Falling by Amber Jaeger Read Free Book Online Page A

course I did!” I nearly shouted. “In the middle of my best, weirdest day ever I realized I had on pretty handcuffs with little wispy smoke chains that no one else could see!”
    He leaned forward and gently took my wrist and unwound the bandages. He made a little tut tut noise, swept a finger over the gouge and sat back. In place of my wound was a thin scar. The bracelet and its chain were still in place.
    “They aren’t manacles. Just a way for me to be sure you keep your end of the promise.”
    “So … what? If I don’t talk, you’re going to string me up by them?” I asked, not joking. I could imagine a dank dungeon somewhere below us.
    “Not at all,” he said with a laugh. “It’s just a way to draw you here, like a tethering, like an anchor. When you fall asleep, now you’ll drift here.”
    “Which is not where I live, not Nightmare Town, not a dream for you …?” I trailed off, running out of options as to where I might literally be.
    Annoyed, I snatched up the fancy glass and took a swig that I promptly choked on.
    “Wine?” I asked, attempting a more polite cough.
    “Of course.”
    “Well, I’m a little underage and I didn’t bring my fake ID.”
    “Ah!” he cried, his face lighting up. “Now we get to what you are here for.”
    I scrambled up out of my chair. “Hey, I’m not here for anything like—”
    Confusion then amused understanding quickly crossed his face. “No, of course not,” he said, waving me back into my chair. “I meant questions. You’re here to answer questions. That was the agreement, correct?”
    Tension flowed out of my body and left my muscles shaky. I nodded.
    “So explain. What does underage mean? What is a fake ID?”
    “Um, underage means being too young to drink and a fake ID is what people use to try to make people believe that they aren’t.”
    “And you have one of those?” He tucked a dark wave of hair behind his ear. I tried not to watch every little move he made but his handsome face and wild hair and strong body were mesmerizing.
    My cheeks began to burn and I struggled to remember the question. “Well, I have a real one, a driver’s license.”
    “And that’s so you can drink wine?”
    My eyebrows furrowed together. “No, it’s so I can drive a car. But it also shows my age so that if I tried to buy wine or whatever, they could see I wasn’t old enough and not sell it to me.”
    Now he seemed confused. “Cars, right?”
    “I … wait, what?”
    “You drive a car? And you can’t do it without your license?”
    “Well, I could, but not legally. And if I got caught I’d be in a lot of trouble.”
    “Why?”
    I took a small breath and looked around the ornate room, smoothed my fancy dress and returned my gaze back to his eerily handsome face.
    “This is what you brought me here for? You saved my brother just so you could ask me about wine and cars?”
    Jordan was quiet for a long moment, twirling the silver stem of glass between his fingers. He seemed younger and more real than he had in Nightmare Town. I could see the details of each dark wave of his hair, the calluses ringing the palms of his hands. My face began to heat again as I appreciated just how handsome he was.
    “Is it so terrible? Being here with me?” he asked, not looking me in the face.
    I felt bad. “No, it’s just … you went to all the trouble of saving my brother and getting him back to me just so you could ask me some mundane questions?”
    “They aren’t mundane to me.” He had barely shifted in his chair and I was ready to jump out of mine and start pacing the floor.
    “Okay, so why don’t you just go there and see for yourself if you’re so interested?”
    He was quiet for a moment. “I can’t.”
    “Why not?”
    Jordan’s eyes narrowed. “You ask a lot of questions for an encyclopedia.”
    My temper flared. “Sorry, I’m just trying to figure out what the hell is going on.”
    He stood up from his chair. “I gave you your brother back and you