Broken Illusions: A Midnight Dragonfly Novel by Ellie James Read Free Book Online Page A

stacks later, one for location, one for murder weapon, and our crime was set. He said he and his mom had played all morning, with Chase claiming to have schooled her three times out of five. Given her occupation (an attorney who once worked in the D.A.’s office), I suppose it made sense that Clue was her game of choice.
    “I’m Miss Scarlet,” I said, fingering the red piece—
    “I saw you last night, too.”
    I looked up, the way his bangs fell against the raw glow in his eyes making something inside me go all raw and glowy, too.
    “You were on a streetcar,” he said, his voice so, so quiet.
    That should have warned me.
    “And you were wearing this tight catsuit—”
    I laughed out loud. “That’s called a concussion, Bonaventure.”
    “—and there was this crowd around you, but you were looking at me, with your hands wrapped around a pole, dancing—”
    The total and complete shift from serious to … whatever this was, blew me away. “So now you’re getting your jollies on a trolley?”
    “Hey!” He play frowned. “You can’t blame a guy for dreaming—”
    “So that’s what you want me to do, dance my way up St. Charles—”
    “Not with an audience.”
    I shifted, bringing up a knee and wrapping my arms around it. “So what else do I do— in your dreams ?”
    The darkening of his eyes was so subtle, I almost missed it. Around us nothing changed—not the video game blasting from upstairs or the dogs barking outside, the game waiting between us.
    But I knew. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”
    He turned and reached for another brownie.
    “Chase, please. Tell me.”
    His hand stilled against the plate. He held himself that way for a long moment, his bicep straining against the barbed wire tattoo.
    Sometimes it looked like it was going to bust.
    Not touching the brownies, he pulled back. “Everyone has bad dreams, T. That’s just part of it.”
    “Then why won’t you tell me?”
    “Because I don’t want you to go back.”
    And from one breath to the next, I knew what he saw when he closed his eyes.

 
    SIX
    “The morgue,” I murmured.
    His eyes burned, just like the night we’d stepped into a darkness so deep every emotion I’d ever felt had wrapped around me, and squeezed.
    “You see me in the morgue.”
    His shoulders tensed. “With that guy and the knife at your throat, and I’m looking at your eyes—”
    I looked down—and saw the knife. It lay on the game board, small and plastic and totally benign, but I felt it anyway, felt it all over again, the cold fissure hovering just out of sight.
    If I reached for it, tried to destroy it, I knew there would be nothing there.
    “Like you said,” I murmured, picking up my own brownie, the one I’d held for over fifteen minutes without bringing it to my mouth. Lifting it, I took a small gooey bite. “Over and done with.”
    “I kill him,” he said. “This time I do it. It’s all slow motion, I lift the—”
    “Chase Bonaventure,” I said, not letting him finish—not wanting him to finish. Not wanting to spend one second longer in that dark horrible place. “In the morgue—with the gun.”
    The slow press of his lips told me he knew exactly what I was doing. “I thought you didn’t know how to play.”
    “Oh, I know how to play.” With another decadent bite, I slid the red game piece—and saw the Ouija board all over again.
    Blinking, I placed Miss Scarlet between the Lounge and the Hall. “It’s just been a while.”
    His slow smile was pure Chase, the one that I’d known for six months, the one from my first day at Enduring Grace. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
    Never looking away, I polished off the brownie. “Bring it.”
    *   *   *
    “Best three out of five wins . ”
    Chase snagged the cards I’d extended and slapped them into separate piles—one for suspects, one for locations, one for weapons. “You’re brutal.”
    He so hated losing. “Like a lamb to slaughter,” I purred with devastating