Page 13 of The Second Sight
My feet moved and my hands trembled violently as I fumbled for the bathroom door. My coordination was shot to hell by fear and alcohol. The doorknob slipped from my sweaty grasp. Behind me, I heard the stall door creak open fully.
“Don’t,” a dangerous voice commanded.
I didn’t look back. My pulse pounded in my ears, nearly drowning out the music. Cold sweat broke across my skin as my fingers finally closed around the door handle. Just as I began to pull it open, a gust of air brushed past me. It was the only warning before a hand slammed the door shut again with such force that the sound deafened me.
He moved like nothing human. One moment he was by the stall, the next he was pressed against my back, his chest solid as stone against my shoulder blades. The metallic scent of blood filled my nostrils, making my stomach lurch.
“How did you see me?” he demanded. His voice at my ear sent shivers down my spine.
I tried to speak, but only a pathetic whimper escaped my lips. His hand moved from the door to my arm, gripping me with a strength that would leave bruises. He spun me around to face him, and I got my first proper look at what I was dealing with.
He was attractive. Too attractive, fashion model attractive, but in a villainous way. Now I knew he had been looking at me like a predator earlier. His whitish-blonde hair fell across his forehead in artful disarray, not perfectly coiffed like before. His facial features were angular, almost too perfect to be real. But it was his eyes that held me frozen. They were wild, hungry andalluring. Blood still stained his full lips, one drop trailing slowly down his chin.
“How. Did. You. See. Me?” Each word was precise and clipped.
I struggled against his grip. “Please,” I gasped. “Let me go.”
His eyes narrowed, focusing on my face. “Answer me!” His voice roared.
Instead of answering, I screamed out loud and desperate. “Help!” but the pounding bass from the club swallowed the sound. No one would hear my cries. No one would come for me.
In a motion too swift to follow, he clamped one hand over my mouth. Then his expression hardened again. “You’ve seen too much.”
Before I could react, he bent and tossed me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing at all. My world tilted sideways, blood rushing to my head as I dangled upside down. I pounded my fists against his back, kicked my legs wildly, but it was like hitting a marble statue. He didn’t even grunt.
He carried me out of the bathroom and down a service corridor I hadn’t noticed before. Kitchen staff looked up as we passed, but their expressions were blank, unseeing. Why weren’t they helping me? Couldn’t they see I was being kidnapped by a lunatic?
I screamed again. My head throbbed. My vision swam from being upside down and from the alcohol still in my system.Where was Brooklyn? Would she even notice I was missing before I was murdered?
He burst through the back exit into the alley behind the club. Like most alleys, it was dark and deserted, lit only by the distant glow of a single faraway streetlamp. I let my present condition sink in. I was alone with a monster, and no one in the world knew where I was.
He tossed me against the brick wall like I weighed nothing. My back collided with the rough surface hard enough to push the air from my lungs. Pain bloomed across my shoulder blades as I struggled to stay upright. My legs threatened to buckle beneath me.
The alley stank of hot garbage. Early June was warped with heat and humidity. Blood— that poor woman’s blood still stained his mouth. It was impossible to miss, even through the glasses still perched on my nose.
This was my chance to flee. With a few feet of space between us, I lunged to the right, desperate to reach the end of the alley, the safety of the crowded street beyond. I’d taken only two stumbling steps when he materialized in front of me, moving faster than my eyes could track. His tall frame blocked my exit completely.
“Don’t,” he said. The single word made me pause. “I’d hate to have to hurt you.”
The trembling started in my hands and spread through my entire body until my teeth chattered. Broken bottles littered the pavement. Nothing I could use as a weapon, nothing that would help against whatever the hell he was.
“Who are you?” he demanded, stalking toward me with one measured step, backing me further against the wall. “What are you?”
I pressed myself against the bricks, feeling each rough edge dig into my back through the thin fabric of my dress. A fresh wave of shivers flooded my body. He was too close.
“I’m nobody,” I managed in two words. “It’s my birthday. Please?—”
“Not what I asked.” He was super close now, close enough that I could smell the copper tang of blood on his breath. “What are you that you can see through my magic?”
I had no idea what he was talking about. Magic? My mind raced, trying to make sense of what I’d seen. He’d been drinking that woman’s blood. Like a vampire. But vampires weren’t real. They couldn’t be.
“I didn’t see anything,” I lied. “I was just looking for an empty stall. I didn’t see you or anyone else. I swear.”
His eyes narrowed, and his hand shot out, pinning me to the wall with his palm flat against my collarbone. Not choking me but holding me immobile with frightening ease. I could feel my pulse pounding against his fingers.
“You saw me feeding,” he stated flatly, no question in his tone. “You saw through the veil I cast. No normal human can do that.” His gaze dropped to the glasses, then back to my face. “These are not ordinary glasses, are they?”
The distant thump of music from the club was the only sound besides my shallow, panicked breathing. A car horn blared on the street, so close yet impossibly far away. No one would hear me scream. No one would come to help.
