Dead Girls Don't Run - fantasy version | 18+

02 | Who Am I to Deny Fate?

The atmosphere is completely different from this morning, the crowd already beginning to flood the place in groves.

I stand behind the bar, feeling the panic kick in almost instantly with the amount of people in the place, even as their focus stays riveted on the platform in the middle of the room.

Still, that knowledge doesn't ease the anxiety, not when I know what crowd establishments like this tend to reel in. My eyes sweep over every face, narrowing on every tattooed hand that passes money between patrons, searching for one in particular even if I know he can't find me here, that Elijah promised he wouldn't know where I went.

I look over the crowd once more just for extra measure, only breathing a sigh of relief when no familiar face from my past pops up.

The faces I look at are unfamiliar and unremarkable, even if the place is so similar to what I grew up in.

With that thought comes the second guessing and I start to back away, promising myself I'll find another way to make money, another way to sustain myself and keep what I'm hiding from shoving itself into the spotlight.

But I stop when a woman clears her throat, staring me up and down in a calculative way.

"You the new chick?"

I nod, "Noah."

"Didn't ask." She murmurs.

"Don't care." The words are out of my mouth before I can think but all the woman does is grin.

"I'm Candace, I run it back here. I'm here most nights and if I'm not here don't come looking for me." She turns then, beginning to make her way around the bar. "Spirits are kept here-" she turns to look at me then, eyeing me as if she doesn't believe I'm old enough to serve drinks.

She'd be right.

But she continues instead of calling me out, "ice, glasses, fruit and other stuff - you can use your eyes."

She then walks further back, pushing open a door. "This is the storeroom, if it's not out there-" she waves a hand to encompass the bar, "then it's in here and if it's not in here then we're out."

I nod, keeping my thoughts to myself and follow her around as she shows me the rest of the stuff before throwing a rag my way, "Start cleaning, take orders, make orders. Thats pretty much it, if you can't do that leave now."

My hand tightens on the rag, and I nod. "I can do it."

I need the money.

She doesn't look convinced but she also doesn't look like she cares, her slim shoulders shrugging. "Then get to it."

• • •

I'm almost three hours into my shift when I feel the hair on the back of my neck stand on end, the deafening crowd quieting to a dull hum.

My fingers clench on the damp rag in my hand, holding it at my side as my eyes sweep over the crowd, stopping on a gap between the people as they part slightly, their gazes riveted on an entryway closer to the back of the building.

My gaze latches onto the focus of their riveted attention, sweeping down the figures of the two men.

They stand tall, dark eyes sweeping over the crowd as if they were dark lords and this was their army.

The slightly taller one narrows his eyes at the crowd, a darkness slithering from him that causes a shiver down my spine, a warning blaring through my system.

But instead of listening to it, I let my gaze travel the rest of the way over his figure, latching onto the tattoos I can see sweeping his arms, and peeking out of the collar of his shirt, almost reaching his sharp jawline.