Page 93 of Nobody Told Me Thrift Shops Sell Stolen Dragon Heirlooms

“My mother taught me.”

Her smile gentled. “Did she use a phonograph to play the music? Sounds idyllic.”

I frowned at her.

“You mentioned something about her father’s old phonograph in the car,” she said.

I had mentioned it, but as an aside, not something to be remembered.

Quinn had remembered.

“Yes,” I said. “This was one of her favorites.”

Quinn’s hand softened in mine. “It’s beautiful.”

“It is.”

For several measures, we didn’t speak. I turned us carefully, keeping her clear of a couple drifting too close. She followed without hesitation now, the skirt of her dress moving around her legs. The city, the museum, the law firm, Marco Bellandi, every badly built room I’d ever tried to win—they receded under the quiet insistence of the melody.

Quinn’s face changed as we danced.

At first, she’d looked nervous, then amused. Now she looked almost wonderstruck, but not by the lavishness around us. Her wonder was more personal than that, as if, for a few minutes, something she’d thought belonged to other people had allowed her inside.

I had the uncomfortable sense that I was watching a wish form in real time.

Worse, I wanted to be worthy of standing inside it with her.

My understanding of love had always been solemn, almost burdensome. But now, as I was dancing with Quinn, I saw another possibility: attention could feel like delight before it became duty.

I gave a mental shake of my head. I barely knew Quinn Bradley. I shouldn’t even be thinking about these things in relation to her.

That was what reason supplied.

My body, traitorous and far less interested in logic, noted the warmth of her hand and her smile when she finally stopped counting steps.

“You’re thinking again,” she said softly, a teasing lilt in her voice.

The urge to answer honestly was unwise.

“I was thinking,” I said, “that you seem to be enjoying the gala.”

“I am.” Her eyes moved briefly over the ballroom. “I know it’s excessive and weird and full of people who probably have strong convictions about linen weights, but yes. I am.”

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“The excess?”

“Yes.”

“Some of it.” She considered that as we turned. “But I’ve spent a lot of my life outside spaces like this, imagining everyone inside them was either happier or meaner than they actually were. Tonight, mostly, they’re just people. Some generous. Some pompous. Some bored. Most of them are ignoring the servers, which I’ll be mad about forever, but the food is good, the music is wonderful, and a woman named Miriam used ancient Greek marital lore to stop her wife from being a jerk in public. So, you know. Range.”

I nearly missed a step.

Quinn’s eyes gleamed. “Did I almost break your dance prowess?”

“No.”

“I think I did.”