Page 19 of Cosplay & Consequences

He put his hands in his pockets, grimacing. “If you want, my assistant can tell you-”

“It’s fine. I believe you,” I said, flatly. “There’s no way you made my boot heel break or twisted my ankle. I could have left you in the elevator or at the door. I initiated it, not you. You were-”

I grimaced. I hated to say it. But even today when I panicked on stage, he showed me who he was. Somewhat. “-a gentleman.”

The expression on his face was somewhere between confused and disappointed. “But you’re still angry with me.”

“What I’m angry with is that every time I think I’m going to see a decent rendition of the books I love, something comes around to fuck it up,” I said sharply. Sharp enough that he took a small step back from me.

I stood up, jabbing him in the chest with my index finger. “Oh, sure. You’ve got the look down. You can say the words, but you don’t know. You have no respect for the source and lore of this show, which millions of people have read and loved. You’re just playing games. You might as well have no soul.”

He stepped back further, his eyes blinking rapidly and his mouth hanging open. “Well, you see I-”

Somebody cleared their throat. We both turned our heads to see the blonde woman glaring at Daniel. He immediately deflated.

“I fucked up,” he admitted quickly. “Honestly, I fucked up, and I know you feel let down, but there’s others I care about who will probably murder me in my sleep, because I didn’t do what I was told.”

“That would be me,” the woman added. “I’m the one who’s going to kill him.”

He winced. “Paige-”

She didn’t let him finish and punched him in the shoulder. “You had a lesson plan. Did you do it?” She punched him in the shoulder again. “No. You had my notes. Did you read them?” She walloped him again on the shoulder. “No!”

Each time she hit him, Daniel would wince. He did nothing to stop her, he just took it. And she was not holding back.

I felt a lot of kinship with this woman. “I’m sorry, but I would really love to know who you are.”

Daniel tried to be polite as he rubbed his shoulder. “Jessica, this is my assistant, Paige.”

“I’m also his sister,” she said, shaking my hand. “And the one pounding the daylights out of him later. You want a video of that?”

“I’d love it.” I couldn’t help but smile at her.

“Are you two done planning my imminent demise?” he demanded.

“No!” we said simultaneously. He took another step back from us.

He held up his hands in a conciliatory manner. “If I may, there's one thing I want to address. It’s the pictures of us.”

I pursed my lips in irritation. “So, you did get pictures of me.”

“And video of you on the floor,” Paige added. “However, those will never be shared with anyone. Danny laid down the law last night when he came back from your room.”

Something snapped inside of me. “You told her?”

“Oh, sweetheart, he can’t hide anything from me,” she said with a smirk, which partially mollified me.

“Hide anything from whom?”

I turned to see Brayonna and Bennet coming up to check on me. I groaned inwardly. As much as I loved them, this was not the place for a reunion.

“Brayonna Risengard! I thought I saw you in the front row!”

I glared at Daniel for being so polite to my friend. How dare he?

The greeting instantly disarmed Bray, but her voice held no warmth. “Daniel. I’m surprised you remember me.”

“Gina talks about you and that campaign you did with her all the time. You should call her! She’d love a chance to play with you again. I watched all the episodes, and they were fantastic!” He then turned to Bennet. “And you’re Bennet! A pleasure to meet you. After we were done watching Debutantes and Dungeons, we watched Adventure High School on Megaverse20. That was brilliant!”