chapter SIX
I tried to slip outside, but no luck.
“Davina!” Adam called out, hurried, and did my ears detect a little bit of guilt? I was pretty sure they did.
“Hey,” he called again and eagerly waved a hand.
Shelly unwound her tentacles around him, but one of her arms remained on his hip. It was intimate and I knew her smirk wasn’t coincidental. They both looked dressed up, but Adam had on a sleek buttoned-down black shirt that looked like it’d been ironed. He always looked nice, but this was a pay grade above that. Shelly wore a leather shirt fastened together by one big pearl button underneath her breasts. It added cleavage. Lots of cleavage. The girl knew how to dress. Even Kates would’ve been appreciative.
“Hi, Davy.” Shelly’s ruby red lips formed a perfect, unfriendly, smile.
Adam was blind. He beamed. “So… where are you going this evening?”
“More like morning, Adam.” Shelly laughed and patted his arm.
If I were a vamp, my fangs would’ve already been out.
“Oh yeah. I didn’t realize how late it was. We were just… talking. Time must’ve gotten away from us both.” Adam smiled nervously and shuffled on his feet.
He was uncomfortable. Good. He should be.
“Are you just going out?” Shelly asked this time. Her quick eyes skimmed me up and down. I wasn’t exactly dressed for a nightclub, but I knew I looked alright. How could a person go wrong with black? And it was tight. Tight always seemed to be good with guys, though that wasn’t why I wore it.
“Uh…” I opened my mouth, but closed it. I wasn’t sure what to say. I couldn’t tell them the truth, but I was a horrible liar.
Shelly’s eyes smarted. She asked, quick on the prowl, “Do you have a date?”
“A date?” Adam sounded taken aback, but he tried to hide it.
Oh yeah, bucko. I have a life besides you… wait. Was this what I wanted my future boyfriend to think? I wasn’t sure.
“Davina…”
I stiffened at that word and not because it was the name I started to loathe (no one can remember Davy), but because I was hit by the same cold blast as all the other times. It was followed by a host of shivers up and down my spine. Roane was able to make my name sound like a lover’s caress and as I turned to look at him, the way he strolled towards us, he looked like the perfect bad boy lover that all the good girls obsessed about. Plus, the whole supernatural predator thing molded to his form perfectly. He dressed like me all in black, but he ventured into leather land. He wore a black tee shirt over a pair of black leather pants. I never noticed how high his cheeks were, the angles seemed sharper and I realized it was because he had nearly shaved all of his hair off. He now sported a clean buzz cut and it made him look even more dangerous. I understood why Emily had a thing for him, but then again all vampires had an unnatural sex appeal.
Judging by Shelly and Adam’s reactions, both were aware of it. Adam seemed to stand taller while Shelly’s mouth could’ve dropped to the ground from her drool. Her eyes quickly darted back and forth from Roane to me. “Is this your date?”
I sucked in my breath as I waited for Roane’s response, but to my surprise there was none. I twisted back, prepared to see fury or something in those emotionless coal black eyes, but there was no reaction. He watched me steadily. So I gulped again and opened my mouth, but as I met Adam’s uncertain eyes I closed it with a snap. I had no idea what to say. If I said it wasn’t a date, they might ask where we were headed and then what? I couldn’t tell the truth. These two didn’t know about that world and I didn’t want them to know. Anyone who got involved with that world got hurt.
So I lied through my teeth and my fingernails cut into my palms, “Yes. It’s a date.”
Something slammed in Adam’s eyes and I felt effectively shut out.
Shelly’s smile lit up, but there was a calculating sheen there. I didn’t know how I felt about that, but I wanted to know exactly what she felt. I really, really wanted to know and before I realized it, I was already inside of her. Whoa—talk about multi-layered. The girl had it all, but the top emotion was selfishness. She wanted Adam, much more than me. Underneath that, she wanted to have sex with Roane, really badly and I even felt some of her calculation how to make that happen. She planned—no! I blinked, shaken, as I ripped myself out.
Shelly had plastered a fake smile on as she oozed, “…wonderful place. I highly recommend it. Right, Davina?”
“Uh…” I was a little mortified to realize that they’d had an entire conversation. “Yes. Exactly, but maybe not.” I learned long ago to always be vague when someone catches you at something. It never mattered what, just be vague. I’d never gone wrong yet and Shelly immediately supplied my question.
“The Shoilster. It’s a great club, right? Your… friend said that’s where you’re going.”
The Shoilster? That place was awful. The booths were plastic and cheap. The food looked decadent, but tasted like fish. All of it tasted like fish. Shelly was crazy. I smiled politely. “Well… yes, it’s wonderful at times, but not all the time. And really, we might not even go there.”
“Oh. I thought…” her eyes jumped to Roane, but to my shock, Shelly didn’t say a thing.
When I turned, I saw that Roane stared long and hard at her and I recognized that look. They did that when they wanted the other person to shut up. Craig had turned that look on me enough times. I couldn’t tell him to stop, not with Adam there, but I needed to do something. I might really hate Shelly, but even my enemy didn’t deserve to be on the other end of one of those stares. They just held a person immobile, like their thoughts were frozen in time. In my opinion, it violated their right and so I did the only thing that I could. I violated Roane’s right to privacy. I narrowed my eyes and I pushed through his shields. He had a lot of them, too many, but I got through and I read the first emotion. He was annoyed and exasperated, but I didn’t think it was with me or Shelly. I pushed further and found the same fierce determination to stand and stare death down.
I blinked, belatedly, and wondered where he got his motivation from. It might come in handy with a new diet I might need… I shook my head slightly and pushed even more. Vampires were a mass of swirling emotion. I’d been in enough to get a general feel, but this felt different. There was something… I couldn’t put my finger on it, but there was something different inside of him. He ran by a different set of codes than the others. I felt that and in that moment, I understood why he was the one to call. Blue hadn’t said it, not directly, but Kates respected this one. There was a reason… and then I felt a cold firm hand grasp my arm and I was wrenched out of him, physically and mentally. I gasped and blinked back abrupt tears—it happened sometimes when an empath was too deep. Then I looked up into Roane’s coal eyes.
He was furious. He’d been unemotional before, but he let me see that fury free and clear now. I gulped and my hand clamped onto his hand. Intending to try and yank his hold free, I couldn’t. I just wrapped my fingers around his arm. He was stronger than me. He wasn’t moving and I couldn’t make him move. We were deadlocked and then he said tersely, underneath his breath, “Stay. Out.”
“Davina?” Adam called from a distance. He was five feet away. I was the one far far away, still locked in a battle of wills with the vampire. “Davina!” Adam called again, more insistent this time.
Roane held my gaze captive. He held a dark promise in his if I didn’t adhere his warning. Well—two could play at that game. “Then don’t use your eye radar thing on my friends.”
He blinked slowly and released my arm, but it felt like some force still held me close. If he moved his arm an inch we would’ve been in an embrace. He murmured, almost sensually, “She’s not your friend.”
“I know that. It doesn’t matter. You don’t do it.”
His eyes judged me, like he wanted to call me a liar. “Fine. It’s your back for her knife.” Then he moved back, just an inch, and I felt like I could breathe.
“Davina!” Adam called again.
When I looked at Adam, I think my heart stopped. He looked utterly and completely concerned for my welfare. Shelly looked pissed off with her arms folded. Her eyes darted from Roane, to myself, and then to Adam.
“Hey…” Adam gentled his tone, but he stepped forward and touched my arm. “Are you okay? I mean…” He raised cautious eyes to Roane and quieted his tone. Little did he know that there was a vampire five feet away. “That didn’t look friendly. You know?”
“I’m fine.” I patted his arm reassuringly. “I promise. That was… it was just a little misunderstanding.”
Roane snorted behind me.
“So, you guys are going to the Shoilster? I haven’t been there. I’d like to come!” Adam exclaimed suddenly and a little bit shrilly.
“What? I mean…” Shelly was startled, but she recovered instantly. She linked her elbow through his and turned a charming smile towards us. “I mean, that’d be great. Let’s go. It could be, like, a double date?”
“A double date?” Adam asked, confused, as he shook his head. “No. We’d just be… hanging out, right?”
I sent Roane a helpless look, but he just smiled tightly and turned his back. Bastard vampire. “Well… okay, but I don’t know. I think. I guess, I—um—we could go for a little while?”
“Great.” Shelly was all for it.
“Great.” I echoed Shelly’s sentiments and surprised both of us when I slammed a hand on Roane’s (very) chiseled chest. We both jumped under the contact, but I gritted my teeth and grabbed his hand.
“Let’s… we’ll meet you there.”
“Uh…” Adam muttered.
Shelly locked her hands with his. “We’ll meet you there! Sounds like a plan.”
They were out the door before I could blink, literally. Once they were gone, it was just me and Roane. I gulped painfully. My hand was still on his chest and I felt him laughing. “Wha…?” I turned, dazed, when I saw an actual smile on his face.
I think I just wet my pants. “Stop!”
Roane just laughed harder and shook his head. Did I mention that my hand was still plastered to his chest? I didn’t think I could move it. “A double date? We’re on a date? I thought you were all about keeping your friend safe, but now I don’t know what’s more pathetic. You and this boy that you’re infatuated with or… the fact that I actually came here?” He chuckled again to himself and moved away.
My hand abruptly fell to my side. “Really? I’m pathetic?”
His laughter dissolved quickly and he sobered while he studied me a moment. Then he shook his head, almost gently, and chided, “No, it’s just your pursuit of being normal.”
My mouth went dry and my body went numb.
He added, impervious, “You’re not normal, but you’re so blind to who you are that you’re willing to do anything for that boy. And he is a boy, trust me.”
“I’m not blind.” I didn’t say anything about the ‘boy’ factor. “I am too normal.”
“No, you’re not.” He stepped closer, unnervingly so. Then he murmured and this time it was fully sensual, “You’re above normal. You just don’t want to admit it.”
“I have a roommate. I go to college. I skip classes. I volunteer at the hotline and I hate it! That’s normal. How can that not be normal?”
“And the fact that you’re telling a vampire all this?” Amusement flared in his depths, but it mingled with something else, something that sent a shiver down my spine and not one of those good ones.
“You’re not normal. When you accept that, you’ll accept your destiny.”
My destiny?
He turned to leave, but he seemed to glide from the room. I was left behind to echo, “I’m a college student. That’s my destiny… what destiny? I’m like everyone else.”
But there was no one in the lounge.
“Hey!” I called out, sharply.