7. Unbelievable

Vaelora POV

“This is unbelievable, Vee,” Andrew said stubbornly to me. We were out of the club now, standing at the curb, waiting for the driver to bring the car over here. Street cleaners had come down while we were at the club, and the street gleamed black with oily water. I wasn’t supposed to notice this, but I had to do anything to take my mind off the horrific things I saw tonight. I tried to calm my breath down so I wouldn’t look shaken.

“I’m aware,” I concurred. “You’d think Mark would’ve brought the car over here before now… or at most, he was supposed to be near with the car parked and him waiting.”

“I wasn’t talking about Mark,” Andrew refuted. “You—I don’t believe what you said back there. It’s unbelievable that those guys with the knives just… just vanished.”

“Maybe I was mistaken and there were no guys with knives, Andrew. It was probably all in my imagination.”

“There’s no way, babe. No way.” He brought his phone out of his pocket, dialing Mark’s number, I guess. “Get the car over here. Not one minute late.”

He turned to me, staring at me quietly for a minute. Then he spoke. “I saw your face when I came into that room. You looked seriously freaked out. Hell, you looked like you’d seen a ghost, Vee.”

I closed my eyes and only one face came into view—Zane with his lion-cat eyes. I snapped my eyes open, glancing down at my wrist, where Xyrelle’s whip had curled, leaving a thin red line around it.

A ghost wouldn’t have shaken me the way those guys did. I thought.

“It was just a mistake,” I said again. I wondered why I couldn’t tell him the truth. He is my fiancé for Christ’s sake. We would be wedded someday and would have six children. I shivered when I remembered what Andrew had said about having children. Why six?

I couldn’t bring myself to tell him the truth about tonight. He would think me crazy. His soon-to-be wife has gone nuts. I didn’t want that. And there was equally something about what happened—something about the black blood gushing out of the boy’s chest or bubbling up around Zane’s knife, something about his voice when he had said, “You’re interesting,” that made me want to keep the events of tonight to myself.

“Damn, Vee, it was a hell of an embarrassing mistake. Many things would’ve gone wrong if one of my fans were present.”

“Your fans?” Of course, that’s all he thought about.

He glanced back at the club, where the bouncer from earlier stood stamping tickets. “I had to warn him not to let any of tonight’s ‘mistake’ get out. Don’t ever visit this club again. I love attention, but not the bad type.”

I scoffed, folding my arms across my chest. I was so mad at his words that it drove me speechless. I turned and was grateful to see Mark driving the car towards us. I raised my hand in case he didn’t see us. The car screeched to a halt at the corner. Mark got out to open the door, but I didn’t acknowledge him. I slid onto the backseat and turned my face towards the window.

Mark spoke. “I’m so sorry for taking so long, Master Williams. I’d thought you—”

“Not to worry,” Andrew cut in.

I felt him sit next to me. “Look, Vee,” he started, and I sighed. “You know you can confide in me. You can tell me anything. You know that, right?”

I hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Sure, Andrew,” I said, still not looking his way. “I know I can.”

I rolled down the car window and let the cold night air rush in, totally ignoring the air conditioner.