Page 106 of Lightning Angel
She gave his arm a squeeze and looked around until she spotted a certain curtained corner. “Let’s go to the photobooth. There!”
Alexa dragged him around the dance floor and entered the booth. They captured a lot of cute and memorable pictures together, showcasing their outfits and infectious smiles. When they emerged, she was strangely animated.
“Do you know how to dance?” She turned to him, hoping his answer would be yes.
“No.” Tristan smiled crookedly. “But I would never turn down the chance to dance with you.”
“Aw, Tristan, aren’t you the sweetest? Don’t tempt me into biting you.” The words escaped her before she could check them.
But it was too late. Tristan’s eyes smoldered. He leaned down to her ear. “Bite me and I’ll bite you back.”
“Will you?” she asked breathlessly.
“You’ll have to find out.” He leaned back and met her gaze. “Now, will you honor me with this dance, my beautiful Alexa?”
She blushed.Oh, stupid, stupid blushes!She placed her hand in his and let him lead her to the dance floor. They found their place among the twirling couples.Familiar faces smiled at her and their eyebrows rose in question when they saw Tristan. She mouthed to them saying,boyfriend.
Tristan rested his hand on the small of her back and Alexa placed hers on his shoulder. They danced away in each other’s arms song after song, the tension slowly easing into teasing smiles and laughter. As the current song reached its pinnacle, Tristan dipped her in a graceful arc.
Their eyes met; his smoldering and hers slightly wide. When the final notes faded away, he straightened them slowly, their faces only inches apart.
Alexa held him a little tighter and realized she wasn’t the only one. Tristan’s fingers began tracing delicate patterns along her back, sending a cascade of shivers down her spine.
“Your ex is glaring.”
“Hush, you’re all I want to think about now.”
Tristan grinned and brushed his nose to hers. He opened his mouth to say something when the next song began, with a familiar melody. By the way his eyes lit up, she realized he knew it too.
A Thousand Years.
“It’s my favorite, thanks to you.”
“Me?” she asked, taken aback.
Tristan nodded, swaying them to the song. “I heard you sing this one day before we crossed paths, and I liked it instantly. I looked up its name on the internet, and it has been in my daily playlist since. Soon, it became my favorite.”
“Can I ask why?” she asked, transfixed in his gaze, even though she already guessed his answer.
He smiled gently, confirming her thoughts. “I feel like the song is about you and me, frommypoint of view.”
“How?”
He leaned to her ear and murmured, “Listen.”
The day we met, frozen I held my breath, right from the start I knew that I found a home for my heart beats fast…
Alexa’s heart escalated. Immense warmth filled her chest unlike the hundred other times she’d listened to this song and sang it. Her feelings stirred, and hewasright; every line felt like it was written in his point of view.
He fell first and hard, he knew she was someone special for him from the start although he dreaded the exposure of his secrecy. But when she leapt from the bridge, all his doubts and fears disappeared into the thin air.
When the chorus began, Tristan leaned back to look at her. The love shimmering in his breathtaking blue eyes made her feel inside out, the passion and longing emanating from him wrapped around her like a magical blanket.
Of course.He had, in a sense, died every day waiting for her, and had loved her before she ever knew him.
The next stanza began, and to her surprise, Tristan sang along, his gaze growing intense with each line.
“Time stands still, beauty in all she is, I will be brave, I will not let anything take away what’s standing in front of me, every breath, every hour has come to this.”