Chương 14: If She Didn't Know Any Better...

Avery reluctantly conceded that Angelo was right (to her friend's great delight and smugness) after Christian asked her out. She had absolutely no idea why he would be interested in her considering their limited and embarrassing interactions but she didn't have anything better to do so she said yes.

When he came to pick her up, she was struck by the thought that his hair looked the same way Mercury's did. Windblown from flying.

Then she chastised herself for being stupid because purposefully messy hair was popular these days. She supposed she simply missed him and was looking forward to tomorrow. She shouldn't be thinking about another man while on a date though. That was bad manners.

Perhaps she should have been more self-conscious after the whole bloody nose incident but Christian had been genuinely amused by her apology cake—she could tell—and that put her at ease. He was a good listener overall and easy to talk to even if she did catch him spacing out a few times.

It was strange. If she didn't know any better, she would say he was hearing something no one else could and doing his best to ignore it and keep his focus on her.

When Inferno attacked, she hadn't been expecting it in the slightest and froze in panic wondering what on earth she was supposed to do in this situation. She technically had the ability to take him down but she couldn't put the suit on with this many people watching.

Christian ended up fixing the problem for her by grabbing her and shoving her into the bathroom to hide. She had no idea what he thought he was doing—was he planning on hiding in the men's room?—but it gave her the opportunity to get involved. She may be a villain but she wouldn't stand by and watch people get hurt when she could stop it.

Not many people knew of Nox anyway because most of her missions were covert. Anyone that saw her would probably think she was some new hero.

Avery didn't expect to run into Mercury in the restaurant. He seemed offended that Inferno thought she was his sidekick and she had to play her very real hurt off as a joke. She shouldn't be hurt by that; they were nemeses. Of course he would be offended by the thought of being affiliated with her.

That sort of dampened her spirits. She had been so excited when she first saw him too.

Hurt as she may be, she didn't want him to get injured. His specialties were strength, speed, and agility. That wouldn't exactly work against a fire villain. He had probably been hesitating when she arrived because he couldn't figure out how to take Inferno down without hurting himself badly.

Avery took that problem into account and took Inferno down in no time at all. She needed to get back to hiding in the bathroom where Christian left her. If he sent Mercury in to look for her and she wasn't there, that would be incredibly suspicious.

And how did the man she loved repay her for her generosity? By beginning to fight her.

Ooh, she didn't have time for this! Since she really didn't want to hurt him twice in the space of two days, she ended up appealing to his hero's sensibilities by bringing up the bystanders.

It was a gamble; she had no idea if it would work. But ultimately his do-gooder personality worked against him and he let her go to focus on the people that needed to be evacuated from the building.

Avery knew he was one of the good ones. He weighed catching someone who constantly gave him trouble over several other lives and chose the latter. She expected no less from him.

She told him to take all the credit because if anyone knew that Nox had been involved in taking down Inferno that could cause trouble for her later, even though she wasn't very well known. She didn't want any further run-ins with other villains to potentially mess with her plans to take down Hunsacher.

Once that was taken care of, she snuck back into the bathroom and realized there were sobs coming from one of the stalls. She hadn't noticed anyone in here before but it might have been because they were scared out of their wits and hadn't wanted to come out.

"Hello? Is anyone in here?" Avery asked. "My name's Avery. I'm not going to hurt you."

The door opened and a girl about eight years old at a glance cautiously peeked out through the crack. When she saw it was a harmless-looking woman wearing a wrinkled dress (side effect of wearing one under the suit), she opened the door all the way.

"I heard lots of yelling and scary noises out there. What's happening? Where are my mom and dad?"

Avery felt sorry for her. She put a hand on the girl's shoulder to reassure her. "There's a fire in the restaurant but I'm sure your parents have already been evacuated. It's okay. Mercury's here; nothing bad is going to happen to you. He'll come get us out any minute."

She had seen him begin the evacuations already and had no doubt he was on his way. He was always dependable in a pinch as long as you weren't on the other side of the law. Like she usually was.

As if he knew she was talking about him, Mercury made an appearance in the doorway. "Are you two the only ones in here?"

Avery had already pushed her earlier bruised feelings aside so she smiled warmly at him. It was nice being able to do so without the helmet on. He never knew how often she sent smiles his way during their fights.

"Yeah. See, what did I tell you?" she asked the girl.

She was visibly excited at the sight of Mercury. "Wow! A real hero! You were right, Avery! Are you going to fly us out?"

"Yes. For the sake of time, I'm going to need to take both of you at once so I'm afraid it won't be very comfortable. Hold tight." He was always so polite about this! Other heroes she saw on television weren't nearly so considerate.

He flew them out and set them down safely across the street before flying back inside to check for stragglers. Avery was sure to stay with the girl—she never caught her name—until she was reunited with her extremely worried parents.

"Oh, Lily! I was so worried about you but they wouldn't let us go back in the building. Are you okay?" her mother fretted.

Lily nodded. "I'm fine, Mom. Avery found me and stayed with me until Mercury got there."

The woman turned to Avery with tears in her eyes and briefly let go of her daughter to clasp her hands. "Thank you so much for helping my baby! Is there anything I can do to repay you?"

She shook her head. "Don't worry about it; I was happy to help. I do need to find someone though so if you'll excuse me…"

"Of course! I won't keep you."

Scanning the crowd, Avery saw a lot of people—police officers, curious bystanders, victims of the attack, Mercury talking to another hero—but no Christian. Where was he? Had he not managed to get out in time?

That didn't seem right. Delta, a water hero she was vaguely familiar with because of the news, was putting out the fire and Mercury was depositing Inferno in front of the police. That must mean that everyone made it out of the building already.

What happened to him after he shoved her in the bathroom? Why would he even do that? She hadn't thought much of it at the time because she had been desperate to find a place to put on her suit but it was a strange thing to do.

She had never sought her crush out first—he always came to her both as Nox and the two times he rescued her—so she was hesitant about doing this. But she needed to know if he had seen Christian.

"Excuse me, Mercury?" Avery asked hesitantly. "When you were getting people out, did you happen to see a guy with brown hair and glasses wearing a blue shirt? I haven't seen him out here yet."

"No but I'm sure he'll turn up," Mercury said with a reassuring smile that made her heart skip a beat.

If he hadn't seen him, did that mean he got out on his own? Did he seriously chuck her in the bathroom and leave her there?! That seemed out of character considering how solicitous he had been when she had something as simple as a bloody nose.

"Thanks," she said to be polite even though the information wasn't helpful.

Without another word, he flew away. He probably had better things to do than stand around talking to a random bystander he didn't know.

Avery didn't have time to be concerned about that. She was too confused and simultaneously worried about her date. She may not have any feelings for him but he was a good person and if he got hurt, she would feel bad since he was only at this restaurant tonight because of her.