Only a couple of days had passed, but it was already obvious that Gwen had fit into our team perfectly.
We’d only had one actual mission since then, but our results had improved dramatically.
Even ordinary patrols had become much more effective thanks to our increased coverage area.
As for dealing with gangs, there was barely even a contest anymore.
They hadn’t stood much of a chance against Penny and me to begin with.
Now that we’d added a second Spider-Woman to the team, they practically disappeared the moment we showed up.
Of course, Penny and I had to tone things down a little so Gwen would feel comfortable.
Being the third wheel was always awkward, so we saved the affectionate stuff for when we were alone.
My relationship with Stacy, meanwhile, was still purely friendly.
We’d had a pretty good time walking around and waiting for Penny to return from the Daily Bugle, but things hadn’t gone any further than that.
There was no reason to rush.
In fact, I’d already rushed things when I started dating Parker.
I’d gotten incredibly lucky that the two of us clicked so well.
If things hadn’t worked out between us, Spider-Woman might never have joined our team at all.
And that would have been a serious problem.
Still, not everything depended on me.
In this world, nobody expected a guy to make the first move.
If Gwen was genuinely interested in me, there was a good chance she’d make a move herself sooner or later.
I couldn’t think of any reason to say no.
I liked her.
She was smart, beautiful, funny, and a little reckless.
Then again, it would be pretty hypocritical for a guy who’d thrown himself into becoming a superhero almost immediately after waking up in a completely new world, without even taking the time to properly understand the situation, to judge her for being reckless.
The news that Felicia Hardy existed in this world was met with what could only be described as genuine Buddhist calm.
I’d already given up trying to figure out which version of Marvel I was in or what the future had in store for me.
At this point, I was simply going to deal with things as they came.
It wasn’t exactly what I wanted, but I had no better option.
I knew even less about Black Cat than I did about Gwen.
She was hot, came from a wealthy family, and had apparently rejected Peter Parker in favor of some vampire named Morbius.
That was an embarrassingly small amount of information, but it wasn’t critical.
I didn’t remember her being connected to any particularly major events, so there was no reason to worry about her.
If we happened to run into each other while wearing our costumes, I’d see what she was capable of then.
There was no point in making a move against her ahead of time.
At the same time, I couldn’t simply write her off because there were things I didn’t know or couldn’t remember.
Just because something wasn’t in my memories didn’t mean it didn’t exist.
And judging someone based on a handful of fragmented memories wasn’t exactly fair either.
Unfortunately, the invitation to the ball presented us with a rather mundane problem.
Neither Penny nor I had anything suitable to wear.
So we dragged Gwen along with us.
Thankfully, the number of partners considered acceptable in this world made things like that perfectly normal.
Parker would probably be busy taking pictures of various wealthy people anyway, so I needed some company and, more importantly, protection from those same wealthy people.
Maybe I was overestimating just how cute my face was, but it was better to be safe than sorry.
So the three of us went shopping.
We’d been dealing with some financial difficulties lately, but Jameson had suddenly become incredibly generous and paid Penny a thousand bucks for her latest photographs.
As for me, I’d simply used the ancient and reliable strategy of asking Mom for money.
When Amanda heard that I was going to a ball, she didn’t hesitate to give me a pretty substantial amount.
Gwen had money of her own as well, so there was nothing standing in our way.
“Fifteen minutes already,” I said with a laugh as I looked at the stopwatch running on my phone.
“That’s not fair! You deliberately picked the first thing you saw!” Penny’s indignant voice came from inside the fitting room.
What was going on?
Well, the girls and I had gotten into a small argument.
They were absolutely convinced that I’d spend ages choosing my suit.
I was convinced I’d finish much faster than they would.
And, as it turned out, I was right.
We’d walked into a rather respectable Italian boutique, and with a little help from the friendly saleswomen, I’d quickly picked out a decent tuxedo at a relatively reasonable price.
I even had enough money left over for ice cream.
And for superhero expenses.
The girls, meanwhile, were taking their time.
It wasn’t quite as terrible as those stories usually made it sound, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying my victory.
Although, come to think of it, Penny and I were probably the only ones actually participating in the competition.
Gwen had supported her friend during our conversation about how long men and women needed to choose clothes, but she seemed to have an entirely different goal for this shopping trip.
“Come on, Sam. Give us a little head start. Not everyone is as confident about their appearance as you are,” came Gwen’s voice from the neighboring fitting room.
“Well? What do you think?”
Yep.
Gwen definitely wasn’t interested in participating in our little competition.
She had another objective.
She deliberately kept choosing the most revealing dresses she could find and showing them to me.
One had a neckline that looked ready to let her breasts fall right out.
Another barely covered her ass.
Somehow, she occasionally managed to combine both features in the same dress.
If she’d behaved like this in my original world, I’d have assumed she was, to put it mildly, an extremely promiscuous woman.
But here, I supposed it was roughly equivalent to a guy showing off his muscles to women.
Although in this world, the guy would probably be the one complaining about sexual harassment.
Apparently, Stacy had already figured out that I wasn’t the kind of person who would immediately run off and complain about something like that.
“I can see your panties.”
Technically, Gwen’s current dress was perfectly respectable.
There was just one problem.
The slit running up from the hem was far too high, revealing a small piece of her underwear.
“Hmm. You’re right. That’s not very elegant.”
The curtain closed again for a moment.
But Gwen had no intention of changing the dress.
When she stepped out again, the little piece of fabric had mysteriously disappeared.
“And now?”
“Now it’s perfect. The only way it could look better would be if you were naked.”
I delivered my verdict with the confidence of a true fashion expert.
Interestingly, Penny could clearly hear our conversation, but she didn’t interfere.
I was slightly worried that her insecurities might get the better of her and she’d start imagining things that weren’t there.
But when she came out to show me another dress, there wasn’t even a hint of displeasure on her face.
Apparently, she really did like Gwen.
Gwen clearly had no intention of backing down.
I couldn’t help wondering what had gotten into her.
Was she still annoyed that I’d managed to embarrass her last time?
Or was my lack of reaction simply encouraging her to push things further?
Either way, I wasn’t complaining.
The show was excellent, and I even had a front-row seat.
Judging by the mischievous expression on Gwen’s face, she clearly had something else to say.
I was genuinely curious about what she’d do next.
Was she seriously going to suggest taking everything off right here?
Unfortunately, I never got to find out.
Whether she’d deliberately decided to interrupt our little game before things went too far, or whether it was simply a coincidence, Penny chose that exact moment to step out of her fitting room.
“Oh my God! You have to get that!” Stacy exclaimed the moment she saw Parker.
“I agree,” I said with a smile.
“You look incredible.”
“Really?”
Penny clearly hadn’t expected her outfit to receive such an enthusiastic response, and she immediately became embarrassed.
The blue dress was almost exactly the same color as her eyes.
It was far more modest than anything Gwen had shown me, but it still did an excellent job of emphasizing Parker’s incredibly slender figure.
Penny tried on several more dresses afterward, but ultimately settled on the blue one.
Gwen, meanwhile, realized she was the only one who hadn’t chosen anything yet.
It took her only about twenty minutes to find a perfectly respectable dress.
It wasn’t as conservative as Parker’s, but it still didn’t reveal anything unnecessary.
Her sly expression, however, made one thing perfectly clear.
This was only round one.
I should prepare myself for the rematch.
We finished shopping at just the right time.
I needed to get home and make dinner.
I’d already been slacking off on that responsibility far too often lately.
Mom was understanding, of course, but I didn’t want to disappoint her.
That woman was already far too good to be true.
Gwen
When they walked Sam home, Penny received a goodbye kiss on the lips.
Gwen got one too, but only on the cheek.
After what she’d been doing at the store today, there was no way something that simple could embarrass her.
To put it mildly, she’d gone a little overboard.
That kind of aggressive flirting could just as easily have ended in an argument as it could have produced a positive result.
But that was one of the advantages of dealing with a guy as feminine as Sam.
In general, it was difficult to imagine him throwing a tantrum over anything.
She hadn’t actually intended to take things that far.
But every time Sam looked at her with obvious approval, she became bolder.
During her last stunt with the underwear, she’d been extremely tempted to take them off right in front of him and toss them into his lap just to see how he’d react.
Thankfully, she’d managed to restrain herself.
There was such a thing as going too far.
“Hey, Pen-Pen,” Gwen said to the girl walking beside her after they’d gotten some distance from Sam’s house.
“I noticed Sam didn’t even ask you to pay for his things. Is he always like that?”
Gwen giggled when Parker frowned at the nickname.
She couldn’t help herself.
Teasing this girl was simply too much fun.
“Almost always,” Penny eventually replied.
“I pay for us when we go to cafés or the movies, but most of the time he just chooses places where we don’t have to spend anything. Public parks, for example.”
That was very interesting information.
Sam already behaved unusually for a guy, even without taking all his superhero activities into account.
And now there was this.
Of course, it would be wrong to lump every guy together and claim they were all interested in money.
But it wouldn’t be wrong to say that a great many of them were exactly like that.
So, Sam was handsome.
He clearly wasn’t the type of guy who spent too much time worrying about his appearance.
Frankly, that only made the fact that he was so attractive even more impressive.
He wasn’t materialistic.
Penny’s words had confirmed suspicions Gwen had only recently begun to develop.
She liked Parker.
Penny was incredibly sweet, but she didn’t exactly strike Gwen as someone capable of financially supporting a guy like Sam.
Add in the fact that he had reacted so positively to Gwen’s behavior today, and it was difficult not to consider him almost perfect.
There was only one major drawback.
His superhero activities.
Gwen wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about having a boyfriend who constantly put himself in danger.
Still, she couldn’t deny that he’d already accomplished a lot.
He was the one who’d thought to check the institute.
Who knew what would have happened if he hadn’t been there?
He’d also found information about Ganali’s machine.
And he’d come up with the plan that ultimately helped them stop Dr. Connors.
That was seriously impressive.
“So, would you mind if…” Gwen hesitated, searching for the right words.
“If I tried dating him too?”
Penny didn’t look particularly surprised by the question.
Anyone with eyes could see the flirting between Gwen and Sam.
Still, she didn’t answer immediately.
Instead, she fell silent and thought carefully.
Gwen couldn’t blame her.
It wasn’t hard to notice that Parker had some self-esteem issues.
She was clearly afraid of being pushed aside if Sam started dating more girls.
And there was also the simple fact that nobody liked sharing.
Of course, every girl understood that being a guy’s only partner was practically impossible in this world.
But who wouldn’t want to prolong the period when a relationship was still just the two of them?
“No, I don’t mind,” Penny finally answered.
“Do I need to give you the whole speech about what will happen if you hurt him?”
“No.”
Gwen shook her head, barely suppressing the urge to say yes.
The thought of shy little Parker trying to threaten her was almost unbearably adorable.
In truth, Stacy was relieved that everything had gone so smoothly.
Asking the current girlfriend for permission before seriously pursuing a guy was really just a matter of courtesy.
The final decision belonged to the man, and only the man.
However, if she’d started pursuing Sam against Parker’s wishes, it could have seriously damaged both their friendship and the team.
Besides, based on what she’d learned about Sam so far, he would almost certainly have taken Parker’s side.
And then Gwen would have been left with nothing.
“But we could discuss something else,” Gwen said, raising her eyebrows suggestively.
“And what’s that?”
“How you’re going to help me get your boyfriend.”