Immortal Beloved Read Free Page B

hell. It took him about twenty minutes to explain shelf stocking to me, another five minutes to go over the intricacies of the old-but-not-in-a-charming-way cash register, and then another forty-five minutes to put the fear of God into me if I should ever happen to steal anything. He kept the back section, where all the prescriptions were filled, locked, so essentially he was warning me off smuggling Tampax, baby formula, and live bait home in my purse. Whatever.
    I rolled up the sleeves of my sexy and provocative plaid flannel shirt, cut open a carton of Garnier Nutrisse hair dye, and starting stocking my little heart out. Focusing intently on this mind-numbing work meant I couldn’t think about anything else. I was determined not to think about anything else for as long as I could. I’d gulped down my herb tea last night and had slept surprisingly well—no nightmares, no memories. But that was as far as I was going to go with the whole eight-houses thing. I mean, how could I come to terms with that? There was so much I didn’t know about my own past, my own heritage. I’d never wanted to know. Was afraid of knowing. Look at everything I hadn’t known about my amulet. Now that I knew, it gave me a whole new level of paranoia. Fun!
    After about an eon of mindless drudgery, it suddenly struck me, the whole point of this, what Solis was hoping I would get out of it: He was hoping that this boredom and pointlessness would so overwhelm me that I would suffer a complete psychotic break, run screaming down the street, and disappear out of his life forever. That had to be the thought behind this.
    And, oh, baby, I was close. So close. But something in me forced myself to keep going, and all I could grasp was the humiliating, confusing certainty that my life wouldn’t be any better if I were anywhere else, doing anything else. Also, as hugely as this sucked—and believe me, it sucked big—this was about as much of a disguise as I could possibly manage.No one I knew would ever believe me capable of being here, doing this. I felt camouflaged, and that nameless fear hanging over me still felt that being camouflaged was important. Why? I didn’t know. I was one big mystery, even to myself.
    Someone was near me, had been lingering near me for some time, I suddenly realized. As Meriwether had said, the town in general didn’t have a lot going on, and MacIntyre’s in particular seemed to be on life support—hardly any customers to speak of. Now I realized that there was someone else here. I felt them, felt their energy, though I hadn’t heard the doorbell jangle.
    I gathered up some empty cartons and headed toward the back, glancing down each aisle. It was the punk/goth girl, the one I’d seen twice before, the one I kept running into because this podunk town was so tiny you couldn’t help running into the same people over and over again.
    She glanced at me, trademark defiant look on her face, and I acted as if I didn’t recognize her. But I watched her in the round mirror at the end of the aisle and saw her slip some nail polish into her pocket. I sighed and tossed the boxes out back by the trash can.
    When I came back in, she was waiting impatiently at the checkout counter. Mr. MacIntyre was helping an older woman in back who was getting a prescription, so I muttered a quick prayer that I would remember how to work the stupid cash register and headed over.
    Old Mac had given me some tips on customer service,but since he was one of the most hateful men I’d ever met, I’d ignored them.
    Now I took the stuff the girl had put on the counter and started punching register buttons, hoping I was doing it right. There was no nail polish.
    I dropped the other items into a plastic bag, then said, “Okay, the polish.â€

 
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    CHAPTER 16
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    Y ou’re coming, then?â€

 
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    CHAPTER 17
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    I ended up going