Tempest

8 : No! Not now.

2020

Tempest walked into Le Coffee Shoppe to order her usual lunchtime latte. There was a long line and she waited patiently for her turn while she thumbed through her phone. She was expecting a text and it was taking longer than she wanted. She huffed, slightly annoyed but she knew that Dean would send it when he had found something worth reporting. Still, it didn't make the waiting easier.

"Morning, Derrick," she said to the tall man behind the counter when it was finally her turn. Derrick grinned back at her as she inhaled deeply.

"Are you going to order anything different today?" he asked her.

"Nope," Tempest said. "Just get me the usual." It was the same banter that they had shared over the last half year. "The day I order something different -"

"-Is the day you and I go on a date."

Derrick smiled whimsically. He knew she was way out of his league. She had shoulder length, curly, brow hair and ocean blue eyes. He had never seen a woman of African descent with blue eyes before and it amazed him every time he saw her. Her features looked like they had been carved by the gods and then mortalised. her pert nose that turned up slightly, her big blue eyes lined with lashes that were thick and long, and lips that would have made Snow White green with envy. Even though she wore blue jeans, a white blouse that was tucked in and white heels, she looked like she had stepped off the cover of a magazine. Her hair was tied into a loose ponytail and she just looked amazing.

Tempest was aware of Derrick's crush. She never encouraged it but over the last six months of her coming to his coffee shop she had found him to be charming and funny, never once stepping out of line or saying anything she would consider to be offensive. He greeted her with a warm smile every time she came in for her cup of chai latte. He was cute, with curly red hair and freckles. Although he was technically too many to be called cute, she loved to tease him about it, often making him turn beet red because of it. It was one of her favourite pastimes.

"You really should try a coffee one of these days," he told her.

"No, thanks," she said. "It's not really my cup of tea," she said with a chuckle, moving her eyebrows up down quickly while a smirk sat on her face.

Derrick rolled his eyes and handed her the latte. She took it with an appreciative grin and paid for it while she took a first sip of her morning drink like a junkie. Despite being nose deep in the latte, she knew the second he walked through the door and she froze, her beast instantly on the alert.

*

Galan rubbed his eyes tiredly. He had barely rested the past few weeks. Reed and Otis were equally tired and as they walked through the city, they tried to hide their dislike for the loud noise and strong smells that surrounded them. The three Lycans stood head and shoulders above almost everybody they passed. They had learnt to ignore the side looks and outright looks of blatant admiration that were usually thrown in their direction, by both men and women. They noted how people tended to skirt around them as they walked, not knowing they were walking past apex predators but knowing instinctively that they walked past something dangerous. Something lethal.

They were in town to meet with another possible ally. The threat of war that had loomed over them for years was closer than ever before. What was even more frustrating, however, was that they still didn't know who they would be fighting against. They had prepared as best they could but it was difficult to know what defences to put up exactly if you didn't know who the enemy was.

"We're meeting Aurora this evening," Galan told Reed and Otis through their link. "She wants to pledge her allegiance. Her Sylphs don't want the war but they are ready to fight because they understand the implications now more than ever."