“Come on, Kal. It’s my last day on earth.”
He scowled further.
“Those men have been watching you all night.”
Maddie shrugged.
“And those women have been checking you out all night.”
“I don’t care.” If looks could kill, someone would have been dead by now.
She smiled. Kal wasn’t going to ruin this. She had one re-do. One chance to leave everything the way she should have.
“Really? Kal, you don’t care about all of these girls, like literally all these girls in this whole place are checking you out.”
He closed the inches between them.
“I have a mate. I don’t need any of them. What I do not like is someone looking at what is mine.”
Maddie craned her head around, because seriously, who in the hell would want her? Besides the insane and incredible sexy dragon-alien-man holding her, which was still a mystery.
“Kal. You need to chill. Let’s go have fun.”
Maddie let the beat of the odd Fae music pull her into the trance, the dance floor full of people. As they reached the edge of the crowded space, Kal paused.
“Kal, come on. If I have to go with you somewhere, you can at least help me have no regrets leaving.” Maddie sputtered in laughter as she looked up. His eyes wide as saucers, and his normally tanned skin, white.
“It’s just dancing,” she yelled over the music.
“I don’t do this kind of dancing.”
Kal looked over her head and back down at her. “How is this acceptable in front of others? Mating is a very private thing to my kind.”
Maddie laughed. “They aren’t mating.” She stopped and took in the crowd. “Probably.”
Shaking his head, he tried to pull her away from the crowd.
“Kal, come on. I want to dance.”
Someone came up behind her, hugging her in a drunk-girl grip. “Maddie. Come on. Let’s dance. Grab your boyfriend, I’ll take his back.”
Kal blanched. “She isn’t taking my anything.”
Pinching her eyes closed, Maddie breathed through the laughter.
“It’s fine. She just meant she’d, never mind.”
Maddie watched Kal glance from her to the crowd to Ellen. Oh, this should be good. She couldn’t exactly hear his thoughts, and she was thinking that right now maybe, it was a good thing. Maddie could still use what was coming next.
“I’ll stand here and watch you.”
Yup. That was pretty close.
“Okay. Because that’s less creepy, Kal.”
If he wasn’t so damn hot, maybe this would bug her more. For now though, she’d keep him around.
Ellen grabbed Maddie’s hand and started to walk.
“Let’s go. I need to get my dance on!”
A second glance back at Kal’s scowl. One chance, this was her one chance. She shrugged and went. He’d be fine. Or well, he should be fine. He could take care of himself. Tonight was for her. Her last night. Tomorrow they’d leave to find the mates of the others and then off to wherever home would be.
Ellen led her out into the throng of people. She slid through a couple grinding. Pushing her too-wide hips through this crowd was a pain. Maddie had never felt sexy in her life, not until she’d met Kal. Until she could feel the beat of Kal’s heart when he looked at her.
Raising her arms, she started to sway with the rhythm.
“I knew this place would be a trip,” Ellen shouted.
Maddie smiled.
She felt sexy and confident. Hopefully Kal could see her dancing.
Closing her eyes, the music flowed through her. She wouldn’t miss Roswell. She never really did. She just missed her mom. Maddie pushed that away. Her mom would find her before she left. She knew she would.
A humming flowed through her body, radiating from her stomach. In the back of her mind she figured that was probably the drinks, the Fae always did things like that. She didn’t care. Peace wasn’t something she’d felt, ever.
The rhythm of the music pulled her. Maddie’s body flowed in movement to the trance. Letting all the stress of the day, her week, her life be taken away with whatever magic laced this place.
In her own world, she liked herself. She liked her newfound confidence in life. She liked that for the first time she didn’t mind knowing her future, or at least who her future would be with.
The beat changed slower. Her cares seemed to float away.
Someone came up behind her. Her mind wouldn’t work the way it should. She should have known to stay away from the drinks here. She just didn’t or perhaps hadn’t cared.
Alarm tried to push through the fog. It wasn’t Kal. She knew that. Maddie could feel the beat of his heart, could tell where he was without thinking. Kal was here, close, and this wasn’t him. Opening her eyes she blinked, nothing cleared, she still felt underwater and everything muted. Worry, concern, life, a dull matter.
The heat of the person behind her was too close though. Panic should have kicked in by now, but she’d have to push through the murky swamp of the Fae magic, and that just wasn’t happening.
Maddie followed Ellen’s lead and danced without care. Then an unwelcome hand rested on her hip.
“Hey beautiful.”
Maddie, still magic drunk, funneled her newfound power to her fingertips and burned his hand.
He squealed.
“Ah. Shit, Maddie. It’s me.”
Everything seemed so slow as she turned.
“Donnie?”
He smiled.
“Yeah. You look amazing. I’ve never seen you wear a skirt like this before.”
Maddie thought she’d stopped dancing, but the room still swayed.
“Yeah. It’s like a new confidence thing.”
Her hands smoothed down the skirt she’d borrowed from Ellen as she tilted. Thankfully, or unthankfully, Donnie stopped her from falling.
“Careful.”
Ellen’s head swam. The skirt. Right. The skirt she liked. Donnie? Ex, she didn’t. But the skirt, right? Kal. Kal had liked it. And if Kal liked it. Maddie liked to be in it. Hell, if Maddie liked it she was going to start fucking wearing it from now on. Kal. Right. Where was Kal?
“I like this new you. So you are back for real?” Donnie’s voice broke the fog.
Why was his voice getting through to her? Fae, he was part something she thought she remembered.
His hand reached out to pull her close.
