Page 23 of A Moth to the Flame (Utopia #1)

I am, however, acutely aware that Duke’s derelict dick isn’t responding to this woman’s proposition. It’s not raring to go like it usually is. I’ve been so busy having fun that I didn’t notice until now.

My silence must not be typical for Duke, because she turns her smile upside down in a playful pout.

“Oh, come on,” she cajoles. “We had such a good time together. Let me be the first to break your two-times-only rule.”

It’s news to me that Duke follows any rules.

The implication also pisses me off in the worst way.

He’s been squandering everything that’s handed to him on a silver platter while I’ve been begging for leftovers. I was more than willing to be someone’s warm body to stick it into. Absolutely starving for even a situationship. A second date? We don’t know her.

I squint at this eager woman as my accountant brain wrests control over my fury. Duke’s predilections for meaningless sex aside, the math ain’t mathing.

We live in a tiny, unincorporated town with a population of less than a thousand.

Most of the people we grew up with are married and a few kids deep by now.

Sure, there are multiple hollers that make up our little area of the map.

There are also numerous ski resorts nearby that are tourist havens in the winter months.

But Duke is thirty, same as me. He should’ve run out of willing, unattached sex partners way before now if this rule was true. Even in Charleston, the single dating pool contracts a little more with every year of age.

I swallow harshly as the obvious catches up to me.

He hasn’t cared if they’re married, engaged, or otherwise attached. If they ask, he answers the call.

I glance at the woman’s hand lingering possessively on Duke’s body. Sure enough, a dull gold wedding band glints under the dim bar lights.

She follows his gaze. Doesn’t pale. Doesn’t hold any shame in her expression.

“Are you having second thoughts?” she whispers.

Yeah. A bunch. Not that I can tell her any of them.

Her pink-painted lips curve into a different brand of smile. “You’ve been a godsend to the women you’ve helped. None of us would blame you for calling it quits to finally chase something for yourself, Duke. It’s okay.”

She squeezes his shoulder briefly before releasing him then merging into the stream of people heading home for the night.

I don’t think it’s okay. I don’t know what to think.

I turn toward the bar, my mind an odd combination of spinning thoughts punctuated by vast emptiness.

“I close earlier on weeknights,” Wallace says.

“Oh.” That explains the mass exodus. God forbid they got sick of Duke. I fish some money out of his wallet and lay it on the bar to cover the whiskeys that I drank. “Thank you for a nice night.”

Wallace chuckles, then slides the bills back toward me. “You don’t have to go if you don’t want to.”

Ugh. I think I’ve had my fill of the Duke Special. Still, I’m not ready to abandon this little foray into social interaction. The woman’s words rattle around in my head in ways that are going to get louder if I’m surrounded by silence.

Why should I care who Duke sleeps with? Or when or why?

I sigh.

I do, damn it. I do care.

If he’s been a hero to others while being a villain to me, then that’s just one more nail in the coffin of my life.

Wallace leans on his crossed forearms that are braced on the bar. “You appear to be wrestling with a reckoning.”

I nod as I stare at the bar. He has no idea.

“Would you care for some counsel? It’s on the house.”

“I should’ve polled them to see just how many of those women I’ve slept with,” I mutter.

“Nearly all.”

I glance up, startled that he heard me, and that he answered honestly.

Wallace’s smile is soft but sad. “Human relationships are complex, and often tragic. Rarely the picturesque happily ever after.”

I can’t argue with that logic. I’ve lived it.

“It was a bold choice to give those women pleasure in ways they would never experience otherwise. Bolder still to put your safety in the line of fire, should their partners discover what you’ve been up to for the past decade.”

I gape at Wallace openly. I can’t help it.

Wait a minute…

“How would you know that? It’s not like I banged them on top of your bar.”

I wince as soon as the last syllable leaps off Duke’s tongue. That’s an assumption on my part, and it might not be accurate.

Wallace chuckles. “Thank you for that courtesy. It may not appear so, but I take the hygiene of my bar very seriously, as well as the safety of my patrons.” He raises his eyebrows. “As to your other question, women talk to each other. I overhear more than most people realize.”

According to the bathroom walls, that tracks, as does this little free therapy session. Somewhere, at some point in history, the very first bartender to offer advice to a drunk patron codified bartender behavior for eternity.

It would be a shame to waste this opportunity, too.

“Can I ask you something?” I blurt.

He reaches beneath the bar, producing a cloudy green glass bottle that he uncorks. “Anything, though I cannot guarantee an answer.”

Not an unexpected response, but it’s more of an opening than I’ve gotten from any of the books or junk at Granny’s house. Besides, I should be focusing on real problems that affect me, not wasting mental space on whatever sexual help ring Duke’s been running in his spare time.

“If you overhear more than most people realize, then have you ever heard any folklore about Utopia? About strange events, the wishing well, things like that?”

“Of course.” He offers me a freshly poured glass of what looks like red wine.

“I didn’t order anything,” I point out.

His grin is sharp. Literally.

Wallace is one of those people who has pointier than usual canine teeth. I imagine that’s where the folklore of vampires originated. From normal people with abnormal physical features.

I also realize it’s the first time I’ve ever seen Wallace truly smile.

He pours himself a glass of the wine and takes a long drag, his throat working on a swallow.

There’s something mesmerizing about such subtle masculine features.

I shake myself out of that little lusty thought. The last thing I need is to give Duke’s dick another reason to be hard.

I pick up the glass he offered me and sniff it. “Do you frequently suggest red wine to your mountain man customers?”

“I would never be so stupid as to offend their sensibilities.” He laughs. It’s a delightfully warm, open sound. “This is a special bottle reserved for only my most special customers.”

Yeah, yeah. Duke’s special. No need to have the facts rammed down my throat.

“So? What can you tell me?” I ask .

“What do you want to know?” he parries back. “You haven’t asked anything specific.”

Fair point. Asking after the lore of the well seems the most logical place to start, but I used to be a prodigious reader. The logical place to start is often a red herring.

I take a sip of the wine as I consider my options.

Then immediately feel my tongue tingle in a way that I don’t associate with any kind of drink. A strange, euphoric warmth travels down, down down before settling in my stomach with all the relaxation of a spa day. It’s like I’ve been transported into a dream.

The bar lights flicker. The world shimmers. Everything looks softer, more sensual. The image of the man before me transforms into something terrifying, something straight out of a nightmare. Like a depiction of the Devil made flesh.

Yet I do not fear.

I reach toward him, toward the connection that’s been stolen from me time and time again.

He holds my hand. The claws that should slice skin are gentle, carefully positioned to avoid harm.

“What are you?” I whisper.

He answers in a language that I can’t understand, yet his sounds carry weight. Like I might be able to hold them in the palm of my hand and puzzle meaning out of them if I had enough time.

Time has never been kind to me, and this moment is no exception. The second I reach toward the monster with my other hand, I blink to find myself holding Wallace’s hands.

He squeezes me gently. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah,” I croak.

Only, no. Not really. Am I losing my mind because I’m stuck in someone else’s body?

Is that why Duke cracked earlier today? What if he wasn’t drunk at all? What if these symptoms are the natural progression of living inside the wrong skin for too long?

“You wanted to ask me something?” Wallace prompts. He squeezes Duke’s callused hands once more, then releases them.

“I—I think I should go.” I hop off the stool .

An overwhelming urge to check on Duke propels his feet across the floor toward the exit.

I was so pissed off that I left him alone, in my body, instead of stopping to think that we might be in a different sort of danger.

“Ask me something,” Wallace insists behind me. “Anything. Choose a single question, and I shall answer it honestly.”

There’s something about the pleading note in his voice that gives me pause.

I glance over Duke’s shoulder. “Do wishes ever come true?”

Wallace stares at me, his expression sober. “Not without a price.”

That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.