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“I’m going to fill up the Jeep, why don’t you go and grab some snacks before we leave.”

  We’d finished eating and were getting back on the road. My mom was one of those people who hated to stop when traveling. So I took her suggestion more like an order. The diner had an adjoining convenience store and gas station. It only had two pumps and the roof over us sagged dangerously. I wondered if my mom was worried about being flattened, I know I was.

  We would drive until we reached the outskirts of the town where I was born and check into a hotel since it would be too late to start knocking on doors and questioning the locals. It seemed like a sure thing – to find someone who’d lived in a small town for sixteen or more years, but neither of us spoke of what we would do if we didn’t find anyone. I allowed myself a brief moment to wish that my mom and dad may even still be in the town. But wishful thinking soon lost out to good old common sense. If my birth mother was smart enough to know we needed to be hidden, she would have been smart enough to get out of town too.

  I was deep in thought when I walked into the store. I hardly registered the tinkling of the bell above the door when I pushed it open and entered the just barely air-conditioned store. Walking up and down the aisle, chewing the inside of my mouth, I rubbed my fingers across the surface of my new necklace. I day-dream shopped, not really looking at the rows of bagged two for a dollar candy. I was about to make my second pass through when I noticed him staring at me from the far corner over by the drink coolers. I had a feeling he’d been watching me for a while. I’d never paid attention much to the opposite sex. My general attitude on dating was – Why bother? With my mother’s nomadic moving tendencies we never stayed anywhere long enough for me to take an interest in anyone or them me. But I had about as much chance of ignoring him as I did the feeling growing in my center.

  In the place right below my heart and right above my stomach, it felt both heavy and fluttering. As if stone butterflies were bouncing around in my chest cavity. As I stood there, staring back at this point, the fluttering stopped but the weighed feeling spread until my arms and legs felt heavy. Weighed or not, my legs started to move. I was being pulled to him. I could feel it like a rope attached to my midsection. I would have looked down to confirm but I couldn’t seem to stop looking at him. He had the same problem. It saved me from being embarrassed about gawking at him.

  I was tall, he was taller, at least six three. His skin was shades darker than mine. His hair was pulled back and I wanted to touch it to see if it really was as soft as it looked. His eyes were small but intense. They were hazel and reminded me of a large predatory cat; a lion or tiger maybe. He had a prominent nose and thick full lips. He was…beautiful. He was also out of my league. The closer I got, the older he looked. By the time I’d stopped, a foot was all that separated us and I’d gone from thinking him a few years older than me to thinking he was a whole lot older, although he still looked the same. There was something about his eyes.

  “Hi, I’m Wila, you from around here?”

  I could have slapped my forehead for such a cheesy pickup line. It was totally unlike me. The guy continued stare. I wet my lips and was about to work my magic with the equally classic: Cat got your tongue, when a second guy walked up.

  “No, just passing through, how about you?”

  I tried to smile but in the end I’m sure the look I had was more in line with puzzled. The feeling had intensified to include a tingling and the pull or attraction I had was stronger than ever. Neither of them commented on the look on my face. I’d forgotten I asked a question when the first guy spoke.

  “Hadraniel,” he said in a voice that was both low and filled the tiny space we stood in.

  “But you can call him Lucius,” the other interrupted quickly, “I’m Sariel.”

  “You’re named after the angel of love?” I asked completely ignoring the other guy whose name I didn’t catch.

  I was still waiting on Hadraniel to answer my question when the bell over the door went off.

  “Ife.”

  My mom had come looking for me, which meant I’d been standing there longer than I thought. I looked over my shoulder and saw her stalking our way. Her lips had almost completely disappeared as she tightened them in frustration.

  “Let’s go.”

  Ife was my first name and my mom had called me by it until third grade. It was the only argument I’d won. I’d begged her to call me Wila after being teased. Now she only called me by it if she was really trying to get my attention. Both of the guys looked liked they’d been slapped and did double takes, first looking at my mom and then at me.

  Ordinarily I would have obeyed my mother, but something held me in place. I couldn’t move. I didn’t even acknowledge her. I turned my head and looked at Hadraniel or Lucius or whatever he called himself; waiting on him to say something else.

  My mom arrived, stood next to me, looked between the three of us and waited for me to get moving. When it became obvious I wasn’t, she tried again.

  “Now.”

  I knew she was annoyed and fast approaching upset, not quite mad but close, because I hadn’t heard her use that voice since I was a younger.

  “I thought you said it was Wila,” he finally said.

  In a voice unlike any that I had ever spoken in, I continued my conversation, completely ignoring my annoyed, slightly mad mother. “It’s both. Ife Wila Freeland.”

  I could hear my mother’s gasp from beside me. We had just had a conversation about me being in, not only danger but mortal danger, and there I was in the middle of nowhere giving a complete stranger my full name. Two of them in fact, the second guy was still there too.

  “Mom’s the only person that ever calls me Ife. It seems too old for me, like someone’s grandmother’s name.”

  If I had been in my right state of mind I would have stopped but I wasn’t. I hadn’t been since I’d set eyes on tall, dark and menacing. I was smitten, a word I didn’t think I’d used in describing myself…ever…in life. But even smitten didn’t seem like the right word. Bewitched maybe?

  “Lucius we have to get going ourselves,” Sariel spoke up. “It was very nice to meet you Wila. I’m Sariel by the way.”

  My mom turned her attention to Sariel and gave him a smile that was both, rude and polite simultaneously, “Very nice to meet you, and you too, Lucius.” Completely ignoring Sariel’s outstretch hand, she turned her attention back to me. “Ife, I’ll not ask again.” She walked to the door and held it open, waiting on me to join her.

  Lucius extended his hand. “It was very nice to meet you Wila.”

  I was not sure if he meant to shake it, kiss it, or take in and run for the hills. I would have happily taken any of the three. I was suddenly very excited at the opportunity to touch him. I looked into his eyes, feeling like the unspoken words that were on my lips were about to be passed to him through touch. I lifted my hand and touched his.

  For a moment the world seemed to stand still. I took in a quick breath and saw him do the same. I was surprised the handshake wasn’t painful because we both were holding on tight, like with a stranger should last. He released my hand, turned and walked away without saying anything else. I stood there for an extra moment looking at him leave. Sariel offered a small smile before following his friend.

  My mom was still holding the door open, waiting for me. She had a strained look on her face as I grabbed the snacks I’d come in for in the first place. I looked over my shoulder one last time, but the two guys were gone. I paid for our snacks, shaking off the last of the daze. Man was that strange. I was probably never going to see him again.

  “Teenagers,” I heard my mom mutter under her breath as I passed her.