Bound

Seaside Serenade

CLAIRE POV

Nerves clamored in my head and sizzled through my gut, which periodically made a dive for the wooden pier beneath heels that were really a bit too tall for a business lunch.

Especially heels with the sleek red lacquer underneath, flashing a sexy secret with every sashaying step. The salty tang of ocean spray filled my lungs as I took a deep, fortifying breath, and continued on.

It should have come as no surprise that Where Enterprises had funded the project raising the Michelín star restaurants Xavier had whirled me around. That had been our first date, and was my last night as a human.

We had eaten here, as well as four other top tier restaurants, shortly before he launched my unsuspecting normie body off the tallest building in the city. Salsa music had warped around me as I plummeted towards the pavement and exploded into my snowy white owl for the very first time.

I hadn't even been mad at him, without the prompt, my owl would have torn the useless normie carcass to shreds in an attempt to reconfigure my cells at a genetic level. Without the gravity trigger I had been done for, and if I had been clued in on the plan, my conscious brain would not have surrendered to the change.

That time, in that memory, the pier had been shrouded in dark. The Seaside Serenade Michelin star restaurant had been strung hem to haw with golden lights, throwing a magical reflection across the flat calm ocean. The actual restaurant had sat like a little castle on the end of a small ferry, surrounded by the black of the sky and the sea in an illusion of floating.

Xavier had supported my unsteady steps with a gallant arm. This time I was alone in the searing sunlight, but combat training and enhanced were reflexes ensured that I would not topple off my stilettos and into the rolling waves of the open ocean.

In the daylight the exterior looked no less magical. As if a sand castle had emerged from the depths of the ocean to sit on the pier. Drawing in mortals with the promise of an experience to die for.

The salty breeze rolling off the turquoise water was a few degrees cooler than the ambient air temperature, and I was grateful for the reprieve. It rippled around the strategically placed diamond panels cut into my knee-length, figure hugging, navy blue dress. This was one of Jenny's designs, and I tried, and failed, not to think about how easily the dress could be ripped off without being torn asunder.

These restaurants had been raised in cherished locations for were history, but had not made the cut for the 'historical landmark' register gatekept by normies. This pier boasted the last place a were shark had disappeared into the depths of the ocean two hundred years ago. The replacement of planks and beams periodically eaten away by the unforgiving conditions on the shoreline technically meant it wasn't the same pier...but technicalities didn't make nearly as good a story.

I waived at the maître d, breezing through the sandy arches of the entrance. He gestured in the direction of my dining companion with an upturned palm.

Polished concrete reflected colourful patrons scattered throughout the first floor, and I didn't need to scan the occupants to know that the other participant of this meeting was on the mezzanine.

Alexi was reclined in a manner that looked too good and too staged to be realistic. The relaxed pose highlighted key points of his chiseled anatomy, and belonged in a painting. White shirt unbuttoned and revealing a tantalizing amount of sculpted chest. Navy pants inching up to reveal golden brown ankles.

Perhaps I could skip lunch and just eat him. I thought as I climbed the stairs with satisfying click, click, click of stilettos on wood. We fought less when our mouths were otherwise occupied. This level was even more sparsely populated. Tables lined up with shaded windows, offering spectacular views of the ocean, without the blinding the diners. The tables themselves were thick pieces of driftwood finished with resin to expose the sea roughened texture.