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ChapterNine
Pretending wasn’tthat hard to do. I’d done it my whole life, back when I thought there was something wrong with me for not wanting the same things my kind did. Back when I thought I could live a whole life pretending to be involved in something I wanted nothing to do with. Back when I was young, and I thought I had no other options but to live the life I was born to live.
Yeah, I’d pretended. I’d done it so well that when I dropped the news on my parents that I wanted to leave the clan and live a different life, they were shocked. So shocked my dad didn’t speak to me at all for three days, and my mom stayed up all night cooking and baking for like, a week, just to keep herself from having to think about it.
But pretending to be in love with Dominic Dane?
What the hell had I gotten myself into?
We arrived at the San Francisco International Airport a little before three a.m. The crowd kept me distracted all the way to the bridge. We didn’t have to wait to pick up luggage—I only had my backpack, and Dominic had a grey duffle bag with him. That could only mean that I was right. We weren’t going to stay here for longer than a day. Maybe two at the most.
How was I going to pretend to be in love with this man for two whole days?
Just the thought of it made my empty stomach roll. I needed food.
No, I needed chocolate. Chocolate would make this better. Chocolate made everything better, especially chocolate cake.
Dominic walked by my side with his head high, eyes sharp, taking in every detail around us as he held onto the strap of his duffle bag that was hanging over his shoulder.
“I need cake.” My voice was barely a whisper, but his ears could pick up even the smallest sounds. His kind were truly Gifted—all their senses were enhanced. Which probably meant he could smell my discomfort, even hear my heart slamming in my chest just as well as a vampire would.
“We don’t have time—”
“Cake,” I repeated. “I need cake or I’m going to lose my mind.” So what if he thought I was weak? Screw it, I was weak right now.
With a sigh, he turned to the other side and walked us to some empty metal benches in the large, overcrowded airport.
“Wait here,” he ordered and dropped his duffle bag on the seat next to mine.
“Chocolate. It has to be chocolate,” I called after him as he strode away. He didn’t turn, but he probably heard me.
And finally, I was by myself.
“Breathe,” I said to my lap. “Just breathe. You’re okay.”
It was a mission. I was good at my job…wasn’t I? I mean, I’d never worked outside the office before, but I was pretty sure I was good at it. In theory, and in my imagination, I kicked ass and took names on a daily basis. This was just another job, just like sitting behind the desk and taking calls and making plans.
I was going to be just fine.
My eyes squeezed shut and my stomach turned again. The job. I needed to focus on the job.
“Just stop thinking altogether,” I mumbled to myself, so desperate now to clear my head, I could have started running all the way back to the City.
“Why are you always talking to yourself?”
I raised my head with a gasp to see Dominic standing in front of me with a plastic plate and fork in his hand. With cake—chocolate cake.
I didn’t answer—couldn’t if I tried. I just grabbed the cake from his hand and dove in. It wasn’t the best chocolate cake I’d ever had, but it was chocolate, and my body responded to it the way it always did. I ate as if I was being chased by monsters, until I was so full I couldn’t eat another bite.
That had been a really big slice of cake.
And now I felt a bit sick. Great.
“I can’t eat anymore,” I mumbled and shoved the plastic plate into Dominic’s hands.
“Where does all that food you eat even go?” he murmured to himself. The question was probably rhetorical, so I didn’t answer. Who knew where all that food I ate went?
I didn’t really care.
He didn’t eat the leftover like I thought he might—he’d refused anything to eat or drink on the plane, too. He just found a trashcan at the end of the bench and threw the cake inside.
“Anything else?” he said, and it was supposed to be sarcasm, I think, but I smiled anyway, feeling a hundred times better with all that sugar coursing through my veins now.
“Yep. A bottle of water, and I’m good to go.”
He rolled his eyes and groaned as he turned the other way. When I stood up to follow, I wasn’t as breathless anymore. My hands weren’t shaking at all, and so I learned the biggest secret I was going to need while on this mission: the key to surviving Dominic Dane was chocolate.
