Read Online Chasing River (Burying Water #3) by K. A. Tucker - Free Book Online Page A

stupid as a T-shirt led her here. She was completely out of it and yet she noticed that?
    Questions are spinning inside my head as I stare at that stunning face, panic rising in my gut. How long are you in Dublin? Were you hurt? Why the hell would you track me down?
    What did you tell the gardai?
    My eyes instinctively dart to the door. No uniforms from what I can see.
    “Um . . .” She frowns, her attention dipping to the tap. I finally notice the Guinness spilling over the rim and pouring into the trough below.
    It’s the exact time that Rowen shows up to slam the tap off and stares at me, gob-smacked. “Wise up, River!”
    “I’m sorry. I distracted him,” she says. Rowen’s gaze shifts between the two of us, settling on the scab over her bottom lip. It’s bad, but not bad enough for stitches from what I can see. Purple-bruised skin peeks out from the sleeve of her flowery pink blouse. That’s my fault. I hit her hard when I took her down. Not that I had much of a choice.
    “Right.” Rowen leaves for the other side of the bar so he doesn’t have to watch me as I dump the entire pint and start over. I can’t serve an imperfect Guinness pour to a customer. But few things piss him off and I know inside that head of his, he’s screaming sacrilege. If there was anything our father taught us to believe in besides an independent Ireland, it’s that wasting beer is downright blasphemous.
    I grab another glass and start over, feeling her eyes on me the entire time.
    “So . . . River.” She has a soft voice. Her accent is a hundred times more charming than that of the American girls I usually meet. Maybe that’s because they’re usually drunk and yelling by the time I start talking to them.
    And now she knows my name. Bloody hell. Won’t take long for them to find me with that, should she share it.
    “Yeah.” I set the glass down on the counter to settle while I move on to another one, trying to quell the panic still burning inside. “My mother couldn’t make it to the hospital in time and ended up having me in the backseat of the car, next to Castletown River.” I’ve told the story of my unusual name so many times it rolls off my tongue.
    “That’s sweet.”
    “Right . . . sweet.” I smirk despite everything. “Better than being named Castletown.”
    She smiles, pushing back a strand of her long hair—a pretty warm brown, like the cinnamon bark Ma likes to stick in her tea sometimes. I don’t remember it being so long, but then again I don’t remember much except her wild, green eyes—the color of a crisp cucumber’s flesh—and how soft the skin on her legs was, when I slid my hands along them, checking for shrapnel wounds.
    She’s more beautiful than I remember.
    Beautiful in that wholesome all-American girl way that the movies teach us about. Perfect, symmetrical features, smooth skin, straight, white teeth. Long, dark lashes that help trap my gaze. I can’t even tell if she’s wearing makeup. She’s definitely not wearing too much.
    Of course I’ve met enough American tourists to know that that’s a Hollywood illusion, that they come in all shapes and sizes and degrees of brazenness, just like people around here. This girl, though . . .
    She shouldn’t be here. She’s the only one, aside from Aengus, who can put me in the Green when the bomb went off.
    “Well . . .” She takes a deep breath, as if gathering courage. “Hello, River.” A dainty hand stretches out toward me and I’m compelled to take it, to hold it. “I’m Amber.” She blinks several times, her eyes suddenly wet, tears brimming at the corners. “I needed to say thank you.” The words she doesn’t say out loud hang between us as a tear spills down her cheeks.
    Bloody hell. I can’t have this girl crying at the bar without raising questions. Maybe I should lead her to the back, where there’s privacy. . . .
    A few irritated plucks of a guitar announce that Collin is now impatiently waiting.