Read Online Golden Anidae (A Blushing Death Novel) by Suzanne M. Sabol - Free Book Online Page B

the phone in my back pocket, I flipped it open. No messages. Of course there were no messages. Exactly one person had the number and she wasn’t calling anytime soon if the look of fear in her eyes told me anything.
    I wanted to use it, to make the call Derek thought was so important. But I knew if I heard Dean’s voice, it would take everything I had to not go running back. I wasn’t ready yet. I’d managed to let Danny go. I’d spent many long nights thinking about Danny, Midnight Ash, Patrick, and Dean. I understood Danny’s death wasn’t my fault. Amblan was a different story. There were too many things I could’ve done differently to keep her safe, to keep her out of my world, and keep her alive. I’d failed and that I wasn’t quite over yet. I may never be.
    I shoved the phone back in my pocket. Throwing my leg over the bike, I took off for Enza’s house for a little siesta before dark, when the real legwork began.

Chapter 6
    I’d talked to almost ten wait staff at Terrible’s and a few of them actually remembered Everett. He’d kept asking if a petite Latino woman had shown up while sitting at the booth near the door drinking water. After a couple of hours of not ordering or leaving a tip, the waitresses got annoyed. I took the hint and asked for a booth along the far wall. Ordering the breakfast special and some coffee, a lot of coffee, I waited.
    I’d gotten on a normal human schedule in the last few months, going to sleep at night and getting up in the morning, like everyone else. The last few nights had been hard. I wasn’t used to staying up at all hours of the night anymore and needed the caffeine just to keep my eyes open. I had to stay alert. The waitress set the plate down in front of me and I hadn’t realized how hungry I was until the eggs were gone and I was working on the bacon.
    I took a sip of the coffee that’d been on the warmer about an hour too long and cringed at the burnt taste offending every taste bud I had. But it was caffeine and I was glad for it, so I swallowed.
    Power slid up my spine like someone was dragging a frozen needle along my vertebrae. I shivered at the chilling sense of magic crawling across my skin even though the hot coffee was still clutched in my hands. My teeth chattered as gooseflesh spread across my skin.
    I glanced down the aisle toward the door where a hulk of a man had just entered, still framed in the doorway. Tall, well over six feet, he towered over the hostess behind the counter. He wore a cowboy hat that had once been white but was now a dingy ivory with long-dried sweat and dirt marks etched in the fabric. Scanning the restaurant from left to right, his eyes finally rested on me. He turned back and tipped the brim of his hat to the hostess like he was still out on the range before heading my way.
    He sauntered toward me in a simple T-shirt, faded blue jeans, and well-worn cowboy boots in the same faded ivory of his hat. He reached my table and sat, sliding into the seat across from me with an easy grace like he belonged there. He didn’t.
    I sat.
    Silent.
    Waiting.
    His power rushed against me, around me, through me, and over me. So much power in one quick shot. I wanted to run screaming from the restaurant but I sat silent, still holding my coffee mug. My heart thundered in my ears and I clenched my jaw as I instinctively reached for the bowie knife. I stopped my hand short beneath the table. The knife wasn’t there. Nothing was there. I’d left them all behind. I didn’t flinch, though as his eyes met mine and the icy chill of his energy began to wane. Wrapping my hands tight around the coffee mug, I shook off the dread twisting my stomach. There wasn’t shit I could do about a weapon now.
    “Ma’am,” he said in a deep, raspy voice, tipping his hat to me as he did the hostess. Deep craggy lines along his cheeks defined his face, looking as if his features had been sharp but worn down by time and weather like the sphinx. The five