Page 5 of Defy Me

Seriously. She must already be asleep because this night was too weird not to be made up by her subconscious. She longed for a safe place and her mind must have created one. She'd think about that tomorrow. For a little while longer she wanted to bask in the warmth of magical unending french fries and feeling protected.

The voices of the couples drifted into her room as she was crawling into bed.

"He stole a shard, Kur. Messed up a whole lot of well laid plans. Besides, I don't have to do anything for him, he's not mine. I don't even have to like him and you can't make me." She sounded pretty mad.

"Sweetness," The man crooned. "He's my blood."

"He's your bastard."

Ooh - somebody was in trouble. But they actually seemed like a pretty solidly in love couple.

"He's the key."

The key. The key. The word rolled around in Yvaine's mind like a song stuck in there. When she closed her eyes and drifted off the key was flying, like a bird through the sky. No, not a bird. A dragon. A beautiful black gleaming dragon that breathed fire. She ran and ran and ran, trying to catch it. That was her key. Her dragon.

Yvaine awoke with a start. Something scratching at her window had startled her out of her sleep. She crept over to the dark curtains and pushed them open the tiniest of cracks. Early morning light poured in. She opened them further and saw only a few people making their way to wherever they were going. Nothing that would have made that sound. Especially not up on the second floor.

She'd slept through the night. A quick glance around the room found it still secure, her bag on the floor, her clothes except for her t-shirt in a heap beside it. She grabbed up her jeans and pulled the wad of bills out of her pocket. It was all still there along with the Eurail pass. Something had gone right for a change.

Please let that little bit of good luck continue. She quickly dressed and headed downstairs, ready to pay for her room and get out as fast as she could. Gone was the coffee table where she'd sat and eaten last night, and there wasn't even a fireplace. No beautiful woman or good looking man stood behind the desk either. A young woman in a World Cup t-shirt sat on a stool, snapping her gum and reading a magazine.

Well, she couldn't expect that the couple worked all hours. Maybe this was their daughter, or just some hired help. Yvaine went to the desk to pay.

"Hi, I owe for one night in a private room."

"We don't have private rooms. What's your name? I'll look you up. You're lucky if you didn't have to share with anyone last night. We were almost full up."

"Oh. Uh. Look under van den Hoogenbond. Amy."

"Naw. We definitely don't have anyone registered under that name."

"Can you look again?" Of course the girl wasn't going to find anything. But she clacked away on the computer and Yvaine slid a hundred Euro note out of the folds and slipped it onto the counter. Before the girl looked up from her search, Yvaine was already out the door and headed toward the train station.

She stopped by a food cart to grab a cup of something hot and some breakfast. She wished she'd grabbed one of the pastries from the dinner plate last night and saved if for this morning. If there had even been a dinner. She wasn't convinced.

"Ein cafe und diese...uh, pastries." Her German was pretty crap, but the guy got the gist when she pointed to some chocolate croissants.

A deep voice that send shivers down her spine said from behind her, "Make that two coffees and add in some of those sausage rolls. The lady is buying."

Yvaine spun around and was face to face with the large muscle-bound chest of Mr. McBroodypants himself.

Come Out, Come Out Wherever You Are

It hadn't taken him more than a few minutes to extricate himself from the brawl at the pub, but by the time he got out to the street, his little thief was gone. Disappeared into the night. That was okay, because Jett was the night.

He slipped into the shadow of a building and let the darkness envelope him, show him its secrets. The demon inside stretched and revelled in the cool night air. This was a part of himself he kept buried, unused, unacknowledged. He hated how its base instincts tried to control him.

It couldn't any longer. Jett knew better now. Tonight he'd let the animal out of its cage to help him hunt the girl.

He sniffed the air and caught a whiff of sulfur first. A minion of hell was nearby. The scent faded under a waft of something much more potent. Sunshine. At midnight dark thirty. The demon recoiled at the scent. It took a long time to train himself to be out in the light of day. He still preferred the dark. Even more when he was in search of prey.

Delicious, mouth-watering prey. That he was going to devour. Eat her right up. Until she screamed his name.

A heartbeat thrummed nearby, and another. The musk of lust wafted to him a moment before a couple walking hand in hand turned the corner. They didn't see him, but likely sensed his presence because they hurried on their way faster than before.

Or maybe they were just anxious to get home and into each other's pants.

He scented the air again, searching for the bit of sunshine that his thief smelled of. The unique flavor of her was part of what made him want her so much.

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