Ricochet Through Time (Echo Trilogy Book 3) by Lindsey Fairleigh Read Free Book Online Page A

written in stone. I just didn’t know when it would happen, and the anticipation was killing me.
    Even so, I couldn’t imagine being in Kat’s shoes—or shoe, in the case of her abandoned slipper. She was one of a kind, and not in any enviable way. She was, like me, a newly minted Nejerette, and she was, like me, a daughter of Set. But unlike me, Kat was also a product of gross incest—Apep-Set having seduced his own unwitting daughter, Genevieve. The reality of Kat’s bloodline had come to light several months ago, revealed by Marcus in a last-ditch effort to rescue my ba from Apep-Set’s prison in the At. Only someone so genetically close to Set could break through his prison’s walls.
    Unfortunately for Kat, eighteen at the time, she was still a few years away from manifesting, which meant her Nejerette traits had to be triggered early by forcing her into the At. Her body was forever stuck at its current level of maturity. She hadn’t cared. Once she’d heard that she was my only shot, she’d volunteered—against her mom’s wishes, of course—knowing full well that she would be the world’s first eternal teenager. She’d saved me, dooming herself to be forever eighteen in the process.
    And just a few weeks later, Kat’s mom had left to join the Kin. Genevieve’s reasons were noble enough, I had to admit—from Dom’s interrogations, I knew she’d thrown her lot in with the Kin in order to create a more tolerant world for her daughter. Kat wouldn’t talk to anyone about it, but it was clear that Genevieve’s return was torture for her. She refused to visit her mother, no matter how many times Dominic relayed Genevieve’s requests. It was painful to watch. I couldn’t imagine living it.
    Figuring it was just about time for us both to suck it up and stop wallowing—or, at least, to make a show of it, I cleared my throat and forced a wooden smile. “Hey, Kit-Kat . . .”
    I waited for her to glance my way. I could practically see the dark cloud raining down on her.
    “I’m going to head down and check on Tarsi. Come with me?” The four-year-old was still comatose, but neither Neffe nor Aset could say for certain whether Tarset could or couldn’t sense us when we visited her. I chose to assume she knew we were there and therefore visited her often, sometimes reading to her, sometimes just talking to her, and sometimes simply sitting there, holding her hand. It helped to pass the time. But even more so, it felt right.
    Kat’s long mane of curly chestnut hair was knotted into a messy bun atop her head, and the stray curls sticking out here and there would’ve lent her a wild, wacky appearance had the usual sparkle shone in her brown eyes. But the glassy, dull gleam, the faraway stare despite looking directly at me, made her simply look wrung-out.
    “Sure,” she said with a halfhearted shrug.
    Stretching and groaning, I hauled myself up off the sofa, earning disinterested glances from the cats for disturbing their sunbathing. Kat rose as well and had to fish around the floor for a moment to recapture her lost slipper. She dragged her feet as she followed me into the entryway, the rubber bottoms of her slippers marking her path with a shsh-shsh-shsh.
    “Lex!”
    I sucked in a breath and clutched at my chest with one hand, flinging my other arm out in front of Kat like my mom always did when she had to brake suddenly.
    Nik came barreling down the stairway, taking the steps four at a time and reaching the bottom in barely three strides. “Get into the basement and lock the door!” he ordered as he flew past us.
    Kat and I stumbled backward a few steps, and Kat’s hands latched onto my arm.
    Marcus and Dominic were halfway down the stairs, Neffe and Aset close behind them. The two ancient Nejerettes hauled a distraught Genevieve between them, twisting in their hold and gasping, “I didn’t know! I swear, I didn’t know!” She spotted her daughter clinging to me at the bottom of the stairs