Dark Spirits by Rebekkah Ford Read Free Book Online Page B

lot, toward the sounds of people and folk music. “Which means she’ll be on her feet soon.”
    “Then what?” I asked, imaging a black figure crawling on all fours through the hot sand. The creepiness of it made me shiver.
    “Then it’ll be a matter of days for her energy to be restored to its full potential.”
    “Are you still seeing Ameerah tonight?”
     “Yes, I’m supposed to meet her at eight.”
    “Where?”
    He hung his head and sighed. “Somewhere that’s not a safe place for you to go.”
    I bit my tongue, deciding not to argue about it. I mean, what would be the point? It would just be a circular argument that would get us nowhere.
    “What were you about to tell me before Ameerah called?” Nathan asked, jumping at the chance to change the subject.
    “Oh,” I said, thinking on my feet. “I want to get a cell phone after we leave here.” Which was true because I had planned on doing that once I found out Brayden was in town. So I wasn’t totally lying to him.
    “We can do that,” he said, smiling as we approached one of the three blocks that were closed off to all vehicles.
     There were rows of white tents that filled the street. Some vendors offered homegrown fruits and vegetables, while others displayed bake goods. The air had a fried, sweet smell to it of kettle corn and . . .
    Omigod! They had funnel cakes. I adored fried bread with honey and cinnamon sugar on it. It was so fattening, but one of the cool parts about being immortal was I could eat and eat and eat and not gain weight.
    Yeah, it rocked.
    “Do you want a funnel cake?” Nathan asked, noticing me breathing in and the heavenly look on my face as I stared at the women making them. There was an endeared amusement in the tone of his voice.
    I pulled him across the street through the crowd of people, straight to a food cart with a red and white striped awning over it. A plump woman stood inside it. She had dark hair with big loopy curls that fell to her shoulders. Her smile reached her hazel eyes.
    “Can I help you?” she asked.
    Written on the right side of the cart in bold black letters was a list of foods they made and the drinks they served. Nathan scanned the list.
    “What do you want?” I asked, pulling money out of my purse.
    “I got this,” he said, taking a half step ahead of me. “Do you want anything else? A drink maybe?”
    “No, just a funnel cake with some honey and cinnamon sugar.” I stepped beside him, and the lady’s gaze shifted on Nathan.
    “I’ll have one of your cream cheese-filled pretzels and a Coke.” He retrieved his wallet from his back pocket and paid the lady.
    Across from us, beside a tent selling incense and candles, was a hippy-looking guy with long brown hair, sitting cross-legged on the ground. He wore a suede fringe vest and was bent over his acoustic guitar, playing the folk music I’d heard earlier. Some of the people who walked by tossed coins and crumpled bills into his open guitar case.
    After the lady handed Nathan his change, I followed him to the window where we were supposed to wait for our food. My eyes lit up when they fell on the food cart beside this one.
    “Where are you going?”
    I pointed to the smoothie cart. He knew my penchant for smoothies and knowingly raised his eyebrows in a “ah, of course” fashion.
     I got a peach-mango smoothie. Afterwards, Nathan and I sat at one of the tables with a red umbrella attached to it among a sea of matching tables in a vacant supermarket parking lot. While we ate, we people-watched, taking in all walks of life that seemed to flock here. A tall overweight guy dressed like a clown in a pair of overalls and a tie dyed shirt caught my attention. He even sported the big round red nose and the curly red wig.
    I thought of Carrie because clowns totally freaked her out. An image of her hiding beneath a kitchen table when we were six entered my mind. We were at a friend’s birthday party that had a clown to entertain us kids, and he