Chapter 16 – Cerberus
CERBERUS
Istare at the man who doesn’t seem to be getting my not-so-subtle rejections. “We’re busy.”
Kayla flashes him a smile. “It’s girl talk, Frank. So get out of here!”
He winks at me. “Girl time is just code for wasting time before you have another dick to ride.”
Anger uncurls inside of me, but he stumbles away before I can give him a verbal lashing.
“So where were we?” Kayla asks.
I take a deep breath, trying to calm my pulse. “I was telling you about my general… experiences.”
“Oh, yeah! And I have to say, you’ve had the worst lovers ever!”
I shake my head, feeling the buzz from our drinks. “I guess I didn’t realize until now that they weren’t good.”
Stacy stops by our table with more shots. On the house. “What’s so funny?”
Kayla’s gaze goes to mine, as if silently asking for permission. I nod, then knock back the shot, deciding without words that it’ll be my last one. Feeling fuzzy is one thing. Drinking enough to let down my guard, nope, not going to happen.
“The only men Cerce has been with have basically climbed on top of her and gotten themselves off. The other night a man actually engaged in foreplay, and she’s feeling freaked out.”
Stacy shakes her head. “Oh, sweetheart, is that the guy you disappeared with during the robbery?”
“Yeah,” I say.
I’d given her a very brief version of that night after she’d called to check on me after the robbery.
She makes a little sound and sits beside me in the booth. “If the guy was gentle and tending to you, it just means you got a good one.”
Is she right? My stomach sinks. I think she is. I actually met a decent guy, but then I had to go and screw everything up. And yet, given my situation, not getting more involved with a nice guy was the right thing to do. Any of the nice guys I’d met.
Wasn’t it? My brain says it was, but my gut says I fucked up in a major way.
I stare down at my empty drink. “I think I might have scared him off. I just… I didn’t expect a man to treat me like that.”
“Nicely?” Kayla asks, then knocks back her shot, wincing. “From now on, you better expect all men to be nice to you. Because if they don’t, Stacy and I are going to kick some serious ass.”
A laugh tears from my throat. “Why should I go for the nice guys? So I can be utterly disappointed when their true colors show?”
The two women exchange a glance.
Again, I get the feeling I messed up. It’s one thing to be a screwed up disaster inside. It’s another thing to unleash that poison on two innocent humans who are trying to help.
Still, my chest aches as I try to explain myself without saying too much. “Sorry, I’ve just never met a man who was really nice to me. When push came to shove, all the men in my life betrayed me.”
“Oh, honey,” Kayla says, reaching across the table and squeezing my hand.
My hound’s fur stands on end. Is she pitying us? We don’t need pity.
Taking several deep breaths, I separate my feelings from hers. No, I tell my hound, she’s comforting us, not pitying us. There’s a difference.
Still, I’m feeling uneasy. Like this conversation needs to end. “It’s okay. I don’t need to talk about it.”
“Of course you need to talk about it!” Stacy exclaims. “And we’re your friends, so we’re here to listen.”
I look at both of them. Such different women. And yet, they’ve shown me nothing but kindness since the moment I stepped into this town. “You… you are my friends. Aren’t you?”
They both start talking at once, and I smile. Not a forced smile, or a pained smile. But a real one… that almost feels natural.
Then they’re both silent again, staring at me.
I take a deep breath, trying not to overthink it.
“My father… isn’t a good man. Actually, he’s a pretty awful man.
He’s pretty much taught me that only fools trust, and that people show us what they are, we just don’t want to see it.
The idea of trusting a man makes me feel sick to my stomach.
I feel like it’s impossible. Something I can never imagine myself doing. ”
Kayla squeezes my hand. “Listen to me really well, Cerce, because this is something important. Your dad’s cruelty has nothing to do with you.
It’s his problem. But don’t let it poison your whole life, because there are good people out there, but you’ll never meet them if you don’t let your guard down. ”
Stacy flashes me a smile. “No risk, no reward, sweetheart.”
I lean back against the booth, feeling uncertain. These women are my friends. But they’re also innocent. They have no idea about the evil in this world. So while they mean what they say, I’m not sure I can ever follow their advice.
But I can try.
Stacy stands. “I have to go back and check my tables.” But when she turns to go, she looks back. “But be careful. I heard some guy has been attacking women in the woods outside your apartment.”
Every muscle in my body tenses. “Are you sure?”
She shrugs. “That’s what I heard.”
My heart races, and I make a mental note to myself to check the woods really carefully for now on. I’d hate for someone to be hurt because I wasn’t there to help them.
“Cerce?”
The deeply masculine voice slides over me like silk. Heart racing, I slowly look up.
It’s the man from the bar last night. And to my shock, he looks even better.
His silky blond hair looks achingly soft, and he wears a dark green t-shirt that hugs his muscles.
His arms look massive. His chest hard as a rock.
And despite myself, all I can think about as the way those muscles felt when I was sliding my hands along them.
“I don’t think we officially met last night. I’m Draven.”
Draven. I mesmerize the name. “Hi,” I say.
He shifts as if restless. “Could we talk? Outside?”
I look to Kayla.
She grins. “Actually, I have my eyes on a particularly sexy booty call. Have fun!”
Feeling uncertain, I scoot out of my booth and follow him out to the back of the bar.
Exiting the door, I’m immediately hit by the cool autumn night and the pleasant scents of the woods. Out here, only one lone street lamp lights the space.
Wrapping my arms around my chest, I watch him carefully as he turns to face me. His expression is unreadable. “Why did you take off last night?”
I stiffen. I should’ve expected his question. I should’ve prepared an answer.
“I—“
He stares for another minute, then roughly runs his fingers through his hair. “I scared you off.”
“No,” I say.
His gaze meets mine. “Then, what?”
Suddenly, I feel irrationally frustrated. I pace away from him. “I don’t know!”
He follows me, catching my arm. “How about we go for a walk?”
Desperate to avoid the questions I don’t have answers to, I nod.
We start to walk, past shop after shop, to where the woods start to line our path.
Briefly I think of the man attacking women.
Even if I wasn’t sure I could kick the nasty human’s ass, I knew the giant man beside me would discourage any trouble.
So I do my best to relax and enjoy the quiet walk.
At last, he stops and points to a bench.
Wordlessly, I take a seat.
“Your friends seem nice.”
I nod. “They are nice. Especially to talk to about… girl stuff. I’ve never really had that before.”
Draven’s expression goes distant. “My sister used to irritate me with all of that. It annoyed me at the time, but now I miss it.”
I turn to face him. “Did you move away from her?”
He’s quiet. “No. She died.”
“I’m so sorry,” I say.
It’s actually kind of odd to talk to the living about death. Somehow, it seems more tragic that they just have to go on without that person.
He looks off into the distance. “I’ve made peace with it. At least as much as I can. I just wish Soren would.”
“He hasn’t accepted her death?” I ask, surprised.
What good was it to not accept something that was?
“Soren believes we could have done more to save her.”
“When Death comes for you, there’s nothing more people can do. Their fate is sealed.”
He glances at me. “You really believe that?”
I nod. “And besides, the dead want to know their families are happy. Soren being miserable because she’s gone from this world to the next doesn’t help her. It only hurts him.”
“You seem so confident about that.” He smiles. “But I’ll have to tell him that; maybe it’ll be the thing that finally gets him to calm down.”
“I hope so,” I say. “Because one way or another, death comes for all humans. Whether it’s from sickness, injury, or old age, in the end it doesn’t really matter. All that matters is what you did with your life when you had it.”
His expression falls, and there’s something vulnerable in his gaze. “I always kind of thought if I fought hard enough, I could protect everyone who needed me.”
Such a human thing to believe. “Warriors fight enemies. But there’s no true enemy with death. It’s like trying to hold back the turning of the earth. To try to attack it like a foe. You can try, but your efforts are fruitless.”
Then I glance away from his keen gaze. What the hell is wrong with me? I slipped so easily into the conversation of death, because it’s something I understand.
But again, I get the feeling I revealed too much.
“I like you,” he says without hesitation.
Even after all the weird stuff I just spewed?
I glance at him out of the corner of my eye. “We barely know each other.”
“I know you better than any other woman in this world,” he continues. “You’re an easy person to like.”
The cynic in me rears its ugly head. “I think you liked what we did, not me.”
He opens his mouth and a strange sound comes from the woods behind me. I’m shocked when we both leap to our feet in an instant. I’m a shifter. Our instincts are fine-tuned. Our reflexes unmatched.
So how did a human respond as quickly as I did?
Again, a terrible sound comes from the woods. A strange wailing that crawls along my spine and makes the hairs on my body stand on end.
I know that sound. And I hate that I know that sound.
“Come on,” I say to him, tugging on his arm. “Let’s go back to the bar.”