh with that rough, hoarse voice, sending shivers down my spine. She’s close enough that I can smell her, the sweet vanilla smell mingled with the fragrance of wine.

Her hand reaches for my chest, and I stay utterly still, half-afraid that if I move I’ll scare her off. Her fingers curl in a fist in my sweatshirt, and she slowly pulls me towards her like she did that night in the peace garden.

An embarrassing sound escapes my throat, a sort of low groan that I can’t quite help. My heartbeat is now deafening, the rest of my senses all focused on Sophie. Sophie’s dark eyes, fixing mine with a half-bold, half-amused look. Sophie’s flushed cheeks and pretty lips. Sophie’s smell, sweet as caramel.

And then she pulls me to her, closing the distance between us and pressing her lips against mine. They are warm and soft and slightly wet.

It’s different from the party kiss. This is a chaste kiss, just her lips against mine, almost innocent, but a shock of pleasure surges through my body like an electric current.

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