The lights of the city sparkled across the dark water. The food was perfect. A violinist played gentle music nearby.
But Jareth was not truly there.
His body sat across from me at the table, but his mind was somewhere else. He barely touched his drink. His leg bounced nervously under the table.
Every few minutes he checked his crystal communicator, hiding the screen beneath the table.
“Is there something wrong?” I asked while cutting my steak.
“What? No. Everything is fine,” he muttered. “Just work messages.”
I knew exactly who he was talking to.
He was messaging Luvena. Tracking where she went. Begging her to behave. Probably promising her anything she wanted.
Suddenly, his crystal communicator buzzed loudly on the table.
He grabbed it immediately. In seconds, all color vanished from his face.
He stood so quickly that his chair scraped loudly against the floor.
“I need to leave,” he said.
“What?” I set down my fork. “Jareth, we have not even had dessert. What happened?”
“Luvena,” he said quickly. Panic filled his voice. “She went out anyway. She is at a bar in the city. She says some men are bothering her. She’s scared.”
“Just call the pack guards,” I said calmly as I sipped my wine.