Read Online Night Moves (The Night Songs Collection) by Kristen Strassel - Free Book Online

Milwaukee than he did of Detroit, or he seemed to think that Erin and I could hold our own. Or he just didn’t care what happened to us anymore after last night. Obviously we weren’t safe from attack on the buses. Whatever his reason was, Erin and I were free to go off on our own.
    “Can you believe after all the time we spent chasing after the band together, we meet up with each other here?” Erin chattered nervously as we walked down the busy road away from the parking lot of The Raven night club. “Think they have Starbucks around here?”
    “Um, probably not.” Many of the stores in this neighborhood hadn’t been open for business in a long time. We walked past a nail salon, a Columbian convenience store, and a pizza place. “There’s a diner up ahead.”
    “They’ve got coffee. Sold.”
    The diner was strangely quiet for being so close to lunch time. We sat ourselves and waited a while for anyone to acknowledge us. Neither of us was ready to really talk yet. We spent the time waiting for a waitress to acknowledge us as we looked around at the dusty Americana cluttering the walls.
    “Would you ladies like coffee?” The waitress finally surfaced, placing sticky menus down in front of us. Maybe she meant for us to sample previous customers’ meals before making a decision. I pulled hand sanitizer out of my bag and silently offered some to Erin.
    “You have no idea.” Erin said, rubbing the gel together in her palms. “Keep it coming.”
    “It’s going to be a minute. I need to brew a pot.” The waitress walked away without asking us if we wanted anything else. Erin and I were both at a loss.
    “Shouldn’t a diner always have coffee? I mean, isn’t that the point of a diner?” Erin spoke rapidly. “Oh well, at least it will be fresh.”
    I noticed she’d already placed her menu aside. Granted, it was gross, covered in jelly and syrup. I had my old standbys at places like these. Chances were I’d order Eggs Benedict or a cheeseburger. I didn’t know if I could resist diner fries. Yesterday’s salad didn’t quite cut it. But Erin always used to take forever to make a decision.
    The waitress returned with our coffees. “Have you ladies decided?”
    “Yes, I’ll have a cheeseburger. Cooked medium.”
    “I’m all set.”
    “Really?” I questioned Erin. The waitress couldn’t care less.
    “Yeah. I have some protein bars back at the car.”
    “You can’t live off of protein bars!”
    “Don’t give me a hard time, Melanie. I mean, I’m the one who should be grilling you. It’s just food. Who cares?”
    I sighed. “You’re right. I’m sorry.” I did have a lot of explaining to do. “So what do you want to know?”
    “When I told you about Jamie, it wasn’t a surprise, was it?”
    I shook my head.
    Erin looked like she might get sick. She swirled her spoon around in her coffee cup vigorously. For such a protein bar aficionado, she certainly added a lot of sugar to her coffee.
    “Why didn’t you tell anyone?” She whispered, eyes wide. I don’t know if she assumed I had anything to do with his death or not. And I wasn’t looking for clarification.
    “I couldn’t. It was just too awful, too fresh.” I couldn’t look her in the eye. I just watched the whirlpool of caffeine following her spoon, concentrating on the motion so completely it made me dizzy.
    “So what came first? That, or you being here?” Erin continued.
    “That.”
    “Are you here with the band, or just here?”
    “With the band.” I bit my lip and looked up at her. Finally her face lit up.
    “Nice.” The Erin stamp of approval. “Which one? Adam? Josiah? Not Thomas, he’s too creepy for you.”
    “Ryder.”
    “No way!” Erin slapped the table, making the remaining coffee in her mug jump. We stopped for a moment when the waitress brought me my burger.
    “Can I have some ketchup, please?” Why didn’t they just keep it on the table? Something about this place was off. I said a quick prayer to ward