From the Shadows (A Shadow Chronicles Novel) Read Free Page A

Please, just promise me one thing.”
    “What’s that?”
    Mark sighed. “Be safe, little sister. Wherever you are, be safe.”
    “I will, big brother. I promise.”
    I bit my bottom lip as I pressed the End button, then I laid my phone on the table, braced my elbows on the edge, and dropped my head into my hands.
     
    ***
     
    After sitting for another ten or fifteen minutes just brooding over the conversation with my brother, I went inside to order something to eat. I hadn’t shifted in a while, but that didn’t mean my metabolism was less a furnace than it usually was, and I needed fuel. Of course, I’d lost my appetite by then, but I still ordered a mocha frappé and a cinnamon pretzel with cream cheese in the middle. I then returned to my table outside, where I mostly picked at the pretzel and barely sipped the frozen coffee. A moment later, Karen—the assistant manager who had come in shortly after I was hired and was close to becoming a friend—came and sat in the chair to my left. She said nothing at first, but I could feel her eyes on me, assessing me.
    “Is everything alright, Juliette?” she asked finally.
    I shrugged, trying to re-form the wall of indifference around my heart, which after talking to Mark had begun to crumble. “I’m fine,” I replied. “Why do you ask?”
    “Well, far be it for me to pry into someone’s personal life, hon, especially someone I don’t know all that well, but ever since you got that call from the English fella this morning —”
    “He’s Irish,” I corrected her automatically.
    Her lips twitched. “Okay, the Irish guy. Ever since he called you’ve been a bit…twitchy. And just now I observed you on a phone call that made you cry.”
    I stiffened and looked away from her, now even more angry at myself for having allowed my moment of weakness to be observed. Karen sighed, then said, “Look, I know it ain’t none of my business. I’m sorry I asked. But I kinda thought we were becoming friends, so… I just want you to know that if and when you are ready to talk about whatever’s going on, I’ll listen. And I won’t judge you.”
    Internally I had to laugh. If only she knew that she was talking to a girl who could turn into a dog, and that I had not only recently added an actual vampire to my list of friends, but that his half-breed sister would be joining my family within the next year. Oh, how that story would freak her out!
    But I reminded myself then that Karen seemed really nice. I could tell she just really wanted to help me. And maybe I couldn’t tell her about shapeshifters and vampires, but I could, if I had the nerve, tell her I’d been kidnapped and raped, and that I was not having the easiest time dealing with that. During my waking hours I had quickly become adept at not thinking about it because I kept myself busy with work and constant exercise. I had even taken to putting large puzzles together and then taking them apart just to do it all over again—anything that kept my mind focused on something other than the memories of what I’d been through.
    At night, however, when I was too exhausted to stay awake, I could not keep those memories at bay. My subconscious never failed to draw them out, forcing me to relive the hell of being beaten and tortured, of having been forced to endure two vampires pushing themselves into me for their own sick pleasure while I was tied down and too weak from an injury to fight them off.
    “Thank you, Karen,” I said at last, chancing looking at her and seeing simple concern in her eyes. It reminded me a little too much of that which I’d seen in the faces of my family and Lochlan before I’d left, but somehow it was easier to bear because I still didn’t know her very well. “I… I had some horrible shit happen to me a few weeks ago. I’m not ready to talk about it—I don’t even like to think about it.”
    Karen gave me a sympathetic smile. “Honey, I understand completely how you feel. Like I