Reckless

Chapter 14 Part 2

Present Day

Character POV: Ariadne

I track her movements from high above, and part of me wonders if she's even in any state to put it together that the fog is my doing. There was a time where she would have been the first person to have figured that out. She had the sharpest mind and was able to see grand plans from miles away. But that was before. Before she was tied to a pyre and almost burned at the stake. Before her sister and family was killed. Before she chose Drusilla and ended our relationship. Before she got on any drugs she could find to numb herself to the point where she didn't care about her life enough to even notice that she was dissatisfied with it.

Then, I see her car pull into the driveway to the club. Instantly, I'm shooting down to the back of the club where Zebulun is waiting by the rear entrance, arms crossed over his frame while he holds the door open with his back pressed against it. There's no sound as my feet lightly make contact with the ground, my predatory vampire abilities masking any normal noise such a landing would make. I have the grace of a cat, or I would say that if I had ever owned a cat. That's more of a witch thing, isn't it? I wouldn't know.

Zebulun gives me a flat stare as I approach him before he asks in a tone so bored that it almost sounds disinterested, "Well, is she here?" I smile at him, impressed that he's able to keep so detached from this saga even though he has had a front-row seat to almost every episode in my relationship with Roxanne. As my best friend and second-in-command, he has to be someone interested in what is going on here. It affects the way our world will run for the rest of all time, not to mention my own state of mind.

"Yes," I tell him, my voice coming out like a purr. There's that cat thing again. I roll my eyes and sigh inwardly, shaking it off before I say, "She just pulled into the driveway. I expect there will be a few minutes of going back and forth and the moral dilemmas mount in her head before she finally breaks and sacrifices her high-and-mighty appearance to get the answers to all of her little lingering, haunting questions."

"You're enjoying this too much," he reprimands, looking down at the ground as he kicks the doorstop out from under the door and grabs the handle with his hand, nodding towards the entrance in a suggestion for me to get inside like he wants to get this over with as soon as possible.

"Impossible," I reply with a cute shrug as I sashay past him and into the building. "On the contrary, I think I'm not enjoying this enough. Centuries of planning and everything, so far, has gone according to plan-- minus one asshole sexist, but the world really won't mourn that loss so I'll keep counting that as a win," I wink, stepping through the door. I hear him close it behind us, the metal-on-metal sound of the deadbolt sliding into place before the two of us walk through the back and towards the front to greet our guest. I call over my shoulder to Zebulun, "Hopefully by now she's had the time to reflect on it and she'll realize the favor I did her, too."

"If I had any breath to hold, I would not hold it if I were you," Zebulun replies with a sigh. I keep walking, ignoring his raining on my parade. After a moment, I stop walking and allow him to take the lead. A neutral party intercepting her sounded like it might put her at ease, so that's what the three of us decided to do: have Zebulun be the first face she sees. Zebulun pauses beside me, resting a hand on my shoulder and giving it a quick squeeze as he says, "I am hoping that things do work out for you-- for your sake, and for the rest of our sakes as well." I smile tightly at him, for the first time thinking this could backfire, and he walks past me towards the front door where Roxanne is sure to be waiting. Here we go. I take a deep breath, smooth out the wrinkles in my red dress, and lean against the wall in the shadows, waiting for the right moment to step into the light.