Secret Worlds (37 page)

“Sorry,” I mumbled, regaining my balance.

High heels—especially of the strappy variety—were not my forte, but Ivory had insisted the Eskimo boots stay parked in my closet tonight.

“I think you have the wrong address.” I waved a hand, indicating the lone warehouse and long-abandoned gas station on the other side of the parking lot.

“This is Club Flesh.” Amusement laced her voice. “You’ll love it, trust me.”

I would have loved anything indoors at this point. The air was far too cold for late September. I nodded toward a steel door lit by a lone, broken streetlamp. “We going in?”

Ivory grinned. “That door’s just for show.”

Turned out the real entrance was the storm cellar doors on the side of the building closest to the forest. Ivory pressed a brick jutting out from the wall, and the storm doors opened. Faint notes of music, seductive and enchanting, carried on the air. I peeked in, only able to make out the first few concrete steps descending into the subterranean depths.

Talk about an underground club. The design must have cost a fortune yet seemed like a lawsuit waiting to happen.

Ivory led me down the dark stairway. My nerves kicked up, but once the light source ahead revealed the last few steps, my heart rate slowed. When we reached the landing, the doors clanged shut, and I jumped.

“Door sensors,” Ivory said offhandedly. She sauntered through the dimly lit stone passage, heels clicking in an even, upbeat staccato.

The eerie dance music grew louder as we walked toward a distant, crimson door. An imposing figure emerged from the darkness, powerful arms folded across his chest and black hair slicked back from the high slope of his forehead.

Ivory’s hand slipped from mine as she bounced up on her toes to plant a kiss on his cheek. “Hey, Theron, busy night?”

“You vouchin’ for that one?” He nodded toward me.

“Sure am. Now, don’t give me a hard time. Let us through.”

Theron spoke in a low, unintelligible rumble, but he must have said, ‘Go on in,’ because he opened the door and stepped aside.

Ivory patted his shoulder. “Lighten up, will ya?”

Once inside, Ivory leaned close, her voice overpowering the thundering music. “Pretty neat, right?

‘Neat’ might not have been the word I would use for the wine-colored walls, stone flooring, and black tables. Gloomy, maybe, if a place can be gloomy and classy at the same time.

I smiled. “It’s…nice. Yeah.”

Ivory pulled me past the bar and around the crowded dance floor to snag us a booth in the back corner of the club. A buxom waitress, bulging from her black patent-leather skirt and a red corset, came to take our order. Her springy blonde curls bounced even after she stopped, and her cheeks were bright from too much rouge.

“I’ll take one of the house’s reds.” Ivory snapped the menu shut and handed it back.

I reviewed the list, trying to decide.

The waitress used her whole body to roll her eyes. Good thing, too, because I wouldn’t have noticed her annoyance otherwise.

“Are you going to order, or what?” she asked.

Ivory pointed to a selection on my menu. “You’d love their Bordeaux. It’s fabulous.”

“Okay, the Bordeaux it is.”

Eye-Roll Barbie snapped her order pad closed and stomped off. She returned impossibly fast and slammed our drinks—wine served in tall beer glasses—on the table.

“Sixteen-forty.” She held her hand out and tapped her foot until Ivory forked over the cash.

Once she took off, I turned back to Ivory. “So where’s the ever-elusive Adrian?”

“Books, Sophia? Really?” Ivory frowned. “He’s the DJ. We’ll catch up with him after hours. For now, we drink!”

Great
.

For the next hour, we chatted while tossing back drink after drink. I wished I could tell her about the voices, but my gut told me to wait, to test the waters first before revealing something that would most certainly make me sound crazy.

***

IVORY CONVINCED me to join her on the dance floor. The dark music quickened my pulse and one song blended into the next: smooth, enchanting, hypnotic.

A gathering of voices, somehow clearer than the music, swelled around me, reminding me of the real reason I’d agreed to come along. If I didn’t take a break, I’d burn out before I got a chance to talk to Adrian about his books. I hollered to Ivory that I would meet her at the table.

On my way, I passed a group of women piled into one side of a booth, crowding a decent-enough man. Two other men sat across from them. The lady-killer captured my gaze, and a cool sensation, followed by warmth, tingled my brain. For the first time in weeks, my mind grew quiet. But, instead of the calm I expected, the silence was unsettling.

He leaned across the table to one of his male friends. After they exchanged words, the friend rose and approached me.

“His name is Marcus,” the friend of the woman-collector said, leaning in close and speaking over the music. He was shorter than me and smelled of beer and disinfectant. “He’s visiting from Damascus. Would you like to join him?”

No thanks.
“I’m sorry, I was just—” I glanced around for an excuse, but found nothing. “You’ll have to excuse me.”

Dazed, I hurried back to my table, plopped into my seat, and scanned the crowd for Ivory.

But Ivory was not who caught my attention first.

A young man by the bar, clad in dark-washed jeans, took a final sip of his wine and slipped a tip for the bartender under his glass. His fitted black shirt showed the confident set of his shoulders, the contour of his chest, and his trim waist. The way he dressed, the way he carried himself…he looked both entirely in control and completely reckless at the same time, standing out in the sea of people as though the crowd had parted around him, though that wasn’t the case.

The case was, he was sexy as hell.

And I hated him for it.

When his gaze captured mine, he offered the briefest of smiles. A curious swooping pulled at my stomach, and I quickly glanced away. When I dared to peek again, he’d seated himself at a nearby table beneath the golden glow of one of the wall sconces. I dreaded the idea he might catch me staring, but I couldn’t stop myself. His toasted-almond hair fell forward to shroud his eyes, and flickers of blue—or was it green?—peeked through the disheveled strands.

The whole thing felt strange, as though I’d seen him before, seen him from this same distance.

It was then, with his body turned away from the table and one foot resting on the opposite knee, that I realized how I knew him. His shoes—dull, black shoes with a red outsole—gave him away. He was the mystery man who’d been outside my window the night of my positive energy ritual.

I should’ve marched over to him and told him off, but what was I supposed to say—‘How dare you walk down a public street and look at a woman throwing flower petals out her window?’

His eyes flickered to mine as though my staring had drawn his attention. There was an intensity in his expression, something dark as his gaze slid over my body, assessing me, and I started surveying the room in hopes he’d think our eye contact had been accidental.

No one
looked at me like that, let alone someone so absurdly handsome.

I peered at him from under my eyelashes, but I couldn’t tell if he was still looking at me until too late. Until I’d already been caught checking him out.

He turned away, but it wasn’t shyness that averted his gaze. The strong lines of his jaw were softened by his uplifted cheeks and the curl of lips. He smirked, shaking his head.

Realization set in: He was laughing at me.

Heat rushed to my face, leaving me thankful for the club’s dim lighting, dark enough to hide the blush that surely reddened my cheeks.

Staring at my drink would be a safe bet. Drinks don’t stare back. I plucked nervously at the hem of my dress, wondering what the hell had come over me. I didn’t have time for this. I needed to find Adrian.

“Dance with me,” came a husky but gentle voice.

I looked up, and my heartbeat stuttered. It was
him
. How hadn’t I noticed him take the seat across from me?

The way he stared—his crisp, teal eyes pinning me—sent a current of warmth through my body, pulling the fear under and away. Even in the low lighting of the club, the stark contrast of blue and green in his eyes was evident, like the oceans off the coast of Greece.

Determined to appear unruffled, I tipped my drink against my lips and drew in a sip of my Bordeaux. The earthy wine provided a momentary relief to my rattled nerves.

“Do I know you?” I asked.

A half-smile rumpled the perfect symmetry of his face. He was even more gorgeous up close—fiercely beautiful, from chiseled cheekbones to strong, shaded jaw and attractive Roman nose. “Clearly you recognized me, no?”

“That doesn’t mean we’ve met,” I countered.

He knew he looked good, he knew I thought so, and now he was mocking me.
Great
.

“You’re funny when you’re angry,” he said.

“Glad you’re amused. Keep it up, and I should be able to keep you laughing all night.”

“All night?” The tumble of his hair obscured the sudden arch of his eyebrow.

I wanted to stay mad, but it was a lost cause. Annoyance had always been my defense against attraction, but his looks and candor were crippling. “You haven’t answered my question.”

He tilted his head to one side and scratched the nape of his neck. A grayish-pink scar lined the inside of his forearm, and I dropped my gaze, as though I’d somehow intruded into his life, though it was more like the other way around.

“Well?” I asked.

“I thought you wanted something. You were staring.”

“No I wasn’t,” I replied too quickly.

He crossed his arms, slouching back, and challenged me with a grin. “No?”

My pulse quickened and my breathing went shallow and I wished I would just disappear. This time, I wasn’t going to respond. He kept his gaze steady against mine, his dark, tangled lashes framing his eyes. Lauren would’ve recommended some special eyelash comb. Thinking of Lauren might help distract me from this gorgeous specimen sitting before me.

The roof of my mouth felt like the shell of a walnut. I wanted to swallow and lick my lips to relieve the dryness, but his staring made me hyper-conscious. His gaze dipped, and I felt a rush in my chest.

Was he checking me out? Was he aware of my erratic breathing or the rapidly beating pulse in my neck?

His gaze continued down.

To his watch.

Not
checking me out.

When he lifted his eyes to mine again, my insides filled with a chaotic energy. Attraction or warning, I didn’t know, but I couldn’t break away. The men in Belle Meadow had no interest in me, but this guy—he didn’t know me. He hadn’t heard the rumors, hadn’t heard about my mastery of the dark arts or how I sometimes painted demonic symbols on abandoned grain elevators.

The longer I went without speaking, the more uncertain I became that I’d find my voice again.

I crossed my arms. “So you’re stalking me, or what?”

He chuckled. “Pretty full of yourself, are you? Do all pretty girls think every man in a public place must be stalking them?”

What?
“I’m not—” Grrr. I refused to defend myself to his moronic accusations. Even if he had called me pretty. “It’s one thing you saw me through my bedroom window, but are you telling me you just so happened to show up here, too?”

“I must be pretty special to have followed you here but arrived first.” He reached into his pocket and slid a wrist bracelet across the table. The fine marker-script on the side of the band displayed today’s date beneath the club’s logo. “Happy hour discount—starts at eight here. You’d have gotten one if you’d arrived before nine. Now, then, perhaps I might inquire if
you
are stalking
me
?”

“Well—”

“Well what?” he asked smugly. “Believe me, darlin’, I’d prefer you weren’t here. It doesn’t bode well of your sensibilities.”

“My sensibilities?”

He smirked. “Tell me why you were watching me, and I will help you get out of whatever you’ve gotten yourself into.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Now he scowled. “Don’t test my patience. I’m offering you an out.”

What was his problem? “I have no idea—”

“Fine,” he said. The angry lines in his expression relaxed, but his posture remained slightly stiffer than it’d been minutes ago. “We’ll go with that for now.”

“If you would tell me what you’re talking about—”

“If you’ve truly only come here for the drinks, I recommend you find another place next time.”

“That won’t be necessary. I don’t go out much.”

“I can tell.”

Okay, so maybe I was being a little edgy. Ivory shouldn’t have let the hermit out to play. “Point taken.”

He rested his forearms on the table and leaned forward. “Was that a yes or a no to dancing?”

I shook my head, but my smile said ‘yes’. Not to mention Marcus was still staring—and in the least intriguing way. He gave me the creeps. If I was dancing with someone else, that might get the weirdo’s attention off me. I spotted Ivory dancing with another girl, perhaps a friend she’d met here before, and figured one dance without her wouldn’t hurt.

The man across from me stood and offered his hand. My palm warmed as I accepted, but when I rose to join him, my balance shifted. I wobbled, nearly falling right back into my seat.

He hooked his arm around my waist, supporting me against his body, his breath soft on my ear. “Careful there.”

At his sudden embrace, a small shock flashed through my body. After a moment, my vision steadied. With his biceps behind my back and his forearm against my side, I felt somehow smaller and safer at the same time. I tilted my face up, catching his gaze. The candlelight from the table danced inside his irises. He cocked one eyebrow slightly, his amused expression also somehow gentle.

The moment rapidly becoming too intimate, I tensed. I needed to put some distance between us, to ignore the unwanted fluttering in my stomach. I stepped back. The air in the room lacked the warmth and comfort of his body.