Incipient A Dark Paranormal Romance - Bianca Scardoni Page 0,26

washed over me. I tried to hide it by reaching forward and taking a shot of Tequila, but Trace definitely noticed the change.

“Did I say something wrong?” he asked, worry puckering his forehead as he watched me set the glass back on the table.

I shook my head. “Nope. Not at all.” Sucking in a deep breath, I tossed my hair over my shoulder and pushed all of the icky thoughts away as my Tequila buzz grabbed the reins again. “Who’s turn is it?”

He eyed me for a moment as though trying to read something from my face, from my demeanor, and then said, “It’s your turn to ask. Unless you want to stop playing?”

“Why would I want to stop?” I asked, doing my best to slide my poker face back into place. “Truth or dare?”

“Truth.” His eyes never strayed from mine.

I smiled because I knew he was giving me a freebie. “How do you know we’re going to be together? What did you see exactly?” I wasn’t sure why I was bringing this up again when I knew deep down, nothing good would come of it, yet I couldn’t stop myself from asking.

Perhaps a small part of me, a buried part of me, still longed for that happily ever after. Perhaps a part of me was still holding on to the hopes that there would be something good at the end of this dark line. That I might finally find peace and happiness after all the heartache and misery.

He pushed forward again, leaning his forearms on his knees as he interlocked his fingers and captured my gaze. “Are you really sure you want to know this?”

That gave me pause, but the hesitation didn’t stick around long enough to sway me. “Yeah. I mean, why wouldn’t I?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “You can’t unknow the future once I tell you.”

“I know that,” I said as the cold touch of trepidation jolted my heart. “I…I’m sure. I want to know.”

His eyes bounced around my face for what felt like an eternity before he finally answered, “I know we’re going to be together because I saw you…walking down the aisle to me.”

Well, shit on a stick.

There it was.

And I totally wasn’t panicking.

10. HEARTBREAK WARFARE

The room felt as though all the air had been sucked right out of it. That or I’d forgotten how to breathe altogether. Either way, my lungs were burning something terrible and my head was swimming with messy, disjointed thoughts. I honestly wasn’t sure how much time had passed before I remembered to take in a breath of air and then let it out.

Yeah…maybe I was panicking a little.

“You’re freaking out,” said Trace as he surveyed me from across the night table.

I shook my head sharply and then lied through my teeth. “No. I’m fine. I’m just…you know, taking it in. Are you sure that’s what you saw? Maybe we were just in someone else’s wedding party?” I fired off my questions like a person who was definitely not fine with what they had just heard. In my defense, they were perfectly valid questions. We could’ve just been attending someone else’s wedding and not necessarily our own wedding.

Our. Wedding. What the hell? I was actually going to make it past my eighteenth birthday and get married? For some reason, I couldn’t seem to wrap my head all the way around it.

“I’m sure,” he said as he leaned back in his chair and swiveled it from side to side again, watching me closely. “I've never been more sure of anything in my life.”

Well, there it was. He was sure. He saw it. What more could I say?

“Is it just me or is it really hot in here?” I asked, fanning myself as I sat there in my bra and underwear. Reaching over, I grabbed one of the shot glasses and tossed the liquid courage back, hoping it would quell my nerves.

His eyes cut across my face as he openly examined me. “Do you want me to open the window?”

I shook my head, deciding that a cold breeze against my semi-naked chest probably wasn’t the best idea right now.

“What do you think about what I just told you?” he asked, still watching me with great interest, his eyes scouring my face in the hopes of knowing me—of understanding the parts of myself I keep hidden.

I stared forward, unsure how to answer him. The last few months, I’d been with Dominic, and it was fairly clear that I wasn’t going to have the whole