Dark Halo (An Angel Eyes Novel) by Shannon Dittemore Read Free Book Online

what I said.”
    “So why are we leaving the city?”
    She drags blood-red fingernails through her hair but doesn’t answer.
    Marco slams his palms on the dash. “Liv!”
    “Change of plans.”
    “What? Why?”
    “You could use some sun,” she says. “You’re getting pasty.”
    His hands twist in the seat belt. “You promised me Henry.”
    Her brows lift. “You get Beacon City instead.”
    “Beacon City? Are you kidding me?”
    She grabs her phone from the console and scrolls through it with one hand. With the other she steers the car away from the embankment.
    “You like that girl, Brielle?” Her voice is calm, her posture relaxed.
    “What?”
    “Forget it. I’m not going to talk to you when you’re all tetchy like this. I’m heading to Beacon City and I’d like you with me. But if you’re going to be awful company, I’ve got the radio.”
    She drops her phone in the console and flicks it on—talkradio, some kind of political soapbox channel. Marco grits his teeth and slams his back into the seat. Clenching his bag tight to his chest, he turns his face away and watches the trees fly by. Patches of shadow and light roll over the car. Shadow. Light. Shadow. Light. It’s disorienting to be pelted by one after the other.
    Twenty minutes pass before he’s calm enough to look at her again. Tired of hypocritical rantings, he reaches forward and turns down the radio.
    “How can you listen to that guy?”
    “I was just trying to outlast you.”
    In the console between them, her phone beeps. Keith Matthews flashes on the screen, but she slides her finger across it, ignoring the call.
    “What’s with you two?” Marco asks.
    “Keith? Nothing. He’s interesting, I guess.”
    “You’re such a liar.”
    “What? You don’t like him?”
    “I don’t dislike him, but he’s not interesting. Not to someone like you.”
    “You haven’t seen me since we were kids, and you somehow know what I find interesting. How’s that?”
    “I just do,” he says.
    “You’re full of it.”
    “I do. Liv, I know you.”
    “You don’t know me.”
    There’s a bitter edge to her voice, and it silences him.
    “What about you?” she says, shaking the hostility from her face. “His daughter, Brielle. You think she’s interesting?”
    “She was Ali’s best friend,” Marco says, “and between herand Jake I never went more than two days without some sort of call or doughnut-laden care package while I was holed up getting poked and prodded like some kind of science experiment. She’s beyond interesting. She’s family.”
    “But she can be a bit much, right? Her intensity level’s off the charts.”
    Marco smiles. “Yeah, she’s a lot like this other girl I know.”
    “What, me?” she says, feigning surprise. “I’m intense?”
    “You are intensity defined.”
    “Yes, well,” she says, fumbling for something in the console. “I’ve got grown-up responsibilities. Some of us are paid to be intense.” Her shoulder slides out of her silky blouse as she jams a cigarette between her teeth. It trembles.
    “You want a light?” he asks, punching the cigarette lighter.
    “Nah. I don’t smoke. I just, you know . . .” She pulls the cigarette from her mouth and puts it back in.
    He narrows his eyes. “No, I don’t think I do.”
    “Oh, come on,” she says, her laugh hollow. “You’re an actor. You pretend all the time. It’s cathartic being someone else for a while, isn’t it?”
    “So the cig helps you pretend.”
    “Sure. Like a prop.”
    “Like a prop?”
    She rolls t the Prince’s haloSJowhe window down and lets the wind suck on her hair while she chews the end of the unlit cigarette.
    Marco watches her for a while. Finally curiosity gets the better of him, and he calls loudly over the wind, “Why are we going to Beacon City?”
    She glances at him then, pulled from whatever thought had her miles away. “You ever been there?”
    “When I was a kid. My mom took me. Ice-cream cones and kites