Page 8 of Shattered Veil

“Are we ready, then?” Tommy ignored my notion, questioning me and Shawn with a wide grin on his face.

“Ah—yeah, ready,” Shawn replied.

“What are those?”

I pointed to Tommy’s face. Not toward his teeth; I wasn’t that much of an asshole—to his eyewear.

He gestured to them with a wave of his hand. “These? Oakley’s, man!”

“The sun has set,” I reminded him bluntly, looking toward the night sky.

“It’s an accessory,” he told me offhandedly.

I retorted, “Mmkay, well, that accessory is making you legally blind, considering that it’s night time and we’re going to be inside.”

Tommy’s blonde brows bobbled up and down, and he tilted his head downward to peek at me from behind the frames. “Well, I’ll be able to feel plenty.”

I fucking hate this guy.

I scoffed. “What, are you gonna grope the dancers as if you’re trying to read fucking braille?”

Shawn interjected, “Jay—”

I held up a hand in his direction, an index finger and thumb pressed dangerously close together. “This close to abandoning ship, Brooks.”

Shawn held up one finger. “You promised me at least one beer’s worth of time.”

“Yeah, man, chill—you gotta at least get a few dances,” Tommy spoke.

I stared at Shawn, muttering, “Is this a test of my patience?”

Tommy chuckled, my annoyance a thorough amusement for him. The noise grated on my ears.

Shawn returned to me, “Okay, come on,” as he patted me between my shoulder blades. “Let’s go.”

I whispered, “You owe me.”

“Uh huh,” Shawn replied instantly as we walked on. “I’m gathering that already.”

A sign by the front door announced that it was Cosmic Night. The lights were dim in the club, and there were blacklights abound. Loud music blared overhead, and the girls wore glow-in-the-dark, strappy getups that shined to show off their greatest assets. We shouldered through what had to have been hundreds of men to find open seats, came across a few closer to the back of the club, and sat. The seating was booth-like in nature, curved, and arranged around a raised, circular stage. I watched the dancers warily as they wandered around us, every so often rotating the woman before us. I declined dances, shrugged away from suggestive grazes of women’s touches on my shoulders, and sipped at the ten-dollar beer that I had purchased as I wondered how a bunch of thirty-something-year-old men sitting around watching each other get blue-balled was supposed to be entertaining.

After what was my one beer’s worth of time, Tommy nearly shouted, “Yo, can someone buy Turner a dance already?”

I intended to tell him to shut the fuck up, but my words just…left me. My mind turned numb. I closed my mouth, for it had fallen open.

She was long legs and strappy heels. Her athletic body was barely covered by a string bikini that glowed bright green. Straight, dark hair hung down to her waist, and her makeup had flecks of luminescence along her cheeks that simulated freckles—the shining freckles continued down her abdomen, all over her arms and thighs, and it forced me to wonder if the beauty marks would exist underneath the makeup. A thin line of eyeliner made from the same glowing material was shining on her upper lids, and the small piercing in her navel was in a similar neon color.

Fuck. Cassie.

Even in the dark of the blacklights, I could tell that it was her. I struggled to gather my thoughts—to recall conversations that I had listened to over the past few months. She had said she was an accountant…right? An accountant who works at a call center with graveyard hours. Not an exotic dancer—I would have fucking remembered that.

I tore my eyes away from her, and Shawn elbowed me.

“Her. Get a dance from her.”

“I—what?” I stammered in an oddly high pitch. “No, no. I can’t.”

“Saw you lookin’, Jay,” he noted as he wiggled his thick brows. “C’mon. She’s cute.”

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