Page 33 of Glitched Fates & Stolen Mates

He grabbed the one plate, carefully decanted the quiche onto it, then perched on a stool. I pulled open the cutlery drawer. And laughed.

And laughed.

And laughed.

“What?” Felix asked.

I turned around, brandishing a fork—the only fork in the drawer. The only piece of cutlery at all; not even a teaspoon remained.

“There’s only one… fork.”

Felix’s eyes went owlish behind his lenses.

“Oh.”

I went around to hop onto the stool beside him, and for a moment it swung slightly. Our legs brushed—just the barest contact—but it sent tingles shooting through me like I was a schoolboy holding hands for the first time.

I slid him the fork.

“Um… are we just going to share it?” he asked, staring at it like it had offended him.

“Unless you don’t want my germs.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” he said, quickly shovelling a forkful of food into his mouth before passing me the instrument.

I almost laughed, wondering how many passes of the fork Felix would last before he pretended he was full and bolted for the basement.

When I took the fork from him, still warm from his grip, my wolf practically purred. The metal carried the faintest hint of Felix’s coffee breath—sweet with too much sugar, familiar as breathing. I concentrated on not groaning as I took a bite of the quiche. Spinach and tomato with a nutty cheese, possibly gruyere, but all I could taste was him.

Fucking hell. I’d truly reached new levels of insanity, losing my mind over shared cutlery.

I couldn’t help my hyper-awareness of Felix’s limbs beside me. The way his knee angled towards mine. How his elbow bumped my arm when he reached for the fork.

How many times could we “accidentally” touch without him getting suspicious? I wasn’t going to find out, because I wasn’t a freak. Honestly.

“How’s Wren?” I asked, completely randomly, and Felix almost choked on his quiche. I wasn’t surprised; the question was so utterly out of left field. Felix was so private he never spoke about Wren.

After he swallowed, he whispered, “He’s okay?” like a question. Then added, probably just to fill the silence, “We’re going to a K-pop concert with my sister, Lily, Saturday after next. SEVENTEEN. You’ve probably never heard of them.”

I made a noise as if I was surprised and intrigued to hear he liked K-pop, though I’d heard it leaking out of his headphones numerous times. I’d even tried looking up the songs to find out more about them. Unfortunately, it all sounded like noise to me. Very loud, noisy noise.

“That sounds fun.” I said. “Does Wren often spend time with your sister?”

“No, it’s the first time they’ll meet.”

I battled violent waves of jealousy. After too much time passed, I finally asked, “Where is the concert?”

“The O2 Arena,” Felix said. His eyes flicked to mine, and he made a face. “Did you know it has a capacity of twenty thousand people?”

“That’s a lot of people,” I said.

We shared a smile.

“I had a panic attack in a large crowd once,” Felix confessed, gaze very focused on the fork.

“Oh,” I said. “I’m sure Wren will look after you, though.” I tried to sound as encouraging as I could while imagining Wren’s arm around Felix’s shoulders, protecting him from the crowd. “Make sure you don’t get crushed.”

Felix snorted. “Nah. Lily will elbow anyone who gets too close to me. She’s even smaller than I am, but ten times more feisty.”