After much maneuvering and at least two near falls, I finally make it down to the dance floor. The wood creaks under my feet. I wipe a bead of sweat from my forehead and turn to find Hyde. He is much more graceful than I, climbing down from the DJ deck using just his hands. I start when he drops beside me and dusts his dark jeans.
“Why do you do that?” I ask, curiosity burning.
Hyde looks up at me and lifts an eyebrow. “Do what?”
“That.” I wave a hand at his jeans and the invisible dust upon them. “You’re not real. There’s nothing to dust, right?”
He shrugs and twists his lips into a semi-smile. “Habit.”
Well that only makes my curiosity burn all the more, for how can he have formed a habit like that unless he had been real once? I open my mouth to ask...only to find his finger on my lips.
“All in good time, sweetheart,” Hyde says in a husky voice.
I swat his finger away in annoyance. “Stop that.”
“Now, now, that’s no way to treat your savior is it?”
Ignoring his comment, I cross my arms over my chest and ask, “So, what’s next?”
“What day is it?”
I laugh out loud until I notice Teddy looking at me strangely from over Jay’s head. It must look like I'm laughing to myself, like some sort of crazy. “You don’t know?”
“Jackie...” Hyde says with warning in his voice. I swallow.
“It's...er...the same day you left? Disappeared? Vanished? Whatever that was.”
“The same day? Interesting...” Hyde muses.
“Why? What’s wrong?”
Hyde gives me a half-smile. “At this rate you’ll be addicted in a week.”
My heart rate spikes and I feel all the blood drain from my face. “A-addicted? To the Nex?”
Hyde says nothing, but that small smile on his face tells me everything I need to know. I open my mouth to ask him how to stop the process, how to not get addicted...because no matter how attractive he is I do not want to live with him as my invisible shadow for the rest of my life. But before I can get the words out, Jay calls out from his seat at the bar.
“Hey! Jacqueline! How’d you get over there?”
I turn away from Hyde and lift an eyebrow. “Uh...shortcut?” I call back.
Jay shrugs and waves me over. I cast Hyde a helpless look. He gazes back without expression.
“Don’t forget our deal,” he says.
“This deal has too many rules,” I grumble as I start to make my way across the dance floor towards Jay.
Hyde trails behind me, one finger lingering near my waist as a constant reminder of his presence. As though I need reminding.
“One pill, one kill,” he whispers and I shudder involuntarily.
Jay grins as I sidle up next to his bar stool. “How’d your meeting go?”
I shrug, careful not to acknowledge Hyde’s presence in front of Jay. “Fine. How’s your drink?”
Teddy snorts and passes me a glass. “Boy’s on his third. Kid can keep ‘is liquor down.”
Jay starts laughing and throws an arm around my shoulder. “C’mon, Teddy,” he begs, a little too loudly. “Let her try some.”
I duck out from under Jay’s arm. He looks confused, staring at the space I just vacated with eyebrows wrinkled.
YOU ARE READING
HYDE: The Monster Within
Mystery / ThrillerJackie has never been the "good girl". Her entire life she's run in the wrong circles and trusted the wrong friends. So when she tries an experimental drug it's just business as usual. But then that drug leads to the uncannily realistic hallucinatio...
