Page 38 of A Bond with the Dark

“Be right up,” the waitress responds with a flirtatious smile and grabs his menu.

“Rare, huh?” I query.

“Yes. I don’t like it when it’s chewy. Rare just melts in the mouth.” He smiles.

“So,” I continue, “none of your siblings have children?”

“No, Scar and I are the second oldest. My oldest brother has never married nor has any children. And my younger siblings haven’t yet, either. I think they all want some one day, but so far nothing.”

“Interesting. And you’re how old?”

“I’m thirty-six. My oldest brother is thirty-nine, and the younger siblings are thirty-two, twenty-nine, and twenty-five. So, still young. Plenty of time to find someone and settle down. How old are you?”

“Same age as you,” I reply, sipping my daiquiri.

“And you have been married once?”

“Yes. We were married for about four years, together for eight.”

“Do you guys get along okay?”

“We’re better now. It got better once the dust settled. I didn’t like the woman he was with first after me at all. The one he’s married to now, however, I like.”

“You’ve been divorced for how long?”

“About three years now.”

“So, he’s married and had a girlfriend before that, all in the span of three years?”

“Well, the first one overlapped a bit. But that’s neither here nor there. Tell me about this ‘almost married’ thing.” I smirk, remembering his comment about almost being married at the bar last night.

“Ah, that. It’s a somewhat complicated story. It concerns why I don’t speak to my oldest brother.”

I eye him imploringly, willing him to go on without me having to pry. He seems hesitant to talk of this brother that he doesn’t speak to.

“I was with a girl,” he goes on hesitantly. “Very much in love and would’ve gone to the ends of the Earth for her. Everything was as it should be, and I asked her to marry me. Had the ring and everything. Then he appeared out of the blue and fell for her, too. She, in turn, fell for him, and they ran away together.”

My heart feels a pang of guilt for him. I shouldn’t have brought it up. It still seems very raw.

An awkward silence hangs between us, and I don’t know whether to go on with the topic or change the subject.

“Did they end up marrying?” I say, finally.

“No,” he says, playing with a frayed string on the linen napkin. “She died.”

“Oh my gods. How?”

“Let’s just say it was mysterious circumstances, and they never concluded how she was killed.”

“Killed? Do you know who did it?”

When he looks at me, I see the pain in the depth of those hazel eyes. There seems to be a darkness that befalls him, and something sinister, giving me the chills that are not from the drafty restaurant.

The waitress appears with dinner.She sets the plates down gently, first in front of Dominic and then me.“Anything else I can get you at the moment?”

“Sayah?” he asks me, as the waitress is paying no mind to me.

“I’m okay, thanks.”

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