From the Shadows (A Shadow Chronicles Novel) Read Free

asked me the other day to ask Lochlan if he’d heard from you, and even I can tell she still doesn’t quite trust him. Where are you, Juliette? I know you left your car at Mom and Dad’s, so if you can’t get home just say the word and I’ll come get you.”
    My throat closed up tight to listen to the worry and the hope in his voice. There were five years between my brother and I, but there was a time I’d felt as close to him as though he were my twin. I used to share nearly everything with him (except, you know, girl stuff…and the shifter thing). And it wasn’t as if Mark hadn’t had his fair share of PTSD to deal with, what with having been a Marine Corps sniper for 11 years of his adult life and learning not even a month ago that the monsters in his boyhood closet were living next door.
    Actually, right down the hall would be more accurate.
    I drew in another deep breath to control the swell of my emotions. “I’m sorry to have made you all worry, I truly am,” I said, once again studiously avoiding the question of where I was—I wouldn’t put it past Mark to come up here looking for me no matter how much I told him to stay away. “But I needed to get away. I felt like I was being smothered with all the damn concern for my welfare. I mean, it’s not like I was the only one who went through hell that day. I just…I needed room to breathe without constantly tripping over somebody who was making sure I was okay.”
    “I understand that, believe me,” Mark said. “But did you have to do all that free br eathing in a whole other city—or state, or wherever the hell you are? My God, Juliette, the least you could have done was to tell someone you were leaving so we wouldn’t have worried about you.”
    My respect for Lochlan Mackenna’s ability to keep a secret rose up a notch. He’d known three days before I left that I was planning to take off —I’d even convinced him to drive me to the bus station. I knew that he was particularly close to his sister (his sire—the vamp who’d made him one—was Saphrona’s biological father), so the fact that he hadn’t said a single word to her about my plan to leave home for a while meant that he really did hold me in high esteem. That he, a vampire, cared a great deal about me, a shapeshifter—his natural enemy—enough to keep a promise that he had made to me despite my having failed to keep my own to him…
    Yeah, I was kinda feeling like a jerk right then.
    I sighed. “I’m probably never going to be able to apologize enough, but I really am sorry,” I told my brother. “Please tell Saphrona that, and Mom and Dad, too. You can even tell Lochlan if you want, that is if he’s even asked about me. Tell them I’m okay and that I’m fine. I’m just dealing with everything that happened in my own way, is all, and I need time away from everyone to do that.”
    “Why don’t you tell them yours elf? You know it would make Mom and Dad feel a whole lot better about you being gone if they could just hear your voice, sis,” Mark said.
    “I can’t,” I replied. “And before you start yelling at me again, I know that I should. I just… I can’t. Calling you was hard enough. ”
    A moment of silence followed, and then Mark said, “I guess this means you’re not coming home anytime soon.”
    The hurt in his voice felt like a punch to the gut, and I was starting to hate myself for causing his pain. I hated that I had frightened my family by running away without leaving word, but I felt I had no choice. Had I told anyone but Lochlan my plans, they’d have tried to stop me.
    “I’m sorry, Mark,” I said, wiping furiously at the tear that had escaped my left eye. “Please don’t be mad at me. I love you, all of you, and God knows how much I miss you. I just can’t come home right now. I need to be by myself for a little while longer.”
    “Alright,” he said. “I know how you can dig your heels in when you’ve made your mind up about something.