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“All right. I will see you around.”
The warlock walked away with a wave. While Brian wasn’t Kin’s savior, the man had proven time and again that he was Ruby’s and was willing to do everything to keep her safe—and really, Ruby deserved that more than anything in the world. Maddox just wanted that for her.
Liar.
He ignored his traitorous musings. He looked away when Brian reached Ruby and the two hugged, with Pearl joining in but calling his name.
“Hey, handsome! Come join us!”
“Later,” he yelled back. “Need sleep. Thanks!”
Again, he felt Ruby’s eyes on him, but soon her excitement floated in the distance as Pearl seemed to catch them up on what they had missed.
“And where were you guys? Brian, you should have invited me along so I could visit Centro, too!”
Pearl’s voice grew faint. Maddox kept walking until his house was in sight, looking forward to getting out of his clothes and sleeping in his warm, comfortable bed—alone, with no woman to think of or long for.
And it was best to get used to that.
“Another drink?”
Rex was already making the drink before Maddox could even confirm, which had his lips twitching. There was something about being welcomed without questions and without hesitation that was heartwarming, the two picking up right where they left off. When the colorful concoction was in front of him, Maddox tilted his head.
“I feel like you are just trying to get me drunk, which is difficult considering I’m one-half of a species that rarely gets drunk.”
“Difficult doesn’t mean impossible,” Rex replied, hands flying to make his next drink for his next customer. “And there’s something different about you.”
“Different how?”
“I have been trying to get you to talk more than a few sentences every time you come in here, but it’s the first time where you are being a chatterbox.”
Maddox tried to recall what he and Rex had been talking about since he got here and realized he had been trying to explain the mechanics of a pirate ship and why there were good pirates—things he hadn’t openly discussed before, other than with Ruby. But it didn’t feel wrong talking about it to Rex, who came back every few minutes to keep listening in between his handling of customers.
“As long as I’m not revealing my murder plans and where I buried my victims.”
Rex made a tsk-tsk sound. “Oh, bummer. But trust me when I say it’s better not to tellthatto the others.”
The bartender gave the room a pointed look. Maddox bit back a laugh, already imagining how some of the warlocks and witches here would either throw a fit or demand his arrest if he ever joked around them like that.
“I won’t,” he promised. “Four more drinks, please.”
“At once?”
“At intervals. I’m in the mood to spend right now.”
“Good for us, then.”
Maddox downed his next drink with gusto, then did something different from his usual routine of hiding in a corner and listening to others. He engaged a lone man in conversation, getting short replies at first before the man seemed to decide he wasn’t so bad and eventually got chattier. He accepted drinks from a woman and bought her one back, politely declining her invite to her house but accepting the one to watch a witch display show next month. He bought more drinks for an elderly woman who came to his defense when a drunken warlock approached and hauled insults at him.
“Your foul mouth has no place here, you foolish drunk. Why don’t you back off now?”
The warlock blinked in recognition. “Anita, you know that wasn’t meant for you—”
“But my poor ears still heard it, you ass.”
“Anita, you know what I meant—”
“How about I tell your parents every disgusting slur you said here, and let them decide exactly what you meant?”
