Chapter Two- Just Old Friends
823 Words
Wren
It was like the all the air left my lungs in a whoosh as our eyes found each other’s. I watched as her step faltered for half a second, terror written making her facial features sharper.
Terror?
Why would she be afraid of me? Me of all people?
Unless of course she thought I still worked for the very people she was running from.
The council.
Her fear was understandable but I hated seeing it on her face. Especially when she made my heart jump in my chest the way she did.
Every single feeling I had buried for over a hundred years bubbled up to the surface. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t think all I could do was stare at her.
Opal.
She was still beautiful.
Older sure, but she still had that fresh look. Her blonde hair was slightly shorter, but not by much. Her face more angular.
But most of all it was her eyes that were different. Sure they were still the same blue. The palest blue of a winters sky. But their light was gone.
She looked like a young woman in her twenties apart from those eyes. She looked haunted. Or maybe it was hunted.
“She’s very popular.” I had totally forgotten the red head by my side but as I turned to her guiltily I was happy to see that she didn’t seem put out at all by my attention being drawn elsewhere.
“Opal.” I whispered her name like a prayer. My fists clenched at my side as the love of my life gyrated some more much to the glee of the men around her stage.
My dragon wanted to kill all of them. Rip out the eyes that dared look upon my mate with such lust.
But she wasn’t my mate. She had chosen someone else. She had rejected me. Not that it seemed to matter to my dragon. He still wanted her with as much longing as he did back then when we were barely adults.
When we had been friends.
“Oh you know her?” The red heads eyes brows shot up. She looked puzzled. “You aren’t one of the people she is running from are you?” She seemed genuinely concerned and I dragged my eyes back to her and away from the stage. I shook my head. “No, I am just a very old friend who heard she was in trouble.”
I held up my hands in front of me, open. “I promise I’m
Just here to help her.”
“She doesn’t look too happy to see you though.” She sounded skeptical.
“We haven’t seen each other for a very VERY long time. She’s probably just surprised to see me.” It was only partly a lie. Opal
Was definitely surprised to see me. Whether she would be happy to see me was another question entirely.
“Well you can have a good catch up soon. She only does the topless dances so you don’t have to long to wait until you get to talk to her.”
Topless.
My head snapped around and an actual loud rumbling growl fell from my lips.
If Opal took her top off in front of this men, I would lose it. My tentative grasp of control over my dragon would slip. And I would lay ruin to the whole neighbourhood.
“Did you just growl?” The red head giggled. “I’ve never heard a man growl before.” She tanned herself . “Talk about hot.”
I barely heard her, slipping from the stool I placed a Twenty on the bar. “Excuse me.” Making my way to the stage I was acutely aware of Opals eyes following my movements. Growing wider and wider the closer I came.
She had stopped dancing altogether by the time I got to her. Boo’s rent the air as she froze.
“Wren.” She didn’t make a sound but it was my name she mouthed silently.
“Hello Opal.” Being this close to her, and not touching her was torture. But I couldn’t just touch her whenever I wanted . Not anymore. Instead I reached out my hand, offering her it. “Time to get off that stage.”
She shook her head. “No.”
My hand hovered there .
So she didn’t want to get off that stage voluntarily? That was fine. It would give me the excuse I needed to touch her. To put my hands on her for the first time in several lifetimes.
I upended her over my shoulder. My hand on the small of her back as I turned on my heel with her firmly sling over my shoulder and headed towards the door and my waiting car.
“I wasn’t asking Opal.”
- Writer
