Page 4 of Song of Tenebrae

It closes behind him and I lean against the wall, waiting for him to be finished. I am taking a chance standing here where Tempest could come out from and yet I can’t leave. I hear him washing up and when the door opens, he steps out, looking once again towards the steel door.

“This is the way out.” I growl and he startles.

He brushes by me and hurries back out to the floor, sitting back down with his buddies. Even though he’s away from here, I can’t leave just yet, and I need to make sure this area is secured. Where is her fucking security? Has she fucking learned nothing? I locked her away on an island, I tortured her, and then I threatened to kill her. Yet, she’s here leaving herself vulnerable to perverts looking to take advantage of her. She’s fucking encouraging it if her antics on stage mean anything. I finger my blade in my pocket and smile knowing she has its mate with her. She kept it, just like I knew she would when I packed it for her, and knowing she still has it makes my blackened heart swell.

I lean against the wall and watch the men look hungrily towards the stage. The music starts low and thumps across the room in a slow wave, grabbing everyone’s attention. I walk further out and look up to see a woman I recognize. She used to be at The Temple and she auditioned for my birthday last year. She’s plus size, and her body moves perfectly in tune with the music. She has long light brown hair and her skin looks like ivory under the bright lights. She’s thick but she’s tight and I can see the muscle she has as she works the pole.

This is the one Squall was slightly obsessed with a few years ago and I can’t wait to tell him she’s right here, waiting for him. He stayed away for fear of attracting the wrong attention to her and I could see how distraught he was when he was forced to forget her. Maybe this will give him a reason to want to get up in the mornings and eat something besides a bottle of Jack Daniels.

She finishes her set and as she’s walking backstage, her eyes land on me. I drop my head but before I do, I see the widening of her eyes. I’m not ready for my demon to know I’m here yet and I can only hope the female didn’t get a good look. I look around the floor for Sky so I can tell her about the crazy men at the front, but I don’t see her, and I know I’ve stayed too long already. I’m tempting fate and I can’t give in to it yet, no matter how tired I am of the fight. I need to trust that Tempest and Sky can handle these men because they’ve made it this far on their own, right?

Tempest

“Am I eating crack for lunch?” Tiny exclaims as she struts into the dressing room. Her tits are out and bouncing and she has a panicked look in her dark brown eyes.

“Huh?” I won’t even pretend I know what the fuck she’s talking about. When she finally showed up here last night, I nearly strangled her with the force of my hug and forgot how pissed I was that she kept putting off coming here.

When I opened The Sanctuary ten months ago, I wrote to The Temple, and directed the letter to Tiny. When she didn’t reply, I thought maybe she didn’t get it, and then I began calling. A few nights of playing phone tag and I finally got her. Then the begging began. She wasn’t keen on coming here and she put me off for as long as she could, finally caving last week.

“I think I saw one of them.” She sits at her vanity with a huff.

“Who?” I ask just as Sky walks into the room.

“Those guys you decided to smother with your vagina are asking for a private dance.”

“It was one of them and no, I don’t do private dances.” I huff and turn back to Tiny, “who?”

“Deluge.” Just hearing the name from her mouth has my muscles locking tight and my heart stopping.

“What?” I croak out and she gives me a weird look.

“Deluge, the band?” she cocks an eyebrow between Sky and I, “weren’t you both at the birthday celebration last year?”

I stand up quickly and stumble through the haze of cocaine, my head swimming with the revelation. “Where?”

“Are you limited to one-word sentences?” Tiny shakes her head. “Standing in the corridor on the other side of the stage.”

I rush up the set of stairs to mine and Sky’s apartment - now Tiny’s too - and run down the other side that brings me to the large industrial steel door. I open it and rush out, seeing a hooded figure disappear around the corner. The shoulders looked familiar but it was just a glimpse and I can’t trust my mind right now. I round the corner and watch as the entrance door slowly shuts, the tinted glass preventing me from seeing outside clearly. It doesn’t help that it’s nearly two in the morning.

My feet skip along the floor and I almost trip a few times getting to the door. I open it and run outside, scanning the parking lot. It’s noisy here on the strip and there’s never a moment of down time, but I don’t see anything. If it were him, he’d have grabbed me by now, right? Raiden wouldn’t rush away from me, he would want to reclaim what he sees as his, right? I press a hand to the pentagram under my robe and try to calm my rapid breaths.

“Raiden?” Instead of sounding like the tough bitch I’ve been trying to be, I sound scared, and I can attest to my knocking knees for that.

There’s no answer and no movement in the parking lot. He could be anywhere or nowhere near here. My heartbeat begins to slow and I finally draw in a full breath, letting it out slowly. Tiny must’ve been mistaken, it couldn’t have been him, and it was just another man in a hoodie. No matter how my body soared for the two seconds I saw him.

The doors open behind me and I hear a few snickers.

“It’s a little dangerous to be out here in next to nothing, stripper or not.”

I turn at the voice and my eyes roll before I can stop them. “Move.” I try to go around the group of men that sat in the front row all night, but they fan out in a line, effectively cutting off the entrance, “I said move.”

“Hold on,” I recognize the one that tried to swallow down my G-String, “I thought we had a moment back there.”

“When you called me a witch?” I cross my arms over my chest. I wish I grabbed my fucking knife.

“Aren’t you one?” he points to my stomach, “we’ve all seen it.”

“And?” I raise my brow.

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