Page 5 of Twi-Flight (Ghostlight Falls #6)

Chapter Four

“ O h my god, he’s here. Look!” I whisper to Lucy. It’s just starting to get dark. Of course Eggward appears now.

“Do I even need to ask who?” She begins to turn around.

“Don’t actually look!” I exclaim as quietly as possible.

“You know, when you yell ‘look’ that your companion’s first inclination is going to be to turn and look,” Lucy responds dryly.

“Okay, fine, look, but…be less obvious about it!” I point my body completely forward toward the stage, but I keep my eyes to the side, trained on Lucy.

She casually adjusts the thick sun blocking parasol she insisted on bringing, using this movement as an excuse to crane her neck toward the back of the crowd.

The summer is great in Ghostlight Falls, the community is small, weird, and close knit.

There’re plenty of public events like this summer music concert.

Los Chupacabros, a local rock band, are on the stage this afternoon.

The slightly disharmonic beat of their local hit ‘Troll in the Hole’ wafting through the crowd.

I pretend I’m not thinking about him, keeping my eyes trained on the stage.

But the heaviness of his gaze hangs on my shoulders, I can picture his silhouette brooding behind us.

Leaning, all casual and sexy, against a tree.

Tall, dark, and looming right behind us.

The night is just beginning to settle, the ground cooling under us, but the heat of his attention is practically burning a hole in the back of my head.

“No one’s not there.” Lucy says.

“What? Seriously?” I jerk around quickly.

He’s gone.

“Am I missing him or something? I don’t see the guy anywhere.”

The figure that I am sure that I saw hovering in the back of the crowd has completely disappeared.

“I swear I saw Eggward.” I insist, scanning the crowd as the band’s melody clunkily evolves into the other song I’m familiar with ‘Frog Licker’. “Vampires can disappear quickly.”

“I’m not sure you’d know a vampire if you saw one.” Lucy takes a sip of her red wine.

I ignore her denial. I know what I’ve seen, and I keep looking, certain he’ll reappear.

Lucy focuses her attention on the beings of physical shadow who make up the band. “Do you think they’re all smoke? Or is there flesh and blood under there?”

“What?” I ask, still distracted by thoughts of my own shadowy silhouette who isn’t there.

“Just wondering if they are single. The one on the left looks good enough to eat.” She’s eyeing the stage.

“Well, I obviously can’t tell…” I mutter sarcastically, and Lucy snorts a laugh.

“You’ll figure it out, eventually.”

“You could just tell me.”

“Not when they aren’t my secrets to tell,” she says mysteriously.

A dark pall falls over our little picnic blanket. A chill runs up my spine. My heart skips a beat. My blood doesn’t know whether it should be heated or turn to ice.

But I know instantly who I’ll find when I swivel my head.

My neck tilts up, and then up further still. Eggward, still in that heavy heat trapping cloak, is standing over me. The setting sun behind him, making his features even harder to discern. But the weight of his gaze is palpable.

“Hi!” My voice pitches up an unintentional octave. “I’m glad you came.” I say in a more normal tone, trying to recover any semblance of a cool demeanor.

“Mina,” Eggward nods a greeting. “I hoped I’d see you here.”

Crap. My cheeks are warm just when he says my name. This close I can make out a shock of red hair and a beard. A very brief mental picture of our tiny ginger babies infiltrates my brain. I shake my head to clear out that thought.

“I hoped that you’d accept my invite,” I mumble, my words coming out far too fast as I catch Lucy’s subtle smirk. With her parasol I’m the only one who can see it. “Do you want to join us?”

Lucy peers back at the tall man. She releases a white toothed grin and half-heartedly pats the ground beside her. Her attempt at being supportive.

“The cavalry has arrived.” Jace Blake shuffles directly into my eyeline before setting down a bag of carryout food. Lucy must have invited him. “Hey Mina!”

“Hi.” I resist the urge to lean around him to look at Eggward.

“Have I missed the good songs?” Jace settles into the spot Lucy just offered Eggward.

“Half of them.” Lucy eyes me over her sunglasses.

Eggward’s eyes fall to Jace.

The tension in the air feels thick enough to touch, and Jace cuts through it without even turning around to properly acknowledge the other man. “Eggward.”

“Jace.” Eggward’s voice is thick with irritation.

Jace pointedly opens his styrofoam container, and Eggward nearly recoils at the sight of his meal.

“I should probably be going.” Eggward mutters.

“Oh dear, so soon?” The sarcasm is rich in Jace’s voice.

“I just wanted to say hi, Mina. Thanks for inviting me, but I’m not going to be able to stay.” Eggward glances at Jace before he turns his back and stalks away. I watch him disappear back in the direction that he came from.

“What the fuck was that about?” I ask Jace.

“I don’t know what you mean. Would you like a bite?” Unfortunately Jace’s question pulls my attention back to him. He gestures to his styrofoam container of food.

“Ugh, I can’t believe you brought those.” Lucy says, her nose crinkling.

“What is it?” I ask, just before the smell hits me.

“Garlic chicken wings.”

Of course he wouldn’t like them. Vampires hate garlic.

“No. Thanks.” I grumble. Eggward has already disappeared into the shadows again. Damnit. He was just starting to come out of his shell.

“Suit yourself, but Red Eyes Pies is great. You are really missing out.” Jace selects a wing.

“I’m a vegetarian.” I mutter.

He tears the meat from the bone with a sickening crunch that turns my stomach.

“Why were you so rude to him?” I demand from Jace.

“I can’t believe he’s the reason that you quit on me.” He shakes his head, carefully selecting another chicken wing from his pile.

“Are you going to ominously warn me to stay away from Eggward?”

“No, it’s none of my business who you work for. I just don’t trust him.”

“That sounds like an ominous warning to me.”

“I have my reasons.” Jace grumbles.

“And what would those be?”

“He’s not human!”

“Hardly anyone in Ghostlight is,” I retort. Jace’s eyebrows seem suspiciously bushy for someone pretending to be completely human himself. Something about him changed since we were kids, I just don’t know what it was.

“He’s a thief.” Jace grumbles.

“Right.” I scoff. “What did he steal?”

Jace clams up immediately, glancing at Lucy and then back at me. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“Everyone seems to think I’m some stupid human who can’t handle the truth!”

“We don’t think you are stupid. We just don’t want to see you get hurt.” The tenderness in Lucy’s voice hurts almost as much as them treating me like a child.

“I’m leaving.” I stand, dusting myself off.

“Where are you going?” Lucy asks.

“Am I not allowed to have my own secrets?” I snark back at her.

“Everyone has secrets, Mina. Even you. You shouldn’t take it so personally.” Lucy eyes me over her sunglasses.

“It’s fine. I know it’s not personal.” I grumble. “I’m just going home, I have work in the morning. Chickens get up early.” I lie, still tracking the direction that Eggward disappeared.

“Let me walk you? It’s getting dark.” Jace offers.

“No! No.” I repeat a little quieter. I will go home after I’ve found Eggward again. “It’s just a couple blocks. I’m fine.” The last thing I need is either man getting the wrong idea about my relationship to Jace. We are purely platonic. I don’t want anyone thinking anything else.

Jace wipes his greasy fingers on his jeans, making moves to stand. “It’s not a big deal.”

“She said she’s fine.” Lucy snaps, her eyes shoot daggers at him sharp enough to physically harm. “Let her handle this herself.”

Jace cannot hide his disappointment, but seems to actually respect Lucy’s response. “Okay, alright. We’ll see you later.”

“Yeah. See you.” I wave to him absentmindedly.

Lucy told me that Jace has been mooning over me, but other men’s attention just doesn’t seem to matter when I can’t get Eggward out of my head.

I make a beeline out of the park, and when I think I’m far enough from my friends, I veer in the direction I saw Eggward go.

The sun has completely melted below the horizon by the time I cut into the alleyways of Ghostlight Falls. The town is small, I know the area well enough, but the shadows feel unwelcoming this evening.

Maybe I don’t belong here. Even when every fiber of my being is begging me to stay in this odd place and I’m quickly falling in love.

Having a job and a potential romance made me feel like I was back home.

But maybe it’s all imagined? Dad loved it here too.

Now that he’s gone all I have is a few friends.

Lucy and Jace…are back in the park. All that’s here is empty alleyways.

There’s no sign of anyone, let alone the tall dark figure that I chased into these shadows.

My foot catches on a random hole in the asphalt. “Shit.” I stumble but before I completely fall I manage to catch myself on a wall. A wall that is much closer and much softer than I expect the stark concrete exterior of the visitor’s center to be.

I look up, into a hooded figure. My hand isn’t on the wall at all. I caught myself on the stable, solid mass that is the stoic chest of my boss.

“I told you to be more careful, Mina.” Eggward’s voice hits a perfectly low, lovely pitch.

“Seems like the best way to make sure you show up.” I reluctantly pull my hand away from his chest. He’s just so perfect, lovely, solid, and warm.

“I mean, being out here. Alone.”

“Or what? I’ll run into you?” I try to laugh at my own joke but the sound falls flat in the empty alley. The faint sound of the band playing in the park is cut by the deep chirp of frogs.

“There are many more dangerous things here in Ghostlight Falls than me.”