Read Online The Fallen One (Sons of the Dark Mother, Book One) by Lenore Wolfe - Free Book Online Page B

fathers were best friends…. They disappeared
for the same reason.”
    His eyes clouded with what looked
like rage—or pain—right before the shutters went down and she saw
no more. She had expected to see rage—but why would a killer have
so much pain in his eyes?
    He sat there, still as stone. She
wanted to shake him. She should be able to read his thoughts.
Couldn’t he read hers? Why did she always get a blank
slate?
    “ Because I have learned to shield
my thoughts from others,” he answered, almost as if he’d
automatically answered.
    She frowned. She was going to have
to learn how to do that.
    “ Well, then,” he said out loud.
“It looks as if we need to find some things out. So we’re going to
have to make a trip—together.”
    She shook her head at the thought.
“Oh, no,” she shook her head again, “no. I’m not going anywhere
with you—so you can just get that thought out of your head right
now.” She tried again to listen to his
thoughts—nothing—damn.
    He almost smiled. She saw the
beginnings of one, teasing at the corners of his lips.
    “ Yes,” he said, “you
are.”
    She frowned. She’d already
forgotten what they were talking about. Why was she so easily
distracted by him? When she remembered, she shook her head again.
“No! I’m not! So you can just forget it!”
    He sprang forward and had gathered
her back into his arms before she could think to react. Where had
he gotten such reflexes? He made hers look tame in
comparison.
    He touched the end of her nose with
a finger and gave her a light, chaste kiss on her lips. “Yes, you
are. And you’ll want to go, because now the postcard I received
last year begins to make sense.”
    “ What postcard?” She was intrigued
in spite of herself.
    “ The one I received, with some
cryptic message that the three of them were fine. It said we
weren’t supposed to look for them.”
    She frowned. “Three of
them?”
    “ Hmmm,” he said. “Apparently, one
of them is not fine.”
    Her gut clenched. That didn’t bode
well. She might have lost a parent, and hadn’t known it all this
time. Tears sprang to her eyes.
    “ When did your parents disappear?”
he questioned, his tone gentle.
    “ Right after we went to your murder scene,” she
snarled, struggling to break loose.
    He let her go, frowning—the
shutters going down on his expression once more. She almost
regretted her outburst.
    Almost.
    But then she remembered the bloody,
sliced-up bodies lying in the alley. “Are you going to deny that
was you, then?” She backed out of his reach. “Are you going to deny
killing those young men?”
    He shook his head. Was that regret
she saw? His mask had actually slipped for a second
there.
    He got up and headed for the door.
“Be ready at midnight. It will be a fast trip. I have deadlines to
meet, but I will have answers that will be met first.” His tone
held menace that ran shivers up her spine.
    She stared at him.
    How could she go anywhere—with a
killer?
    But how could she not? Especially
when Kat had spoken of a book that would tell her everything she
needed to know. She said this, now, to Justice. She didn’t know why
she told him about it. It wasn’t like her to do so. But she felt
the urgency to tell him, and she always trusted her
instincts.
    He frowned as she told him, but it
was the only indication he gave as to his thoughts. If this
concerned him, he gave no indication.
    He only said for her to be ready by
midnight.
     
    She was still arguing with herself
an hour later—while she packed. She had called her partner and
given him an excuse for her disappearance for the next couple of
days. He hadn’t been happy. She didn’t blame him. He didn’t know
Justice. And—well, what he did know was that she believed Justice
to be a murderer—even if he had been the one who had argued on
Justice’s behalf when he felt that perhaps she should have been the
one to do so.
    But still, she was the one who believed he was a
murderer.