Page 27 of Entangled in the Woods
Watching my steps,I walked into No Bars, behind Jenny and Leo. The shoes Jenny had loaned me were not what I was used to. The tan wedges made me even taller. Jenny had styled my hair in loose waves that reached midway down my back. I was already cursing every hair that got caught in my lip gloss she’d insisted I wear.
We saddled up to the counter and ordered our drinks. Looking around the room, I saw two tables pushed together, surrounded by the very people I was trying to avoid.Is there only one bar around here?I thought. Gavrill and Kostas sat talking with Everett, while Kleio and Jack looked to be teasing Wilder. I tried to sink behind Jenny’s curly hair, but I was too late.
“Elise! Oh my god! I’m so glad you’re here!” Kleio’s voice carried across the room. “Come over here and sit with us!”
Jenny turned to me, curious. “How are you meeting all these people? You seem to know everyone around here.”
I looked around frantically, trying to come up with an answer for Jenny that didn’t involve the wordshifter. “They’re Evere—I mean, Wilder’s friends. I met them last weekend.”
Leo gestured to the table. “You’d better go over there and say hi. The blonde one is almost falling out of her chair.”
Kleio was bouncing in her seat, looking at me expectantly. I grabbed my drink and walked over to the table. Leo turned to Jenny and began flirting with her, making her laugh. He seemed happy to have her to himself.
As I approached the table, Wilder got up and walked over to the bar, rushing past me with no acknowledgment. What a nice guy I’d picked last weekend.
Kleio rolled her eyes at him and patted the seat next to her. I sat down, suddenly noticing who was seated at the other side of me. I felt his body tense as he looked over and met my eyes. The golden swirls around his pupils were hard to look away from.
“Hi, Elise.” Everett’s stare was possessive, as if he dared me to look anywhere else but into his eyes. I accepted his dare and held contact. The feeling didn’t make me nervous as it had with Wilder last week. This was more commanding, but he emanated so much assurance in his actions that I felt safe.
“Hi, Everett.” My voice came out so quiet that it was almost a whisper. He looked much more rested than when I’d left him on Sunday. The dark circles under his eyes had disappeared, his hair tamed.
Sitting in the chair next to Everett was as close as I had ever been to him. The skin on my shoulders hummed where I had brushed against his black T-shirt as I sat down.
I glanced down at his arm and couldn’t stop myself from looking over the full sleeve of tattoos. The designs all flowed together seamlessly, weaving through one another. My fingers reached out to trace the lines that reminded me of the map of trails I had left in my room.
Before I could touch his skin, Everett pulled his arm away. I felt my face heat as my eyes snapped up to his. He smirked at me as if knowing what I had just tried to do, and I couldn’t believethat I had just done that. It was like I had involuntarily moved and had no control over my body. I curled my fingers into my palm to control myself.
Kleio touched my left arm, breaking the hold Everett had on me. “How have you been? You look so cute tonight! How’s your head doing? I’ve been thinking about you all week.”
“My head’s fine. It’s pretty much healed,” I said.
“Already healed? Wow, you must know what you’re doing with all those plants you gather,” she said. I was kind of surprised that Kleio had remembered me picking the yarrow. “We’ll have to go on a scavenger hunt again soon.”
I nodded my head in agreement. Feeling a mental pull to my right, I turned to see Everett listening to our conversation. Kleio turned to yell something to Gavrill, who was laughing with Kostas across the table. Everett looked down at my jumpsuit that barely covered half of my thighs. I immediately felt exposed in front of him.
“I like your outfit.” His low voice rumbled through me.
“Thank you. It’s my roommate Jenny’s jumpsuit. This isn’t what I normally look like.” God, I was babbling. What was it about Everett that made me feel like this?
“I know what you look like. You always look beautiful.” Everett’s words sent those tingles down my spine that reached all the way to my tailbone.
I took a moment to compose myself. “I should go check on my friends.” I got up to leave, but a firm hand on my thigh pushed me back into my seat.
“They look like they’re just fine,” Everett said.
When I turned to see Jenny and Leo, I saw that they were doing fine, probably more than fine. Jenny had her tongue halfway down Leo’s throat, and he looked like he was enjoying every minute of it. A few barstools away from them was Wilder,chatting with a couple of blonde girls that had their breasts pushed up to their chins.
I sighed, turning back around. It seemed I wouldn’t escape that mistake until I finished my research. Everett removed his hand from my thigh, and I immediately missed the warmth and touch of his fingers.
He noticed my gaze toward his packmate. “Wilder’s always been like that. He’s a flirt and immensely insecure. Don’t feel bad that you fell for his charm. He’s perfected his flirting game to make up for what he’s lacking.”
Everett opened his mouth, tapping on his large canine teeth. I gasped at the sight of the large white fangs. Last weekend I had seen Kleio’s, but these were much larger. I didn’t fear his teeth as much as I was curious about them. What would it be like to kiss him with those teeth? I could see him using them to nip at my lips and tongue. What would they feel like dragging across my body? A dull scratch against my skin followed by a warm tongue…
I shook my head to get those thoughts out of my brain. Where were they coming from? I needed to stop drinking. The one drink I’d had was already messing with my mind. I pushed my glass to the middle of the table.
“Wilder never got his fangs. It’s rare, but it happens. I think he tries to make up for the lack of them in other ways,” Everett said.
He looked over to the bar where Wilder had an arm around a girl’s waist. I didn’t feel jealous—everything Wilder had showed me after our night together solidified that he was nothing more than a one-night fling.
