Luminosity (Gravity Series #3) (The Gravity Series) by Abigail Boyd Read Free Book Online Page A

shoulder with his fist. I was taken aback by the sudden contact, a little frightened that he could touch me.
    “Do me a favor,” he said.
    “Why would I ever do you a favor?” I asked. “Especially after what you did to Jenna? Twelve years of torture doesn’t make you my ally.”
    “Hey now, there’s no need to be a bitch about it. And I never tortured you, you friggin’ drama queen. You’re not that important.” For a moment, I saw tendrils of smoke twirling out of his nose. I blinked and they were gone, maybe an illusion of the fire. He continued, “I was just asking whether you could—”
    He paused, glancing back up at the orphanage.
    “What are you doing?” I asked, irritated by his insane mood shifts.
    He put one finger to his lips. “Shut up and listen. The phone’s for you.”
    I listened very closely over the roaring of the flames. A dog was barking faintly from somewhere inside.
    “You should answer it,” Ambrose said. I didn’t like the way his pale eyes fixed on me, the calm intensity of his stare. I turned back and listened to the dog.
    “Hey, what favor did you—” I began, but Ambrose was gone. Gray space stretched on for miles behind me. Dark shapes moved and twisted in the fog, making me nervous. There was no way back.
    I was still wearing the binding white dress, but like hell would I go into the fire with it. It was too heavy and it would slow me down if I had to get away. I reached down and ripped and tore at the seemingly endless layers. I finally pulled what was left off of me and dropped it on the ground.
    Taking a deep, sobering breath, I took one final step forward. The fire went out as if I’d blown out a match, plunging the building into darkness. A smoking husk was all that remained, negative sunbursts of soot marring the stone.
    My heart lurched in one painful beat, like I’d suffered a blow to the chest. My breath filtered out in icy whorls. The ground was now coated in gray snow, and ashes floated down like dingy flakes. A few ebony crow feathers were mixed in, too. I reached out and caught a feather gently by its quill, twirling it around.
    I jumped up the obviously unsafe stairs. The porch sagged under my weight, buckling from years of rot and termites as I grasped the doorknob. I felt the beaten wood begin to give way. Slamming open the door, I lunged inside. The entire porch collapsed into a black hole below with a loud crash.
    Ghostly light emanated from deeper inside. The dog continued complaining to itself. The interior didn’t appear burnt at all; in fact, it looked more like what it must have in its heyday. The decorating was spartan and tidy with paintings of trees on top of rusty red wallpaper.
    I didn’t like looking at the paintings; the sight of the black, emaciated trees produced a funny buzzing inside my ears.
    Hesitating for the briefest moment of self-preservation, I moved on. The floor creaked as I went down the hall and around the corner. A barking dog wasn’t a welcome mat. It might very well attack me, but I couldn’t ignore the pull the dog had on me, as though I was holding its leash. Or the other way around.
    The canine’s shadow was thrown up huge on the wall. The dog stood just out of sight, but I knew I’d seen it before—a mixed breed lacking identification, capable of becoming one of the shadows.
    The dog stopped barking. I was about to call out, but it took off, paws beating against the wood. I gave chase, adrenaline racing through me to feed my limbs.
    Follow, follow, my brain chanted. Let it lead you.
     

CHAPTER 5
    I WOKE UP tangled in a mass of sheets and blankets. I’d pulled them all down with me when I’d fallen out of bed. The back of my head ached steadily and I rubbed my skull. Ow.
    “You hit it on your desk when you fell down,” Jenna said, startling me since I didn’t realize she was in the room. “Kind of funny.”
    I rubbed my head again, feeling irritated, and gathered the lump of blankets. I shoved them untidily