An Eternity of Eclipse (31 page)

I shot him a baffled look. “What are you talking about?”

He took a step closer to me, looking quite intimidating while he towered over me.

“I’ve been nothing but patient and affectionate with you. To be honest, I think all that affection has gone to your head because you seem to not know a good thing when it is right in front of you.” A bitter smile that didn't reach his eyes graced his lips. “Well, if you don’t see it, I’m sure some other human girl will.”

It took all my will to control the fires that were threatening to sizzle in my eyes. “Are you trying to make me jealous?”

“I have to get some action from someone, right?” he countered flippantly. He gave me a measuring look. “If you’re not so willing, then I can easily find another girl who’d be more than willing.” A challenging smile touched his lips before he took a step closer to me. His much-too-hot-body towered over mine suggestively. “Of course, if you’ve truly seen the error of your ways and admit that it is you who is at my mercy, then I’d be forgiving. Things can return to normal and I’ll go back to spoiling you with my affections.”

I scoffed at the male arrogance emitting from him.

“Don’t make it seem like I’m the one who should be taken pity on, Ashtray,” I said to him harshly. I could feel the competitive vixen within me spring to life. I wasn’t going to give Eclipse the satisfaction of thinking that he had won when it was abundantly evident that he had lost since the beginning. “You’re the one who’s obsessed with me. You’re the one who gave up your powers to be here with me, and you’re the one who can’t stay away from me. Now tell me—who is at whose mercy?”

He smiled wryly at what I said, his eyes accepting my challenge.

“Well then, have fun on your girls’ night, Teacup,” he told me tactfully. He wheeled away from me and waltzed back towards the club’s backdoor, officially setting the competition between us in motion with his final words.

“You know where to find me when you’ve gotten off your high horse and are ready to admit who is obsessed with who, who can’t stay away from who, and who is at whose mercy.”

“I may have waited a lifetime for him . . ."
21:
My World

I don’t know what came over me as I sat there, watching as girls after girls threw themselves at Eclipse. The Demon looked like he was having the time of his life as he sat up in the balcony, sharing shots and laughing with them. All the while as this occurred, I simmered on the ground floor with boiling blood and rage-filled eyes. I was angry, I was so angry. As much as I hated to admit it, I was also incredibly jealous.

He was
my
Demon! I had to suffer with him! I had to deal with his overbearing personality, and what ended up happening? Who got to benefit from it? Why did all these other girls get to crush on my eye candy, dance with him, and have their way with him while I had to watch out for nosebleeds and threats of possible death from sex?

My life is a joke.

Plagued with misery, I kept drinking and drinking. I was going crazy. The girls, even Kina and Missy, were beginning to become worried for me. They even tried to move all the drinks away from me, but I was persistent. Every time they attempted to take my drinks away, I would violently swat their hands, causing them to recoil in shock from the violence I displayed. I was normally very nice and soft-spoken, so I knew they must have suspected that the alcohol was beginning to work its effects on me—which was actually true. I typically had a very high tolerance for alcohol. However, when someone downs the drinks like I did, there was no blood that was strong enough to withstand the effects of the alcohol.

I was inarguably drunk.

How did I know for sure I was drunk and not just tipsy? Well, there were only two things I would do if I became drunk. The first was that I would become a bit more violent, and the second . . . Oh cheeses rice, you’re about to see the second . . .

“Grace! Where you going? Oh my God! You’re so drunk, come back!” Dawn’s voice chased after me while Ara’s arms tried to reach out for mine. They belatedly realized what I was getting ready to do in my drunken state.

“Grace, no!” Ara screamed. “Please come back! Damn it, you’re going to kill us when you’re sober!”

“Fuck! Is she really doing this?” I heard Missy cry out, attempting to reach out for me as well. She missed me by a mere inch, causing Kina to groan in the background and cover her face in mortification. “Oh crap, she’s going to humiliate us!”

“Grace!” they all screamed. “Get your short ass back here!”

But it was too late.

I was already staggering onto the dance floor, bopping instinctively to the music. I recalled the image of all these girls dancing sexily, using Eclipse like he was a stripper pole. I shook my booty in anger, releasing my frustration by gyrating my wrath away. Then, I did something I would never do in my sober state: I busted out my signature move.

The Shopping Cart Dance.

Envisioning myself pushing a shopping cart down a grocery aisle while some weird trance music played in the background, I started to glide down the dance floor. I pushed the invisible cart with one hand, shook my butt like no one’s business, and reached one hand up. I grabbed an imaginary chocolate-chip cookie box and threw it into the shopping cart while alternating the process with my other hand. It was a cross between old-school disco dance and simple foolishness. As I did this, I could feel my girlfriends trying to pull me away from my imaginary shopping cart. Being the persistent drunk I was, I kept running back to my shopping cart. I would push the cart with my hips, gyrating about like I was a planet revolving around the sun.

I briefly looked up to the balconies. I could see Eclipse resting his arms over the railing, completely ignoring the other girls who were vying for his attention. He kept his undivided attention on me. I couldn’t really tell because my vision was kind of blurry, but I could’ve sworn there was an adoring smile on his face while he watched me with unrivaled interest. Hell, I would go as far as saying that he found me entertaining. A soft laughed poured from him as a couple of his “workers” stood beside him and watched me with big smiles on their faces as well.

I’ll show you.

Wanting to demonstrate to him how awesome I was without him (and wanting to add some spice to my “shopping” routine), I ducked down without warning. I pretended that I was grabbing a tub of ice cream from the bottom shelf of the nonexistent freezer aisle and bounced back up with skills.

“Make room! Make room, guys! Hahahaha. Look at that little chickie go!”

“What the heck is she doing?”

“Hahaha! Oh man, this is making my night!”

“Work it, shorty! Work it!”

I could see the crowd swaying off to the side to give me room to dance. Under any other circumstances, my shy nature would have had a heart attack from all the attention I was getting. Sadly, because my beer goggles blinded me, I didn’t give it a second thought. I merely kept pushing my cart down the aisle.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Work it, Grace. Work it,” I encouraged myself shamelessly.

As I felt the alcohol pump its way through my body, I took my dance performance to another level. I attempted to channel the Shakira within me. Unfortunately, with the screams of horrors coming from the girls, I had a feeling that instead of looking like Shakira, I looked more like a drugged-up ape doing some extremely frowned-upon tribal dance gone wrong. But I couldn’t stop. I bounced around like I was convulsing with an exorcism and started fist-pumping the air.

“Yeah!”

“Whoooo!”

“Oh yeah, baby!”

I guess I was getting really good because as the laughter faded, I could hear cheers coming from the crowd. I thought it was because of my own personal dancing skills, but when I felt someone grab my hips, I knew then it was because the “sun” of our small world had returned, and he was marking his territory with me as his primary object of affection.

Wrapping me against his strong body, Eclipse placed each of his hands on my hips and applied a bit of pressure. He easily controlled the sporadic swaying and rotation of my hips, so instead of looking like an out of control hurricane, I actually looked like a woman who knew her way around the dance floor.

“You win, Teacup,” Eclipse whispered into my ear, his warm breath giving me butterflies. I could feel a bitter smile form on his lips as he spoke to me. “I lose. I’m the one who is obsessed, I’m the one who can’t seem to stay away from you, and I’m the one who is at your mercy.”

“I always win, Ashtray,” I slurred drunkenly, feeling satisfaction that he was back by my side.  

His concurring chuckle spread over me. He pulled me closer by affectionately wrapping his protective arms over me.

“You will
always
win when it comes to me,” he crooned melodiously, making it sound more like a vow than a statement.

Next thing I knew, I was dancing in rhythm with him, our bodies swaying harmoniously to the upbeat music. Turning, twisting, and moving like an ardent wind, I was lost with him. It wasn’t a slow dance, it wasn’t a grinding dance, and it wasn’t a sexy salsa dance. It was just that—a dance. A dance that old fashioned lovers did with one another to break loose and have fun, and a dance that completely steals you away from your reality. The club that was filled with people faded into oblivion. All that existed in my world was Eclipse, and judging from the way he was looking at me, I imagined at this particular second, I was his world as well.

“How did I look dancing?” I asked moments later, feeling myself sober up while in his arms.

“Like an electrocuted monkey performing a dysfunctional mating dance during a 10.0 earthquake.”

My cheeks boiled with fire. I was absolutely speechless. Was I that bad?

Eclipse laughed, raising a hand to gently stroke over my flaming red cheek. “Can I request that the next time you dance like that, it will only be in the privacy of our own bedroom and only when you’re completely naked with me?”

“I thought you said I looked like an electrocuted monkey?”

A devilish grin played on his sensuous lips. “I didn’t say that it wasn’t entertaining nor did I say that it didn’t turn me on to see you shake your cute little butt like that.”

“You’re always such a pervert,” I replied, though I was secretly glad that he was turned on by my dysfunctional dancing routine.

I felt like I was on cloud nine—that was until people began to come up to me and tell me how much they enjoyed my performance. That was when I sobered up exponentially. I realized quickly that I had just danced like an idiot in front of a bunch of strangers! Horror streaked over my face. I was getting pats on the back from guys and girls alike, telling me that I was the best performer they had ever seen. They were being really nice, but I knew they were lying. I was nothing but a cute dork who made them laugh while they were performing their own mating dance.

Oh God, I was so mortified!

There was never a worse time to stop feeling drunk.

“Grace, do you know him or should we intervene and rescue you now?”

I almost had a whiplash when I heard Dawn’s timid voice float over the loud music. The momentary possession Eclipse had over my reality disintegrated. I instinctively stepped away from him and was greeted with the sight of Dawn and Ara standing behind me. Their faces were drained from chasing my drunk self around all night. Behind them were Kina and Missy, both of whom looked exhausted from trying to help Dawn and Ara regulate my craziness (and obviously failing). And if my drunken eyes weren’t deceiving me, then I’d say they looked extremely pissed off with me for ruining their night with my antics.

I didn’t blame them. I was definitely acting the fool tonight.

“Oh, I know him. I know him!” I assured them when I realized that the girls and Eclipse were staring awkwardly at one another, unmistakably waiting for me to make the appropriate introductions before they could start conversing. I laughed nervously, still trying to gather my bearings. I gestured a tentative hand motion from Eclipse to the girls. “Um, everyone, this is Eclipse. Eclipse, these are my friends: Ara, Dawn, Kina, and Missy.”

“Eclipse?” Dawn whispered, her gaze broadening. She gasped at me before pointing at him. Knowledge glimmered in her eyes. “Ooh! Are you Grace’s new neighbor?”

Ara’s eyes bloomed as well. “Were you the one who crashed Grace’s date with DonKi?”

Kina exhaled in disbelief. Laughter threatened to deluge from her mouth when she hastily asked, “Were you the guy who convinced DonKi to ditch his date with Grace and told him to cheat with someone else’s girlfriend?”

“Were you the hot guy who just walked in?!” Missy blurted out, drunk off her mind before covering her mouth in a blush.

Eclipse laughed, pretending to feel awkward with the blunt questions—though I knew he was internally proud that he was so “infamous” with my friends.

“Uh, I guess I’m guilty on all counts.” He faked a blush, smiling at Missy who blushed like hell when he added, “Though I’m not sure about your question, but I’m flattered that you find me to be so favorable in the first place. Thank you for that.”

The girls nodded, all grinning nonstop at him. Their behavior was similar to the residents at Sanctuary. They were completely enamored with him.

I wanted to whisper to them, “You guys know you’re smitten with a
Demon
, right?” But I refrained from doing so because that would not be a fun conversation for anyone, especially for four Christian girls who adored God and detested anything that went against God.

Ara laughed, being the first to break everyone from their stupor. “Well, it’s so nice to meet you, Eclipse.” She glanced at me with an approving glint in her eyes before facing him again. “Thanks for saving Grace and getting her to stop that weird dance of hers. The girls and I have been trying to pry her off the dance floor all night, but we were afraid of getting attacked because Grace is kind of violent when she’s drunk.” Another laugh poured from her. “She’s uncharacteristically wacky too, so it’s a great relief to see that you could help maintain her drunkenness!”

I glared at Ara. “You do know the alcohol is wearing off and I’m becoming coherent again?”

Ara smiled coyly, winking at me before Dawn, who had a sneaky smile on her face, said, “Anyway, we’re going to call it an early night.” She angled her head at me. “We’re going to stop by the church and since it’s all the way in the other direction . . .” Her eyes bloomed as though she was horrified by this newfound development. She gasped dramatically. “Who’s going to take you home, Grace? We don’t want you traveling all by yourself at night!”

I bestowed Dawn and Ara with a blank, un-amused stare for their poor acting performance.

Eclipse, who clearly saw through their act, smiled courteously and took advantage of the opportunity they opened up for him.

“I’ll take her home,” he assured them. He definitely approved of their efforts to match us together. “You know, since we both live in the same apartment complex and all. It makes sense if she leaves with me. I’ll take care of her from here.”

“Oh thank goodness!” Ara beamed with a clap of her hands. “We thought poor, beautiful, and
single
Grace here was going to walk home all alone without anyone to protect her.”