When Perfect Meets Crazy novel Chapter 45

It had been less than twenty four hours since my epically embarrassing moment and thankfully, Ian and I were pretending it hadn’t happened. It wasn’t much in the way of comfort but I was desperate enough to take anything I could get. It was that mortifying.

I was also being extra snarky to cover it up. I couldn’t help it. Knowing what I had done, how cringe worthy my reaction was, I couldn’t not do everything to erase the mental image. He had only himself to blame anyways.

“So...,” he drawled, eyeing me cautiously as we re-shelved the books.

“What?” My tone was less than friendly.

“My sister’s tea party is tomorrow.”

I bristled, thanking God for my black melanin endowed blush resistant skin. Did my outburst last night make him feel like he now had to report his every move to me? It certainly couldn’t get any more embarrassing than this.

“Okay,” I drawled as casually as I could manage, then arched a brow.

The ‘why are you telling me this’ was loudly implied.

“I was supposed to take Tammy and... well, obviously that’s not happening anymore. Apparently, I can’t not show up without a date. It’s ‘just not done.’ It’ll supposedly ruin everything.” He rolled his eyes exasperatedly.

It was craftily done but I could tell. He was avoiding my gaze.

“Okay?” I frowned, eyes narrowing with suspicion.

“Would you...” He swallowed, nervous interlinking and unlinking his fingers. “A lot of people don’t know I’m home. I can’t tell anyone else without them asking questions about why I took time off.”

I nodded slowly. I understood that, what I didn’t understand was his sheepish attitude.

“I uhh... What I’m asking is...” He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down conspicuously.

“What? Spit it out.”

“Would you... go with me? Not like a date. I know you have Trevor. Just uhm..., to not ruin the party.”

I frowned. It was a relatively harmless request. At least it seemed so from where I was standing. I wasn’t seeing the need for his shy act.

“Is that all?” I asked, suspicion coloring my tone.

“Yeah.” He nodded a little too enthusiastically.

I mulled the idea over. If he owed me one, getting over this current awkwardness would probably be easier. Or hopefully, something embarrassing would happen to him too there and we'd be equal.

“Fine.” I was still very much suspicious. “I’ll do it.”

“Thank you.” He sighed in relief.

My frown deepened. Was I really so scary that he had to go through a whole anxiety cycle just to ask me for a favour? I knew I wasn’t the approachable type but I figured our friendship –if I could really call it that- was past that stage. That he had me figured out already. It was both relieving and aggrieving to find out that he hadn’t.

“So how’s the mission going?” I asked, to distract myself from wayward thoughts.

“Not good.” He sighed. His shoulders drooped with disappointment. “I have to go back to school soon and we still haven’t figured anything out. I’m just... tired. I’m tired of fighting. Of acting. And Townsend. It’s getting to him even more. He has lot riding on this. It’s just so frustrating that we have absolutely nothing.”

My mind was cast back to my first and only time at the arena. To our shocking encounter. To those people who misled me.

I bit my lip.

If I was right about them -the people who misled me- and they were, in fact, connected to the supposed drug network, there was no way Ian would’ve known about them since they left about two-thirds through the matches. Like I had that day. He was probably looking for people leaving towards the end or midway since that was more common.

He would have been fighting or in his changing room prepping for a fight at the two-third point. Townsend, on the other hand, might have been able to catch them but, to be fair, they were right in front of me that day and I still lost them. Maybe they just were that good.

I made the decision before I even realized I was opening my mouth to speak.

“Your next match is today right?” I asked. “I’ll come with.”

I was going to figure this out once and for all.

“What?” Confusion colored his features. “Why? You hate... You don’t... You think going to that place is the worst decision you ever made. You said you’d kill me if I ever took you back there.”

“I didn’t say that.” I waved his argument away with a flick of my wrist. “I said I’d kill you if you took me there or anywhere illegal. It was a limited promise. Just for that day. But you took me to get ice cream. Hence why you’re still alive.”

“You know,” he said, gazing down at me with an amused light in his eyes, “you make threats so casually.”

I smiled, rose to my feet and walked away. I could feel his gaze on me as I did. I couldn’t help but smirk.

I called over my shoulder as I left, “I carry them out casually too.”

“Are you sure about this?” he asked, for the umpteenth time.

It was all I could do not to sigh.

Another girl might have found it cute that he was so worried but I was irked. I made the decision to come here. I was obviously sure. Given my track record, there was honestly no need to ask me that twelve times. I knew what I was doing quite unlike him.

If anything, I should’ve been the one asking him that. Since I was willing to respect his seriously questionable decisions, the least he could do was pretend to trust mine.

“If you ask me that one more time, I will punch you,” I stated, turning my head so he could see my serious expression.

The arena was rapidly starting to fill up. We were seated in my car, watching people go in. His match was the second to the last so he was free to sit with me.

“You should go.” I said, nodding to the almost empty parking lot. “Find me here after. Or at home if I’m not here.”

He nodded and we parted ways. Both of us going through different entrances.

The smell of the arena instantly assaulted my nose. It was even worse than I remembered. I wrinkled my nose in distaste, picking my way over to a good vantage point from which I could keep an eye on both exits. My surveillance post wasn’t as good as I would’ve like but I wasn’t in a place to make demands.

If my theory was correct -and I really hoped it was- then this could all end nicely by weekend.

I watched the first half of Ian’s match, flinching and silently cussing every time a punch or kick got past his defences. He was good. Really good but his opponent was good too. Fortunately, unlike Ian, his bulk got in the way of his speed. He wasn’t able to land as many blows but each one he did counted. I couldn’t help wincing every time it happened.

Ian, unsurprisingly, had a lot of fans. More, it seemed, than the other players. The second he stepped into the ring, the cheers went wild. He stepped in, faced the crowd, scanning for something. Someone. I wasn’t sure if it was me or whoever he and Townsend were hoping to catch. Despite that, it still took all my willpower not to grin back when his eyes found me in the crowd and his lips stretched into a purely male egotistic smile. Idiot.

I smiled at his figure one more time even though he was too busy with the match to notice. Then, I quietly slipped out of room, my feet taking me in the same direction I had gone the last time.

I hadn’t seen anyone suspicious slip out while I was on watch but as I trudged on, I heard footsteps ahead. Sending up a quick prayer of thanks that I had worn padded sandals as opposed to heeled boots, I crept along.

I vaguely recognized the area I had lost sight of them last time as we neared it. I increased my pace till I had them in my sights. I sent up another prayer of gratitude that the arena was set with circular corridors that allowed me to follow from a close distance while still keeping out of their sight.

I watched carefully, my phone tightly gripped in my hand so I could pretend I was texting in case I got caught.

One man in the group, a man I recognised from last time, stepped forward and pressed both of his hands to two spots on the wall that were too odd to be random. I filed the information away in my brain, all but forgetting about my texting act. I watched like a hawk as his left hand moved away to reveal a dial.

A distant part of my mind prayed it wasn’t a biometric scanner he had initially pressed his hands against.

From where I stood, I couldn’t see what numbers he turned the dial to but regardless, I memorized the directions which his wrist moved to. Eight o’clock. Ten or eleven o’clock. Four o’clock and two o’clock.

A doorway opened in the seemingly seamless wall and my targets disappeared through it. I let out a sigh of relief and smiled to myself. Mission accomplished.

It was so easy, so smooth, a part of me almost couldn’t believe this was it. My heart was pounding though, a gentle reminder that it was, in fact, real.

I turned back, ready to return to the audience when a dark figure filled my field of vision, a hand clamping down on my mouth before I could scream.