Read Online Dragon Call by Emily Ryan-Davis - Free Book Online

that he turned. She watched his hands
go through the motions of turning one page after another and
wondered what his handprint would look like next to her own.
Higher, she met his eyes. Even though he turned the pages of his
book, he’d been watching her examine him.
    She cleared her throat. “Tell me about last
night.”
    “Here?”
    She bit her lip and looked up. On every side
of them, people perused bookshelves and chatted with their
companions. She wanted to take the request back, wanted to keep
secrets secret and not discuss them in an impersonal,
fluorescent-lights bookstore that didn’t even have dust on the
books to give them a bit of charm. She thought of Diane, though,
and the way she always went back around to Cora’s refusal to
publicly acknowledge the other part of her family’s life. Being a
Lune, a Dragonkeeper, was different for Diane. She had everything
to be proud of and nothing to be ashamed of. She, unlike Cora, had
been able to receive and hold onto her gifts whereas Cora hadn’t
believed strongly enough to receive them in the first place.
     
    She should stop being a coward and allow
herself to believe she was enough part of it that she had a right
to discuss that different world at all, never mind publicly or
privately. Instead, however, she shook her head and said, “No, not
here.”
    “Where?”
    “Nowhere.” Cora bent to stuff her things into
her bag and stack the books she’d taken into a neat pile. “I need
to go.”
    Salim moved, and she jumped. “I’m not going
to hurt you,” he murmured. “What happened is I got sidetracked. I
intended to make sure you understood the importance of keeping your
distance from Cho. You don’t know what he’ll ask of you. You took
me by surprise, though. It was stronger than I expected.”
    Cora swallowed and straightened, shouldering
her bag. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I need to go,”
she said, inexplicably shaken. Salim leaned back in his chair, his
eyes intent on her face, strange and unreadable. She wasn’t sure
she wanted to read what was in them. Diane had called him a
monster, which was a powerful label from one familiar with reality
beyond the normal rhythm of the world. She didn’t want to stick
around long enough to find out how he’d earned that title.
     

Chapter Seven
     
    Cora stopped at a small Italian bistro for
brunch. She positioned herself to face the window and watched
pedestrians go by, scrutinizing every face. Salim didn’t follow
her, to her relief. Eventually she relaxed and dug her cell phone
from her bag. She checked her minutes, an automatic habit, and
grimaced at the month’s usage. Fortunately December was almost over
and her minutes would reset.
    She dedicated some of her remaining time to
calling Diane.
    “Salim warned me to stay away from Greg,” she
told Diane after exchanging morning greetings. “I was thinking
about trying a hypnosis session. I need to get some sleep.”
    “Have you tried meditating?” Diane asked.
Cora heard the gurgle of a coffee pot finishing its perk. She made
a mental note to order a cup of her own when her server came around
again.
    “I tried last night,” she said. “I had a hard
time concentrating.”
    “Try it again. There’s a portable DVD player
in my nightstand and a couple yoga DVDs. Try using the exercise to
relax yourself and spend some extra time during the meditation
portion at the end.”
    “Does that really work?” Cora pulled the
phone aside so she could request coffee of the server when he
brought her fruit plate.
    “Did you just order coffee? No more caffeine;
how are you supposed to get any sleep with all the coffee you’re
drinking?”
    “You’re drinking it,” Cora said
defensively.
    “I don’t have any trouble sleeping at night,
either.”
    Cora stubbornly let the coffee order stand.
“I’ll try the yoga,” she said. “When are you coming home?”
    “Don’t have any set plans. Want me to hang
out here so you have some