Fangs Fate & Other Bad Desicions novel Chapter 74

Chapter 74

I take a step forward. Then another.

Criffin mutters something behind me. A warning? A curse? I don’t catch it. But I don’t care.

The music fades into background noise as my vision narrows to one singular point across the room. I’m no longer aware of the glittering pinpricks of light strung from the rafters or the swell of string instruments rising around us like ceremonial smoke. I can’t even feel the floor beneath my shoes.

I only see her.

The crowd parts before me in slow motion, the way shadows recoil from flame, as if the universe itself knows better than to stand between a vampire king and the only woman who’s ever brought him to his knees.

When the song ends, her partner bows slightly, polished and grinning. She laughs softly–radiantly–and begins to step back.

But I intercept her before she can take even

half

a breath between movements…

“Mind if I cut in?” I ask, the words leaving my mouth like a low growl–less a request, more a claim.

The man beside her–tall, blond, annoyingly flawless–smiles politely. He reads the moment for what it is, nods once, and retreats without protest. Smart man.

She turns toward me, the smile still curving her lips–until she sees who stands in front of her.

It dies slowly. Carefully. Like something she’s trained herself to kill.

“Thane,”

she says.

My name doesn’t shake in her mouth, but her eyes…they flicker li

like candles tested by the wind.

“Harley.”

There’s a heartbeat of silence. Then I take her hand–gently, but firmly–and pull her into me before she can decide to refuse me.

She stiffens. And for half a second, 1 brace for the push. For the slap. For her to walk away and leave me standing in front of an audience who wouldn’t dare laugh at me.

But she doesn’t. And so I let out the first breath. I’ve taken in what feels like a week.

The music shifts, and a new melody rises, slow and aching, the kind that sounds like confessions spun into chords.

We move. One step. Then another. Closer. Then closer still.

Her left hand rests lightly on my shoulder, the right cupped tenderly in my left, her tension laced through every finger that touches me. My right hand finds the small of her back and settles there like it belongs. Almost like it never left.

Her gaze finally lifts to mine, and it’s sharp and unreadable. “So what’s this?” she asks, each word honed like glass. “You saw me dancing and decided now was the time to remember | exist?”

“I never forgot you,” I say, low and sure. “Not for a single second.”

She huffs a short laugh that holds no humor. Just friction. “Funny. You ghosted me, as if it were an Olympic sport. Are you training for gold, or just allergic to basic communication?”

I could lie. But I won’t Insult her like that. “I’m not good at this.”

“Oh, that clears it right up.” Her mouth twists, and her voice lowers into something bitter and burned. “Painfully mysterious and emotionally unavailable. Oh, be still, my beating heart.”

I feel the edges of myself unravel beneath her words. But I deserve worse. So much worse.

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