Evil at Heart by Chelsea Cain Read Free Book Online

July, but today there was no blue sky in sight. The Gorge rest stop was forty-five minutes away. She could make it in thirty—unless it started raining.
               
                She fed a Jimi Hendrix CD into her car stereo, and was turning out of the medical campus, when her phone vibrated in her lap and nearly caused her to steer into a Ford Explorer. Susan slammed on her brakes, causing her purse to spew most of its contents onto the floor. The woman behind the wheel of the Explorer had blond hair. Her head was turned, and Susan couldn’t see her face. But there was something about the hair.
               
                Susan’s body went cold.
               
                Gretchen.
               
                Susan couldn’t move for a moment. Her car stalled, and she snapped to and laid on her horn, hoping to get the woman to look up, but the woman kept going.
               
                Susan glanced across the street where a billboard with Gretchen’s face on it advertised a special edition of America’s Sexiest Serial Killers. Another blonde drove by.
               
                Susan shook her head, restarted the Saab’s engine, and pulled onto Glisan Street .
               
                This was ridiculous.
               
                Gretchen was long gone. And if she wasn’t—well, Gretchen Lowell wouldn’t be caught dead in a Ford Explorer.
               
                The phone in her lap vibrated again and Susan flinched.
               
                She closed her eyes. This couldn’t continue. At this rate she’d be dead of a coronary before she turned thirty.
               
                The phone. She picked it up off her lap and answered it. She could barely make out the voice on the other end over the wail of electric guitar coming through her dash speakers. “What?” she said.
               
                The voice got louder. “Hello?” It was a man’s voice. She didn’t recognize it. He sounded confused. “Hello?” he said again.
               
                Susan turned down her car stereo. “Sorry,” she said. “Are You Experienced.”
               
                “Am I what?” he asked.
               
                “Not you,” Susan said. “The album. Hendrix. Are You Experienced.” It must have been lunch break at the hospital because traffic was crawling. “Can I help you?” Susan asked.
               
                “Susan Ward?” the man said.
               
                Her full name. Susan’s fingers tightened around her sheepskin steering-wheel cover. She knew where this was going. “I sent in that student loan payment yesterday,” she said. She was lying. “Swear.”
               
                There was a pause. “What?” the man asked.
               
                This part of Glisan was all flower shops and bars. “This isn’t Sallie Mae?” Susan asked.
               
                “No,” the man said.
               
                Susan mentally inventoried the bills stacked next to the Vogue on her coffee table. “Visa?” Susan guessed.
               
                “I’m not a bill collector,” the man said.
               
                “Oh, good,” Susan said. The light at the upcoming intersection was red and Susan came to a stop behind a long line of cars. It started to rain and she turned on the windshield wipers, which needed replacing and only made visibility worse.
               
                “I want to talk to you about a story,” the man