Midnight Angels by Lorenzo Carcaterra Read Free Book Online Page A

had both a full-time job and a fiancée. I’ve got neither. So, when it got to me, they asked about my schoolwork, but it was with that tone in their voices that I had heard so many times before.”
    “And so you blurted it out,” Kate said, “despite your promise to me.”
    “I was proud of what we had done,” he said, “what we had found. And I wanted them to know I wasn’t just wasting my days buried inside a classroom, that I was doing work that mattered.”
    “Were they impressed?” she asked.
    “Not as much as I thought they would be,” Marco said, “but enough so that it got them to stop talking about weddings and engagements and listen to what I had to say, at least for a minute. I didn’t tell them that much, nothing more than the basics.”
    “Which are?”
    “That you and I had stumbled upon a lost work,” Marco said. “I didn’t tell them how we discovered it and what we did with it, just that we had found something that, up to now, was only rumored to have existed.”
    “Did you tell them what it was?” Kate asked.
    Marco shook his head. “But they were smart enough to figure out it had something to do with Michelangelo. Anyway, they bought a round of drinks, toasted me, and we called it a night. And that was the end of it.”
    “Not for all of them,” Kate said. “One of your friends had to mention it to someone, and that someone had to care enough about what we found to come looking for us.”
    “The people chasing us are dangerous,” he said, “and none of my friends know anyone like that. I don’t know anyone like that. I get nervous around kitchen knives. I wish none of this had ever happened.”
    “You didn’t know what it would lead to,” she said, letting her voice soften now. “There’s no reason for either one of us to have known.”
    “I don’t mean just talking about it in front of my friends,” he said. “I mean all of it. Finding the work and …”
    “Meeting me?”
    “In a way, yes,” Marco said. “Now, please, don’t walk away. Give me a chance to explain what I’m trying to say.”
    “I’m not going anywhere,” Kate said.
    “I like you,” Marco said. “From the day you first walked into class. What’s not to like? You’re beautiful, funny, kind, smart, and from what the other students tell me, even rich. It’s a dream for someone like me to meet someone like you.”
    “There’s a but coming,” she said. “I can feel it.”
    “But there is a part of you that scares me,” Marco said. “I can tell justin the way you react every time we’re in danger. You don’t seem bothered by it. My body goes numb when we’re chased, but you’re in total control. I’ve never been around anyone like that, and it frightens me. Does any of this make sense?”
    “All of it,” Kate said. “And I’m sorry I got you involved in this, but I’m not sorry I met you and I’m not sorry we became friends. And just because I don’t look scared, it doesn’t mean I’m not scared.”
    “Really?”
    “Yes,” Kate said. “I’d have to be insane not to be frightened by what’s going on around us. And while I may be impulsive, I don’t think it fair to write me off as crazy.”
    “What do you think is going to happen?” Marco asked.
    “Maybe I shouldn’t tell you,” she said. “It might be better if you didn’t know what I’m thinking.”
    “You see what I mean?” he said, stepping into the street, his hands spread wide. “What you just said scared me even more than those men who have been chasing us.”
    “I won’t ever lie to you, Marco,” Kate said. “No matter how good it might make you feel.”
    He took a deep breath and stepped closer to Kate, inches away from her face. “And I won’t leave you to fight this alone,” he said. “No matter how scared I get.”
    “I don’t know who is chasing us,” she said. “But whoever it is, they want to get their hands on what we found. If they wanted to kill us, they would have done it by