*Once Upon A Time* {Tristan}

[DEVON MARLOWE]

Devon may have been a princess at heart and in her mind, but she didn’t eat like one. Not at all. She ate like a starving native that never ate a single meal in her life. And this was at every meal of the day. It had to be the whole shifter thing. It had to be, because a girl her size should not be able to eat the way she did. Two burgers, French fries, and a bowl of soup. Yea that wasn’t normal. But that was okay because if she wanted normal, she wouldn’t be living in Forks. The home of almost every annoying vampire on the planet. It was like they all flocked here for some strange reason. Really? It wasn’t that great of a town, to be perfectly honest. It was small, humid, and grey. Every human knew every human. It was like there were two types of humans that lived here: those who couldn’t leave and those who were too stupid to get out. So why anybody would willingly live here was beyond her? Granted, she lived there, technically. But that was because her best friend and alpha lived here. Some loyalty thing that came with being a shifter.

But anyways! Devon was chilling at the small little diner in the small little town of Forks. She had already ordered her meal and was half way done with her soup. Honestly the waitress’ look when she ordered had to be the best face Devon has seen in a long time. Generally the shifter goes there for her special cup of tea. So when she actually sat down in a booth and ordered food, it kind of threw the staff off. But of course Devon had just acquired some money from one of her many rich friends in the states, and decided to go out to eat for once instead of cooking. Obviously she wasn’t going to spend all of her money on the diner, she did save most of it back at the house. She took a little with her though for her dinner and some grocery shopping. Devon figured Pete and Keisha would appreciate the surprise of food when they came home from a long day’s work. Sure, Dev never worked an actual job in her life. But she did have the ability to get money from people. Especially those people that she still had influence over. Sure the girl has made a shit ton of enemies from stepping on them and using them. But there were a handful of people out in the world that still like Devon and knew of her reputation. It was her network and her secret. Shockingly it was the one thing Keisha didn’t know about. She knew of Devon’s past and her enemies. But her network was her little secret.

It wasn’t that she was afraid of Keisha and Pete taking advantage of it. It was just that Dev felt like that part of her had to be kept a secret. Sure Dev knew about the whole thieving thing Keisha had to do every now and then. And they would probably appreciate knowing that Devon had these connections. But these were fragile connections and Dev couldn’t use them all the time. So it was better that Keisha and Pete just assumed that she conned some stupid people off the street. So whatever, as long as she contributed to things the siblings shouldn’t care where it all comes from. Devon glanced out the window next to her and debated on all the things she should buy. There were the necessities like fruit, meat, vegetables, seasonings, but she was also thinking of some of the dessert she could surprise them with. Like cookies, brownies, or just a really big cake. It had to be something big that would last them a couple of days. And Devon wasn’t about to buy the ones already baked, she was going to bake them herself obviously.

The brunette quickly fixed her skirt from under the table. That was one thing about skirts that drove the girl nuts, they always rode up on her. Even though she fixed them constantly. The skirts weren’t really short like all the teens wore them. They went down to her knees, so they shouldn’t be an issue. But no, apparently they had to be difficult regardless of what she did to them. Whatever. It wasn’t like she actually had anyone to look nice for. The girl has yet to imprint and yet to fall in love. Because she has yet to find a guy that was worthy of her feelings like that. Nobody could keep up with her verbal battles, except Keisha. And no guy was patient enough for her moods and dramatic rants. And if they weren’t patient enough than they wouldn’t be able to treat her the way Dev knew she should be treated. Maybe she was better off alone. Maybe the shifter god didn’t think Devon was capable of imprinting on anybody. Well that kind of sucks, but oh well. Devon was still having fun in life.

Then suddenly everything came crashing down with a soft ding. Devon sucked in a deep breath and almost choked on the scent of vampire that went into her nose. What was a vamp doing at a diner? Didn’t human food suck to them? They couldn’t eat it. So why was one here? Dev ignore the leech though. She kept her eyes on her plate and the window. But there was something in the back of her mind that just kept nagging at her to look up. But she wouldn’t. She knew how to ignore her body’s urges and was an expert at it. But her brain was persistent. Devon told it to calm down, that she would look up when the vampire leaves.