“What was it like? Growing up around here?”
Her face sours. “Not that great. My parents were…” She shifts uncomfortably in her seat. “Look, can we talk about something else?”
I nod. “Yes. What do—” I almost said humans but Ezo was very strong on this point also, that humans do not refer to one another as humans. “What do people talk about when they go out.” I try out the terminology to see if she will reject it or not.
She laughs. “God, I don’t know.”
My chest soars. She agrees that we are going out.
The female from before comes back with beverages for us. Juliet grabs her glass and takes a long drink. I mimic her, bringing the dark brown liquid to my lips. I take a large swallow, just like she did.
But then I sputter, almost spitting the liquid out all across the table. By the ancients, I have not tasted a more foul brew.
Juliet immediately starts laughing and then she claps a hand across her mouth, a look of fear entering her eyes. Will I never understand these humans?
“Did you intentionally befoul my drink?” I ask curiously, wondering if that is the reason for her fear.
She drops her hand and a wide smile splits her lips again. “Oh my God, the look on your face.”
She breaks into another round of laughter. For such a small creature, she has a big laugh. It is contagious and soon I find myself laughing along even though I do not know what the joke is.
“I take it you don’t like stout beer?”
I grimace and glare at the drink in front of me. “Hum— People actually drink that intentionally? Is it medicinal?”
I was entirely serious but this only brings on new gales of laughter from Juliet.
“Come on.” She stands up and grabs my hand. “Let’s go play darts.”
Chapter Nine
Juliet
So, Shak is kind of… Amazing. Unbelievably sweet. He’s got this innocence about him but at the same time, he’s definitely all man.
He’s built like a brick shithouse, for one. And I don’t miss the way he occasionally scans my body. But it’s not creepy or skeezy. He’s not staring at my boobs the entire time or anything.
It’s just like for the first time in forever, I feel…safe.
Which is delusional.
I’m letting myself live in this little fairytale where Robbie has actually disappeared from my life. Where he’s actually let me go and I can be happy, maybe for the first time since…well, in a really long time.
But as I watch Shak’s brows scrunch adorably in concentration as he lines up another dart, I feel it. Happiness. It’s bubbling up inside me like champagne. It feels so foreign but I’m already drunk on it.
Shak lets the dart fly and his entire face lights up when it hits the target, right outside the bull’s-eye.
“Fifty points,” he says, bright amber eyes flashing my direction.
I feel the look all the way down to my toes.
“You sure you’ve never played this game before?” I arch an eyebrow at him and sashay back his way, not able to help giving an extra swing to my hips. “That’s the third game in a row that you’ve smoked me.”
“Smoked?”
I smile, amused at the little things that are lost in translation. It makes me pause and think about language in a way I never have before. “You won. Beat the pants off me. Smoked me.”
His eyes immediately drop to my waist, like he is imagining the pants off me even though I’m wearing a skirt.
He licks his lips in that sexy way of his and then his eyes meet mine again and the light must catch them because I swear for a second, they flash golden.
“Okay, Prince Charming. It’s getting late. Walk me home?”
He looks a little crestfallen. “Is it over already? Our go out?”
I giggle. “Yes, this date is over but that doesn’t mean we can’t have another one.”
“Tomorrow?”
He looks so eager.
“Don’t you know you’re supposed to play hard to get?” I tease him.
I entwine my arm with his again as we leave the pub. He’s so big and warm beside me. After Robbie, I should be put off men forever. I absolutely should not be jumping right into something else. So what am I doing?
“Play? Is this a game?” His brow crinkles in confusion.
I sigh and pause on the sidewalk. Then I shake my head and break away from his arm, leaning back against the side of the pub, looking up at the dark night sky. “A lot of people think so.”
“Do you think so, Juliet?”
God, is it wrong that I already love the way my name sounds rolling off his accented tongue? I squeeze my eyes shut. “No. I’m tired of games.”
That’s all it was with Robbie. Mind games mostly. Me constantly walking around on eggshells, never knowing what would set him off.
“I liked the game of darts and I am new to this,” he gestures at his chest and then mine, “but I do not consider it a game between you and I. Maybe I am too serious. I have been accused of it before. And I like your laugh. But I do not want to be a game to you.”