Page 3 of Dark Creed

“Goodbye,” I whispered out the word before hanging up, my heart fuller than it had been in a long time. He was coming to meet me. Ten years might’ve passed, he might sound gruffer, older, but he was still the same guy I used to know.

I didn’t sit there and linger longer than I had to. I got up and started walking.

There were a lot of places downtown I’d never been, mostly because I had no reason to go deep into the city, where some of the buildings were so tall they reached toward the sky. The streets were busy, traffic jams more common than not. As I walked, I figured it’d be faster to use your own feet than drive a car here.

I followed my phone’s directions, reaching the place in twelve minutes, not fifteen… mostly because I’d jogged there. The anticipation was thick in my veins, I couldn’t help it.

The Hooting Owl sat on a street corner on the base level of one of the smaller buildings downtown. Its sign was made of old wood, an owl’s wing outstretched, where the words were carved. I gathered myself, not knowing what to expect when I walked in. I think it was a restaurant or something.

I was seconds from pushing inside when a man and a woman walked out, arm in arm. When they saw me, their eyes widened. The man didn’t say a word, but the woman did: “Are you lost, sweetheart?”

“No,” I told her. “I’m supposed to meet someone here.”

Her eyes scanned me up and down. I could tell she was unimpressed by what she saw, and I couldn’t blame her. She was gorgeous, wearing a short leather dress and I… I was in sweats and a hoodie, college necessities. “If you’re sure, darling,” she was slow in saying, and without another word, she and the man left.

I looked down at myself, seeing my homeless appearance for myself. With a sigh and a shrug, I pushed inside, because there was nothing else I could do. I had no clothes to change into. I… I had nothing, right now.

The Hooting Owl was actually a bar. A bar with a big pool table, along with an old-fashioned jukebox and a rounded bar countertop that spanned the length of the right side of the place. A wall of mirrored glass sat behind it, the reflections of all the special booze sitting on the glass shelves made to look double. Barstools lined that area, while the left side of the bar had a few wooden booths.

I went towards one of the booths, sliding in so I could see him when he arrived.

The bartender looked to be a man in his thirties, with slicked-back brown hair and a short goatee. He strolled over to my booth, a tall glass of something brown in his hand. He set it down near me, but I tried to push it away.

“I’m not twenty-one,” I said.

He didn’t seem surprised. “It’s coke and grenadine.” When I only stared up at him, he added, “It’s like cherry coke, no alcohol.”

I didn’t know what to say. “I don’t have any money” was what I settled on.

The man gave me a grin and said, “Don’t worry about it. It’s on the house.” He said nothing more, turning his back to me and returning to the bar, where a few patrons sat, chatting. Someone else had gone over to the jukebox and was picking out a song.

I didn’t touch the drink, mostly because I didn’t know if I could trust the bartender. I mean, I’d never heard of a bartender saying any drink was on the house. And I wasn’t sure what grenadine was.

The drink did look good. Now that it was in front of me, it looked a more reddish hue than brown. And cherry-flavored drinks were my favorite… but no. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. I couldn’t get over how strange it was that he’d given it to me in the first place.

Come on. It was girl 101 that you didn’t accept drinks from strangers, especially drinks you didn’t see made. He could’ve slipped anything into it. The last thing I needed to do tonight, after everything, was wind up murdered. No, thanks.

I didn’t know how much time passed before the door to the bar opened and a man stepped inside. He wore a sleek black suit, so out of place in a bar like this. His head surveyed the bar, landing on me.

I was seconds from deciding he wasn’t who I was waiting for, because he always hated dress clothes—his mom always had the worst time getting him ready for special occasions, even her and Dad’s wedding, from what I remembered—but when our gazes met from across the bar, something inside of me twisted.

It was him. It had to be him.

After that, it was like I had him on a fishing line and reeled him in, right to me. He made a beeline to my booth, walking through the place like he owned it. Wearing a fancy suit like that, he just might. He held his head high, proud, and every single soul in the place, the bartender included, watched him.

He sat across from me after unbuttoning the two buttons on his suit jacket, folding his arms over the edge of the table, not once taking that brown-eyed stare off me. His brown hair was cut short on the sides, left a little longer on top. Thick stubble lined his square jaw, his mouth drawn into a thin line.

It’d been ten whole years, but it was him. It was him. I could tell by the way he looked at me. When I was a kid, I always made fun of his serious face, but now… now that serious, intense expression made me a little uncomfortable—not because I was scared of him, but because…

Well, because it’d been a long time, and he’d obviously changed. A lot happened in ten years; I knew that much myself.

His dark gaze dropped to the drink in front of me, but it was back on me in seconds when he asked, “Don’t like cherry pop anymore?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but then something occurred to me. “Did you—”

“I called Jeff and told him to make something for you,” he said. “I assumed your taste buds were the same, but if you want something different, I can—”

“No,” I cut in, pulling the drink closer to me. “No, I still do. I didn’t know it was because of you. I thought… well, I just didn’t know.”

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