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Several glasses of wine down and suddenly the night had begun to blur together. As a firm hand guided her down the carpeted hall, Filene blearily tried piecing the order of events together. The cold air had helped sober her up a bit, but her memory and vision were both still a bit hazy.
She had been closing the shop for the day when Crown came calling. Liam and Harry, the usual pair, had dropped in on her as the sun began to sink beneath the horizon. “Your last tip helped us clean house the other night,” Liam had said to her with a cheerful grin, “Let’s go out for celebratory drinks!”
Filene hadn’t seen a reason to decline. Over the past couple months, she had settled into her odd position of Crown’s informant. It really wasn’t all that different from her usual gossip habits…aside from the fact it often became a lead into a criminal underworld and more than a few casualties. She had been understandably disturbed immediately after accepting their terms for her own life and now she was leaning against one of those Cursed men, tipsy after spending hours with them drinking away like any other young adults out for a night of fun. Filene wouldn’t have believed it if she wasn’t currently living it.
At what she deduced was Victor’s behest, a few of the Crown men had started visiting her family’s store for normal, trivial reasons. She had to credit the man for at least trying to ease her into the new role. It wasn’t as if they were strangers entirely either, one had even been a frequent customer for years before they had their lives entwined as something more.
That same customer was the one now supporting her stumbling steps through the castle, a flush to his own cheeks in spite of his exasperated expression. “Hey, no falling asleep on me yet,” Harry chided, hauling her toward one of the empty guest rooms, “You shouldn’t have taken that mix from the bartender just because he said it was all the rage among the locals, downed it too fast and now look at you.”
Filene just dropped her head further onto his shoulder, making the brunette grunt in annoyance. “Shut up Harry…you’re hardly much better than I am,” she grumbled, using her free hand to try and rub at her face.
“I’m not the one about to collapse in the middle of the hallway,” Harry replied. A sly smile crossed his face as he loosened his grip on her shoulder just a little. The loss of support was enough to make Filene lose her footing as her center of balance wobbled. She barely managed to catch herself by clutching at Harry’s arm with far too much force.
“Harry! That was mean,” she pouted up at him. “Were you just going to leave me there if I fell?!”
Harry just shrugged nonchalantly. “I could have left you at the bar. I’m sure the plush carpeting of Crown Castle is much more comfortable than most beds,” he snickered.
“That didn’t answer my question,” Filene huffed, attempting to straighten herself without Harry’s help. She was able to stand on her own by now, Harry eying her warily from the side.
“Thought you wanted less help figuring things out,” Harry said, leaning over to tap her on the temple, “Hm? Weren’t you boasting about taking on the ‘Great Detective Gray’ just an hour ago? You sounded like a real rival Filene.”
Filene rounded on him, hands on her hips before they flew out to steady herself. She took a breath and shook her head. “Ugh, you’re teasing again…I totally could-! Just not right now,” she coughed into her fist.
“Doesn’t seem like you could be doing much of anything right now,” Harry observed with a quirk of his lips.
“‘Lying Fox Curse’ more like ‘antagonizing fox curse’,” Filene muttered under her breath. Harry didn’t seem at all bothered by her complaint, he just looked more amused.
They came to a stop just before a closed door, a sliver of moonlight hitting the handle just so. Harry didn’t move to open it. Filene raised a brow at him while he continued to watch with only a mild seeming interest. He gestured to the door, “Room’s all yours, try not to trip and turn the place into a crime scene.”
“I will not-” Filene was cut off by her foot catching in a small snag in the carpet, sending her careening face first into the door. “Ow…” She had thankfully been quite close to the door already, so the impact was minimal.
Harry’s chuckle echoed in the hall as he waved his hand at her. “I didn’t think you’d actually- pfft.”
Up Filene’s finger went, first to gesture rudely at him then to point in accusation. “And the culprit to my untimely death is you Harrison Gray!”
“Oh yeah? And how would you incriminate me?” Harry queried, playing along with the girl’s antics despite the late hour. She didn’t seem at all fazed by the bump to the head she had taken which indicated she was fine, especially if she was trying to tie them into a cheap mystery novel.
She was more aware now, the light ache in her skull somehow knocking a bit more sense back into her sobering up brain. Roger probably would have a few choice words for her if she ever brought that theory up to him. Filene took a step closer to him, chin tilted up at him. Their eyes met, a muted blend of minty green and deep blue muddled by a lingering haze of alcohol. “Let’s set the scene, a poor young woman finds herself being escorted by a seemingly well-intentioned man after a few too many drinks, not home but to a shared space where she knows the residents. He’s a regular at her shop, but little else is known about him. The witnesses all see them leave together. The two aren’t seen for the rest of the night…but the next morning a maid comes to check in on the woman and finds her with a fatal head wound. Of course, being the last person to see the woman, the man escorting her becomes the prime suspect,” she narrated with a fluid ease that betrayed her tipsy state. The words fell easily from her lips, each one a puzzle piece that fit into one cheap novel or another they had both read.
Harry smiled down at her with his head tilted to the side in thought. “The obvious culprit? We sure make a boring mystery,” he noted in amusement. “As if you’d let yourself die in such a trite way.”
She giggled in agreement. “Never~ but our great detective being the main suspect and trying to clear his name?”
“Nothing’s ever entirely original, but I can give it a pass,” Harry said.
“A tough critic,” Filene sighed as she ran a hand through the tangled ends of her hair. “...although you don’t make for a particularly good culprit. A means and opportunity, but what could motivate Harrison Gray to take the life of a mere bookbinder?”
“You don’t think I’d have a motive?” He asked, leaning forward as a sly smile pulled his lips upward. He was close enough that her nose pricked at the lingering scent of alcohol that clung to his clothes and lips. His own gaze was a study in restrained heat as his cheeks matched her own in shade. “I can think of more than a few. True to the story it was a simple mistake, wrong place and wrong time. Or maybe I’m a vexed customer who took things too far? Perhaps,” Harry continued, tracing her cheek with the back of his index finger, “a crime of passion born from a torrid affair?”
For a moment, Harry thought he had her outmaneuvered. Perhaps she’d shrink away and blush or even lean into it.
Instead, he was met with her doubling over in a fit of laughter. To say he was miffed in his own inebriated haze was an understatement. “A t-torrid affair,” she repeated through her giggles, struggling to get the words out between her gasps for air, “Harry you’d never! Of all things I can’t see you being that sort of man.”
A flash of something that felt uncomfortably like irritation flashed through him, clashing with the flicker of pride he felt at her easy admission of how she viewed him. He was far from noble, but she did apparently believe him to have a bare minimum set of standards. His hand landed with a decisive thud next to her head, braced against the door of the guest room and making her tilt her head up at him in a bleary sort of confusion.
“You shouldn’t be trusting villains so easily, Filene.” His voice was a low murmur in her ear, her name rolling off his alcohol loosened tongue like a silky caress.
She blinked at him, blue eyes still a bit watery from her bout of giggles. She waited for him to pull away, to flick her on the forehead with a teasing quip about getting her hopes up or letting her guard down around the wrong kind of people. It never came, the quiet between them filled only by her own soft breaths. As the seconds ticked by, she became increasingly aware of his palm pressed against the door, the way his taller frame had her caged in against the solid door behind her. Her eyes drifted, the old spark of curiosity taking over as her gaze noted the top button of his shirt had fallen open, the way his weight leaned into his palm, and the heat of his lips skimming over the shell of her ear.
Filene felt herself leaning back, pressing herself against the door in a futile effort to escape the proximity he had created. It wasn’t like they hadn’t been in close contact before; there were fleeting moments of being pulled aside, of their hands crossing at the same shelf, simple daily occurrences that neither seemed to think much about. This was different, deliberate in a way that made her fingers twitch in anticipation. Harrison Gray was proving himself to be more of an enigma than the novels they often discussed.
“You don’t play fair Harry…” Filene mumbled, her hand inching up the door to rest on the handle. All it would take was one turn, one swift move that she hopefully wouldn’t trip over and she’d be safely behind a closed door. They’d be distanced by a sturdy, unfeeling wall.
He smirked down at her, the hand that he had rested against the door slid down, coming to enclose around her own. She jolted from the sudden contact, suddenly and vividly aware of his raised temperature, how much larger his hand was as he slowly began to press down, the handle giving way to the pressure. “Not much of a challenge if I gave everything away,” he laughed, a soft breathy sound that prickled against her cheek.
The door began to give way behind her, falling open as Harry slowly walked her back. Step by step, he held her gaze with a playful expression taunting her into a game of his own. Filene pursed her lips as the back of her knees hit the edge of the bed, bringing the two of them to a stalemate. “How sly of you,” she said, “full of ulterior motives.”
Harry’s expression didn’t waver. “I told Liam I’d get you back safely, I believe I’ve held up my end of that agreement.”
“I don’t recall anything about needing to tuck me into bed like a child,” Filene frowned.
He didn’t reply immediately, merely tilting his head to the side as he trailed his fingertips along the back of her hand. The ticklish sensation made her breath catch. “I could,” he teased, “put you to bed and pull the covers up like a good escort. But I don’t think that’s what you want right now, is it Filene?”
The questioning tone was laced with something other than his usual ribbing at her. She quirked her lips up at him, “You’re drunk Harry.” The droll statement was accompanied by a soft poke to his cheek, “Your cheek is still warm, just like how you made me test it earlier.”
Harry had almost forgotten their brief banter over his sobriety at the bar. It had been a short quip, a simple ripple in the rush of the evening. It had been an offhand remark about how hanging out with Liam so long had gotten him tipsy and sensing an opportunity to prod at his company he had urged her to test his temperature. Perhaps a bit tipsy herself, Filene had pinched at his cheek with a giggle rather than any demure touches of her hand. They had descended into another slurred back and forth after that, the short skinship fading from mind until now.
“You don’t believe that, not really,” Harry replied, a slightly smug air about him. At the very least, she didn’t believe that any sort of drunkenness was the sole reason behind his behavior. He let the words linger in the air, the subtle reminder that he could see right through her no matter how clever she played at being. “Did you want me to leave?”
The blunt question left no more room for being coy. The basic ‘yes’ or ‘no’ of an interrogation hung over her like a judge’s gavel about to drop.
Part of him thought she’d start pouting more, pushing back against his unfairness in using his ability for something so seemingly trivial. At first that’s what it seemed like. Her eyes narrowed at him, searching even behind the drowsy droop of her eyelids. Finally, she let out a resigned exhale, “No.”
He didn’t even need his Curse to know she wasn’t lying. The flush to her ears couldn’t be written off as the alcohol, nor could the way her eyes continued to flit about his form with more than investigative curiosity. His finger curled around the dangling ribbon tied daintily around her collar, one last chance before he set to unraveling her completely.
All it took was one fluid tug as the ribbon fell to the floor, taking what remained of their easygoing night with it.