Burning in a Memory by Constance Sharper Read Free Book Online Page A

dent in the car if she tried. The man fidgeted, his eyes raking up her body about as subtly as a sledge hammer.             
                  “Must have been a tree branch,” he said, abruptly dismissive of the accident.
                  There weren’t even any big trees on this street, but she wasn’t going to argue. Instead she sized him up in return. The man looked more like a boy from this close. Wild red hair touched below his shoulders and thick rimmed glasses took over his face. The guy must have been the son of whoever owned the house. She took in her surroundings one last time before she thought up her new plan. Then she returned her eyes to him and smiled coyly.
                  “That’s awful. Is that your only car?” she asked as sweetly as she could muster.
                  He looked suddenly happy, like they weren’t standing in the rain near the ruins of his Infiniti.
                  “No. I fix them up. I have a badass Mustang in the garage.”
                  Or maybe it was his parents’ Mustang. She suddenly decided she didn’t really care.
                  “Does it work?”
                  He cocked his head to the side.
                  “Why baby, wanna take a ride?”
                  The hint of bile tasted sour in her throat, but she swallowed it down. She raised her face slowly to let her eyes linger on his. The rain nearly soaked blouse. It might not have been white, but it was enough. The redhead didn’t stand a chance.
                  “I need a ride. Could you give me a ride in your Mustang?” she purposefully asked slowly. She was actually impressed his head didn’t exploded when he heard her.
                  “I’ll get the keys. Don’t go anywhere!” He raced in to the house.
                  Cold and wet, she wrapped her arms around herself. A quick look around and she saw it. Below the puddles of water on her driveway were new cracks in the concrete. This wasn’t a natural disaster happening in a twenty square foot radius. Something had been here. Adelaide lost her composure and dashed to the neighbor’s house. She arrived just as he ran out and they nearly brutally collided.
                  “Please, please. I’m in a rush. And I’ll owe you one.” She had to slow down at the end to add a beckoning twist in her tone. When he unlocked the car, she dove in the passenger’s seat and closed her eyes. She couldn’t feel anything in the area. There was always a chance the shades came and went when they didn’t sniff any mages out in the area. She could only hope that a ride with the human would dispel the last of their interest. When she couldn’t smell any smoke over the scent of rain and Axe cologne that clung to the seats, she forced herself to relax a bit. The neighbor sprung in and peeled out on the street.
                  She rocked in her seat from the abrupt stops and the bad shifting.
                  “Where we taking you babe?” he asked.
                  “JoJo’s pizza parlor, downtown. Market Street.”
                  He turned his head to watch her for a lot longer than he should have with the car in motion.
                  “Huge rush for a pizza parlor?”
                  “You don’t even know why I’m going,” she countered back. He shut up for only a moment.
                  “How long have you been living next door? I don’t remember seeing you.”
                  She bit the inside of her lip. Even Bradley had seen that question coming better than she had.
                  “Recently,” she refused to give more details. Before he could question more, she drew her knees up higher on the seat until the wet skirt pooled back toward her thighs. He might have