Chapter Eighteen
Deogal
I’m already here when she walks into the bar. Not in flesh but in shadow. Leering. Watching.
The door opens and the cold air folds around her for a second before the heat of the room takes her back.
She shrugs her coat off with a small hitch in her shoulder, like her body hasn’t quite caught up with her decision to be here. Her gaze drifts before it lands, taking in faces without holding onto any of them. She’s unsettled.
I lap it up.
A blonde girl folds into her space without hesitation. She leans over the table, her hair catching the light, her voice spilling easily into Rheda like it’s already familiar. I watch the way she reaches—hand brushing her arm, fingers lingering a second too long as she speaks.
Rheda turns towards her. Her head tilts slightly to hear better over the noise. She answers, something quiet at first, then more easily when the blonde laughs like it’s the easiest thing in the world to draw her out.
I watch her mouth change.
It softens when she smiles, the tension easing out of it, the line of it shifting into something warmer. The blonde says something else, closer now, her voice dropping like it’s meant just for her. She points over at a man.
He looks back.
I track it all.
Rheda reacts, a laugh slipping out of her. She leans into her friend, cheeks darkening before she can temper it. And before I know it, the man is approaching the table.
He touches her too easily and she doesn’t pull away from him. She lets it happen.
She takes a drink. Then another. I track the rhythm of it, the small changes it makes. The way her mouth lingers a fraction longer on the rim of the glass. The way her eyes lose that sharp edge, that constant awareness.
She’s letting it go.
Letting them have it.
My teeth press together slowly, pressure building behind it. It spreads through my jaw, into my neck.
The man beside her leans in, says something that makes her smile. Not the tight, polite one she gives when she’s performing. This one is different. It reaches her eyes.
My fingers curl slightly against my thigh.
He speaks. She answers. I watch the way she turns towards him, just a fraction more than she should. The way her attention settles.
He leans in. Too close.
My fingers press harder into my leg, nails biting through fabric, grounding the shift that wants to move through me. My shoulders hold, locked in place, but there’s tension coiling underneath, something tight and waiting.
She doesn’t move away. She smiles at something he says, and it’s that same smile again—the one that reaches, the one that softens her, the one I haven’t finished taking apart yet.
He’s watching her mouth now. I can see it. The way his gaze dips, the way it lingers.
It lands in me like a violation.
And then—his arm. It settles behind her, light at first, tentative, waiting for resistance that doesn’t come. She lets it stay.
My fingers curl fully now, tendons pulling tight.
My vision narrows. The rest of the room blurs at the edges, light smearing slightly, bodies becoming shapes rather than people. The only thing that holds is them. Her. Him. The space between them that keeps closing.
The girl beside her leans in, whispers something.
I don’t hear it but I see the effect.
Rheda stills, just for a second before she looks back at him. He looks at her like he’s waiting.
Don’t you dare.
She nods. It’s small, barely there, but it’s enough.
He leans in.
I don’t breathe.
The moment stretches, every second dragging as he closes the last of the distance, as his hand shifts against her, as his mouth—touches her.
The urge to hurt him arrives sharply. It folds inward, rage coiling in on itself instead of breaking free, pressing tight against everything else.
My body doesn’t move, but every part of it is ready to.
He holds it too long and she fucking responds. Not deeply. Not enough to matter. But it’s enough to be real.
My vision sharpens again. The line of his mouth against hers. The angle of her head. The way her body doesn’t immediately pull away.
I feel something cold slip under the heat.
Stop.
The word curls into her thoughts. Her body reacts immediately.
She jerks back like she’s been burned, hand coming up between them.
He startles with it, confusion flashing across his face.
He says something, and she responds quickly.
There’s movement, she forces a laugh, trying to smooth the sensation over, but her eyes are already moving toward me.
I don’t move from the shadow.
I let her look.
I let her feel the shape of it without understanding where it’s coming from.
The girl beside her pulls her into a loud, careless hug, the moment swallowed up by noise and laughter and everything that pretends this is normal. Rheda leans into it slowly. There’s hesitation in her still.
I sit back into the dark, finally allowing the smallest shift in my posture, the tension in my body easing just enough to hold instead of strike.
She let someone else touch what I’ve already claimed.
And tonight, my Doctor will learn a very fucking important lesson.