Page 81 of Game On

We went down to the street where my car was parked. Blaise opened the door for Veronica so she could get in, and I did the same for Lily as she got in the back with Blaise. Before long, we got on the road with Veronica’s Halloween playlist playing from my stereo.

“You know we’re gonna hear this all when we get there, right?” I asked.

“Don’t be a party pooper, Logan!” Veronica exclaimed.

“Sweets,” Blaise warned.

I shook my head at them.

It wasn’t too long of a drive to our destination, and I listened to the girls chat along the way while Blaise poked at his phone. We pulled up to the long driveway of Mac’s massive four-bedroom home, already littered with cars. Spooky decorations filled the lawn leading up to the front door, and the party looked like it was already underway.

We got out of the car and walked up the drive. When I knocked on the door, Natalia answered with a big smile on her face. Natalia was a tall Black woman with natural curls, and tonight she was dressed like a vampire, complete with a cape and fake blood painted down her chin.

“Hey, you made it,” she said. “Come on in. Mac’s around here somewhere.”

Natalia scanned our costumes, and when her eyes landed on Lily, she turned to me with a questioning look.

“Tali, this is my friend Lily. Lily, this is Mac’s wife, Natalia,” I introduced them.

Lily stuck out her hand, and the two women shook hands and introduced themselves.

“Friend, huh?” Natalia teased. “Is that what they’re calling it these days?”

Underneath the dark lights of the party, Lily’s cheeks reddened.

Natalia laughed. “I’m joking. Come on in and enjoy the party.”

“You have a lovely home,” Lily told her.

Natalia beamed. “Thank you. Enjoy, seriously. Mac loves Halloween, so he went all out. We even have a smoke machine.”

At that moment, a popular Halloween song came on the stereo, and Natalia turned around, laughing at her husband leading the charge of a dance in the center of her living room.

Blaise and Veronica had wandered off during the conversation. “You want a drink?” I asked Lily.

“Sure.”

I put a hand around her waist and bent my lips to her ear. “I’m very glad I got to see your cosplay.”

She grinned. “It’s not too much, right?”

“Princess,” I growled into her ear. “I want to see you wear it in the bedroom. You’re killing me.”

She gave me a naughty smile and turned around to face me. She put a hand against the ridiculous helmet on my head. “You really went all out.”

I grabbed her hand and kissed the back of it. “Gotta show my princess I’m her warrior.”

She fanned herself. “I need a drink. You in that costume is dangerous.”

I gave her a cocky grin. “I’m trying so hard to keep it in my pants tonight.”

“Who said you needed to do that?” she teased.

Fuck me.

Before I could give her a witty comeback, she dragged me by the hand into the kitchen.

That’s where we found my teammate Benny drinking a beer with his girlfriend Rox. She wore a floor-length black dress, and he wore a black suit. It took me a beat to realize what their costume was, and I only figured it out because he had shaved his beard, leaving only a small mustache. Next to him, Noah and Dinah were chatting with them. I was confused about Noah and Dinah’s costumes. They looked like hikers?