Beasty (A Royal's Tale Book 2) Read online

  It was clear Jay loved her like she was his own.

  I think even Abigail was impressed by the new Jay that Lolette seemed to have brought out.

  “Here,” I mumbled warmly as I walked over and handed him the milk bottle just as he settled Lolette—who was now freshly cleaned and changed—on the sofa.

  Jay’s bright eyes met mine as he took the milk bottle and, placing it carefully between his two thighs, grabbed my hand and pulled me down on the sofa beside him. I smiled as I quickly snuggled against him while he fed Letty her milk.

  It was when we were on our second episode of Scream Queens when the doorbell rang, and I let out a startled scream of my own.

  Instantly, a grumpy Letty, who was sound asleep on Jay’s chest only seconds ago, let out a frightened scream and began to cry very loudly.

  “There you go waking up the baby,” Jay grumbled as he got up and tried to soothe a now pink and very angry Lolette.

  I sighed as I got up and took the screaming baby from his arm. Bouncing her against my chest, I began walking around, cooing soothing words into her ears. “Go check who’s at the door, will you?” I whispered to Jaydin as Lolette began to calm down, her large stormy grey eyes—that she had inherited from her mum—shining with tears and twinkling at me with the sort of warmth I’d only seen babies give their mothers.

  I held her closer to my chest, touched by the tiny realization. Having witnessed Letty and my interaction, Jay smiled and nodded before he turned around and walked towards the door.

  “Letty looks so much better with a smile on her face. Ooh yes, she does!” I whispered to a wide-eyed Lolette. Immediately, as if she understood what I had said, her smile broke into a toothless grin, and I found myself grinning along with her. I couldn’t help but melt every time she sent one of those smiles my way. “Aweeeee! Now let’s go and see where your Uncle Jay is, okay? He’s taking a little too long, isn’t he?”

  Letty grinned again. And my heart turned into mush. “Jaydin, I’ve been looking everywhe—” I stopped as I took in the scene at the doorway.

  “Erm…Jay?”

  Jaydin immediately turned around, his brown eyes stormy. I frowned when I saw the person standing there—tall, lean, heavily tattooed with piercing hazel eyes, and his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He looked at us in bewilderment.

  My frown hardened. This did not stop him from voicing out his curiosity.

  “What the hell, man? This your baby and the momma? You’ve barely gotten out of college, Jaydin!”

  Strangely, still calm, I sighed. Jaydin made a move to hand him some, but I quickly wrapped my hand around his arm and pulled him back. Just then, Lolette cooed against my chest, and I bounced her lightly, soothing her back to sleep. She sighed.

  “Jaydin?” the man exclaimed, his hand waving up and down in the air, exasperated.

  “Quiet, Dom! She’s sleeping! And this is my best friend, Olivia, and her niece. I already told you about her, you idiot!” Jaydin then turned to me, his eyes glistering with embarrassment. “Olli, this is my cousin, Dominic.”

  As if that was some kind of trigger, something switched in Dominic. He froze then sent an apologetic look my way. “I’m sorry. I…get upset easily.”

  I waved it off with a smile. “It’s all right. I would have thought the same thing, too. Well…maybe.” I moved back, motioning towards the house. “Do you want to come in for coffee?”

  A spark of gold flashed through Dominic’s hazel eyes, and I gasped, taking a step back in my shock. Dominic didn’t notice, or if he did, he didn’t show it. Instead, he smiled and only shook his head. “Maybe not today. I just came to get Jaydin. It’s a…family emergency.”

  Smiling, I nodded in understanding. Jay then hugged me back, which I returned, and kissed a now sleeping Letty. “I’ll see you later, okay?”

  I grinned. “Oh, I’m sure I will. Aby is coming over tomorrow, after all.” Jaydin blushed, and my grin widened. I turned my attention back to Dominic and waved. “See you later…” I hesitated, not comfortable to use his name so casually.

  “You can call me Dom. Everyone else does.” He chuckled as both Jay and he began to walk away. He suddenly stopped and turned around to face me. “Maybe I’ll come over next week. How does Thursday sound?”

  My eyes widened, a little bit surprised. I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Cheeky man. He took advantage of a friendly invitation and turned it into an extended invite.

  Beside him, Jaydin suggestively wiggled his eyebrows. Amused, I nodded. “Sure, Dom! See you both soon then.”

  Both Dominic and Jaydin grinned, their left hands coming up to wave at me, as they walked towards a black Porsche. As if they’ve done this a million times, they bid me goodbye in sync.

  “Bye, Olli.”

  I stood gaping as the car rolled out of my driveway.

  Chapter 3

  I just got out from the library from another round of much needed reading. The definite clicks of my feet against the stone pavements sounded cold and sharp in the scarcely occupied underground parking lot. With every step, the feeling of dread increased. With every footfall, the fear I had spent almost a month conquering, almost a month forgetting, became stronger.

  It was humiliating. And yet, somehow, I had expected it.

  I had become scared of driving. Especially during nights.

  My eyes found the spot my new car was parked at, and I pushed away the dreary feelings down my crazily thumping chest. I willed myself to keep walking towards it.

  One step left…

  My matte black car just a grasp away, I stopped.

  The thumping in my heart increased, and my palms were now sweating really bad. I cringed as I automatically wiped my hands on my pants, gulping.

  Just do it. Extend your hand. Open the door. It was just an accident.

  I lifted my hand slowly, then worked my fingers—in what seemed like forever—on the door’s handle. An inch away and my fingers froze. My chest chilling with fear, I found myself recoiling my hand back.

  The familiar feeling of boiling anger and desperation began to seep again, like it had so many times before. I cussed myself for being weak, for never being strong enough to completely face my fear.

  It was useless. There seemed to be no way out of this.

  I had gotten into the car this morning well enough that I had been so sure the drive back home at night would be no big deal. Clearly, I was wrong.

  One would think that I would have learned from all the other times I had panic attacks. I had been in so many episodes, after all. But like a very persistent foe who always lurked in the shadows, it waited for and pounced at even the smallest of cracks in my defence, catching me unawares.

  “Any problem?”

  My head snapped towards the speaker, and my eyes immediately widened when I noted who he was.

  “Dominic?”

  Wearing a very similar outfit to what he had yesterday—a light pink button-up shirt and formal black pants—Dominic stepped closer as he analysed the scene between my innocent car and me. Before he could state his observations of my standing in the cold, he smiled, despite looking distracted and confused. “Funny, we’re colliding way faster than normal pendulums do: yesterday at your place and now here,” he mused. Then, remembering the matter at hand, he asked me, “Is there something wrong, Olli?”

  Normally, I would have cringed at the nickname Jaydin had one day decided to curse upon me, but I was admittedly distracted counting the chances of finding Dominic in my university’s parking lot, not to mention embarrassed at the fact that he stumbled upon me having a psychological episode with my car.

  Panic came again, and thinking quickly, I changed the topic.

  “What are you doing here anyway?” I wondered aloud, taking a step away from the car and towards Dominic. Up close, I noticed how his fancy pointy formal footwear seemed as expensive as all of my current outfit’s costs combined. Maybe even my existence too.

  Dominic’s smil
ed faltered a little, but he quickly glued it back. I felt a little taken back by the realisation that there was more to Dominic than met the eye. Maybe it wasn’t as strange as I was thinking, though. This was our second meeting after all.

  “Work purposes. My…superior is one of the governors of this university. I came to fill in for him today. He has been on the edge lately.”

  Hmm…

  I nodded before smiling. “Oh! Okay!”

  Decent job, Olivia! Three syllables!

  An awkward silence ensued for a while before Dominic began walking towards me. Holding out a hand, he smiled. “I can drive you home.”

  Suddenly suspicious, I looked up from his face to his extended hand.

  Was I that obvious? I couldn’t help but be slightly stunned at the transparency of my emotions. Or maybe it was the mortification displayed on my face. Had it been that easy to see the dread in my eyes? Was it that easy to see why the dread was in my eyes?

  “Your c—”

  “I’ll ask for it to be picked up. Don’t worry.”

  The hard metal of my car’s door felt cold against my touch as I stood there frozen. I contemplated the offer. Could I really risk another panic attack?

  The moment passed, and I felt my shoulders slump. I gave in, looking down at my shoes as I put the car keys in his palm.

  ~

  “I would have never taken you for an instrumental sort of a girl.”

  The silence that had settled in the car since the start of the journey, which was ten minutes ago, cracked, and my eyes turned towards the man who now occupied the driver’s side, looking at ease and very much in charge.

  “I find piano music most soothing while driving. Also, while studying. Although it does just make Jaydin fall asleep half the time,” I said, a small smile playing on my lips as I thought about the many times Jaydin had fallen asleep in the car with me driving. Now that the tense feeling had faded, I finally eased in my seat and brought my hair up into a loose bun.

  I opened the window to let in the chilly breeze of the night, letting it hit my exposed neck. I smiled.

  “Where’d you get that?” Dominic asked, trying to make it sound casual, but I could hear the curiosity in his question. I froze.

  “Get what?” I muttered, then slowly closed the window, glad that I had something to do to make me look busy. I remained looking outside and not give away anything by facing Dominic.

  I knew what he meant. It wasn’t very hard to miss. Almost everyone asked me about it lately. I had a feeling most thought I was just a diehard fan of Dracula or something. That’s a small embarrassment to take for what it truly was. The dark puncture scars had refused to leave—I had waited a month, so I’d know. And the way Abigail talked about embracing it felt like there was no other option than to accept it. I had a feeling it wasn’t going to be that easy for it to fade. The giver was not anything close to human, after all.

  My fingers itched to touch the scar, but I contained myself.

  This was not a normal scar.

  “That. On your neck. What is it?” Dominic dropped all pretences and suddenly snapped. Even so, he still had his eyes on the road. I kept silent.

  “Olli?”

  Livia? Olli? Livy? Olive?

  I sighed.

  “It’s not really any of your business to be concerned about. But if you must know, my neighbour’s cat bit me,” I said in the most convincing tone I could.

  “Your…cat? Bit you?” Dominic drawled out sarcastically. This time, I looked at him from the corner of my eyes. I noticed he had an eyebrow cocked up in blunt disbelief.

  “Neighbour’s cat, yes,” I muttered back.

  I didn’t really have to do this: lie every time someone asked about the mark. I will not deny that sometimes I even felt like exploding with the truth. But somehow it felt like a natural instinct to protect Beasty’s secret. And this instinct strangely riled me up in inopportune moments.

  A part of me wanted to explode right there and then and just tell Dominic the truth straight up, confess about the crazy accident in detail, about the even crazier fact of the man-beast who had saved me and given me the scar. But something in me resisted it, and so I stayed silent.

  “So, are you researching about this so-called cat?” Dominic asked, playing along with my made-up story. The insides of my stomach turned, and my head snapped towards him. I stared, wide-eyed. He could be observant if he wanted to.

  I was, in fact, researching the “cat.” But the fact that Dominic had hit home—and so quick—was dangerously bad for my safety.

  One wrong move and Dominic could either pull me into a world I was not sure I was ready to enter—if it existed and if he was one of them (as I was suspecting). Or he could be completely human, and I could be sent to the asylum within the next twenty-four hours.

  In which case, what were the odds I would let my secret out now? Slim. In fact, highly unlikely.

  “I don’t see why cats need researching, Dom. Especially when I do not own them.”

  Strangely, Dominic chuckled.

  “You might want to research this cat in particular, Olli. Trust me.”

  He turned towards me with a knowing smirk.

  I didn’t answer.

  ~

  “Here you go.”

  The rest of the drive had been uneventful after that, and thank God because I no longer wanted to be around Dominic with his knowing look and sardonic smiles as if he had figured out my secret and was just waiting for me to own up.

  He and I sat a few moments after he had parked the car, watching the yellow lights twinkling from my home’s windows indicative of Aunt Prue’s presence in the house.

  Somewhere too close for comfort, lightning zigzagged across the sky, and the thunder boomed in response. It was one of those strange stormy nights.

  Just like that, tiny drops of rain began to drizzle against the car’s windshield, and I sat quietly, mesmerized by the sound of the pounding rain and the sight of the water trickling into tiny channels in the window. Suddenly, I found myself in an ironic situation: rooted to my seat, taking shelter from the rain, when, a while ago, I was ready get the hell out of the car.

  But I couldn’t. Dominic had left his car back at campus, and it was suddenly raining outside.

  Either I left Dominic to his own device in the rain and escape or stay with him in the car until the rain stopped. I could invite him in, but with the level of suspicion I was suddenly having about his species type, there was a high chance I could end up doing some of the stupidest things ever.

  “Thinking about the cat again, Olli?”

  I felt myself stiffen. “I just noticed, Dominic. You’re more interested in the cat than I am. Maybe the next time I think about researching the cat, I’ll just call you instead. Do you happen to come from the same species?”

  Dominic’s eyes flashed golden, and I felt my heart jolt in terror against my chest. The odd mixture of fear and triumph bubbled in my chest as I watched the light-skinned man’s serious face slowly stretching into a grin.

  Suddenly, the space in the car seemed crushing, and I acted on impulse. Turning around, I opened the door and got out. I heard the other door opening and saw him standing outside.

  “Good night, Dominic,” I said and nodded, catching the car key he threw my way.

  The rain picked up and fell down heavier on me. Along with the late-night mist, everything around looked every part a mystery thriller movie.

  Dominic grinned before turning back to me.

  “You’re a smart one. Good night, Olli.”

  The only thing I managed to reply was a loud gasp after Dominic turned around and made a Flash-like exit, shocking the living hell out of me.

  He just ran off into the night in an inhuman speed. One second he was visible and then gone the next—poof!

  I almost reeled back, the sweep of wind latching onto me. If it hadn’t been confirmed earlier, it now was. Dominic was just what Beasty was.

  “A vampir
e, werewolf, or Frankenstein 2.0,” a shocked whisper came from behind me.

  What the hell!

  I shrieked, instantly jumped around, looking for whoever it was. In my jittery disposition, I slipped and fell on my ass. “Oh god,” I groaned, lying completely flat on my back against the driveway pavers. In the rain. At night.

  “Livy! Are you okay?”

  I groaned louder, rubbing my face with my hands, and registered the guy now crouching beside me. “What the hell are you doing here, River?”

  “I came to spend some time with my niece. But damn it. Tell me you saw that too! Saw that guy run like—who was that guy, by the way? And how do you even know him?” River demanded.

  “You talk too much,” I muttered as I got myself up on my feet, leaving the still-shocked River crouching on the pavers.

  “I’m serious! Who was that guy?”

  I let out an exasperated sigh. “That was Jaydin’s cousin, and thank you so much for helping me up. Shows how you care so much,” I hissed at him before I began my limping walk towards the front door. My butt was now ruined.

  “He’s definitely not human,” River whispered behind me, seemingly unfazed by my cold exterior. I heard as he closed the front door behind us and quickly rushed to join me as I continued to stride quickly away from him.

  “I won’t tell anyone,” River whispered again as I began climbing up the stairs. As if that was going to lure me into telling him.

  I sighed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Riv. Go away. I need to shower.”

  Reaching for my room’s door to push it open, I just had my hand on the cold knob when another hand grabbed mine and pulled me back.

  “I’m putting my bet on vampire,” River said, persistent.

  Despite myself, I scoffed. “Yeah right, the Cullens are in town. Sure. And Jaydin is secretly Jasper!”

  River, however, remained serious. The spark in his eyes dulled, and he sighed, a frown forming on his forehead. “You’re right. Maybe it was a trick of the light. It could have been the rain too,” he mumbled as he shook his head, twisting his fingers into his hair and pulling it lightly.