With my heels on, my head reached about four inches below the bullseye, which he’d been nailing all night. Chances were, he wouldn’t hit me, but it still didn’t stop my anxiety from creeping in and my palms from sweating.
Then I felt the weight of something heavy sitting on my chest. I wanted to run my palm down the front of my pleated shorts, but I couldn’t move. I attempted to turn my head to the side, unable to watch, but I was stuck in place. I had no control over my limbs, my movements, almost as if a force of magic bound me to the wall, keeping me here, and Kane flashed me a devious smile.
My anxiety spiraled, my breathing turned shallow, and my gaze hit Julian, who was sweeping across the bar swifter than a vulture. Before Kane had a chance to throw the dart, Julian appeared behind him and plucked it from his hand.
“Playing against yourself proves nothing. Play me.” His voice commanded the attention of all.
The chatter ceased and everyone watched, gripping anything closest to them.
And I still couldn’t move! I was fucking trapped, and all I could manage was to blink, swallow, and focus on my breathing to make sure I still was.
Kane turned, almost as tall as Julian, and stared at him for a moment with widened eyes. “You afraid for her, Blackwell?”
Julian’s mouth twitched. “The girl barely reaches the board. It doesn’t take much talent to avoid hitting her unless you’re aiming for her.” He looked over at me, and the dart squeezed inside his fist. “Release her,” he ordered aloud with a nudge of his head.
Kane pointed at me and lowered his eyes. “No, she’s staying,” he cocked his head toward Julian, his finger turning into an up-right flattened palm, “Go for it, Heathen,” he challenged. “You make that shot, I’ll free her from my hold.”
Silence passed between the two of them. Julian clenched his jaw, and the veins in his neck popped. He was considering Kane’s words, and my eyes bounced from Julian to Kane, back to Julian, having no idea what was happening or what Kane’s words meant as my heart pounded hard against my chest.
“I do this, and you’ll let her go?” Julian confirmed. “You’ll free her from your hold?”
“Ab-so-lute-ly,” Kane sang and took a step back, nudging his head to behind him. “But you have to do it from back there.”
By this time, more people had gathered as I stood under the dartboard, my stomach feeling like it had floated into my throat. A fat bead of sweat slithered down the nape of my neck. How did it go from everyone ignoring me to everyone staring at me? It was so hot, I wanted to shed my jacket, but couldn’t unglue myself from this position!
Zephyr took a step forward between the parting crowd. He stood taller than the rest, at least six foot four but just as lean, and lowered his head to whisper something to Julian. Zephyr’s blond hair fell from its slicked place and over his white mask as he looked up at me with bright lime-green eyes. Julian nodded.
Kane looked around the crowd, chuckling nervously. “Are you guys done kissing yet or what?”
The three of them broke apart when Julian took many steps back, keeping his eyes on mine. And the way he looked at me peeled away all my nerves. My panic dissolved, only hearing one distinct sound. The sound of a heartbeat. It beat so loud in my ears. Soothing. Steady. Stable. I focused on that. It granted me permission to relax and trust him.
Julian paused, at least twenty feet away, if not more, and I wanted to close my eyes, but couldn’t.
Then he rolled the dart between his two fingers, and all that consumed my senses were the colors of silver and green as Julian and Zephyr zeroed in on me, feeling me, breathing me, touching me. They were everywhere as if they were standing only centimeters away.
Without warning, Julian flicked his wrist, and the dart pierced through the air between us. The room was so quiet that I heard the dart’s whistle before it disappeared with a quickthump!against the wall. I stood frozen, unblinking eyes still linked to Julian’s, and waited for something to tell me to breathe because my mind could no longer put together a single command. Julian’s chest caved, and his eyes briefly closed before they blinked open to mine.
Relief. We breathed in at the same time but with twenty feet between us. Everyone else remained silent. A few had their jaw dropped open, eyes wide, and brows in the air.
“Congrats, Julian,” Kane said with a slow clap of his hands. “You see where you’re standing? That’s the closest you’ll ever be allowed to Fallon Morgan.”
Julian’s eyes narrowed with Kane’s words, his chest rising and falling rapidly. I was still standing under the weight of the dart, no doubt in the bullseye but too paralyzed to check. Julian secured his gaze to mine, and I felt him calming himself down through me.
Kane laughed, and my gaze dragged between the two worlds, the heartbeat still pounding in my ears. Time moved slow. And once Kane snapped his fingers, it sped and the bar fell back in tune. The weight slid off me. My muscles melted with the freedom, and my body felt as if it had run miles upon miles.
Julian gave me the same apologetic look he’d given me in the Devil’s Playground, the one he’d given me when we’d said our goodbyes in the woods. His look told me he was about to disappear again, and I shook my head, but it did no good. He still turned away, and I was too weak and spent to use anything to stop him—my voice, my arms, my feet.
Julian threw his hand up to Phoenix, and Phoenix nodded from behind the bar.
Then the Heathens were gone.
Kane snapped his eyes back over briefly with a devious smile.
“That was freaking amazing,” Adora said, coming before me, breaking my narrowed gaze on Kane and peeling me from the spot under the dartboard. She led me toward the bar as Kane talked to his friends, all their eyes on the path Julian just took when he’d left. “I can’t believe you did that for me,” she went on, but a solemn void took over the high Julian once gave. I wanted to run after him, to thank him and slap him and kiss him all at the same time. But Adora clung to me with a smile on her pouty lips under a wave of appreciation.
“It was nothing,” I said with a vacancy, my eyes locked on the door Julian had just walked through. I couldn’t just let him leave again. I had to talk to him. I had to know where his head was at after the night we shared.
Then my feet started moving in that same direction.
