Steel 5: Blackthorne MC#5 by Carrie Cox Read Free Book Online Page A

had to be .
    “Was it Claire?” I asked, scanning her face for any signs that she might not be telling me the truth.
    She gave a shrug. “They didn’t give a name.”
    I bit down on my lip, thinking hard. It had to be Claire. Who else could it be?
    “Well, I’d better get back to work now. I’ll leave the cell phone with you for now, okay?”
    I smiled at her and resisted the urge to hug her. “Thank you so much! You have no idea how much this means to me.”
    She returned my smile. “I’m glad I could help.”
    I sat on the bed and put the phone on the nightstand after she left the room. The time on the screen of the phone said that it was now fourteen fifty-eight, so just two minutes to go.
    My gaze shifted from the phone to the door. I really hoped Nick didn’t return before I got this call.
    I wrapped my arms around myself, tapping my foot nervously, waiting for the cell phone to ring.
    Fourteen fifty-nine.
    Why did time pass so slowly when you were anxious for something? I tried to take a deep, calming breath but it didn’t do much good.  
    Then, at three o’clock on the dot, the cell phone rang, and I snatched it up with a trembling hand.
    “Claire?”
    There was a pause on the other end of the line, and then a voice I didn’t recognize said, “It’s not Claire. I got this phone from Claire, who asked me to pass on a message to a girl called Ella if she ever rang.”
    Disappointment flooded me, and for a moment, I couldn’t think straight.
    “Hello? Are you still there?”
    “Yes, sorry. I’m still here. This is Ella. What message do you have for me?”
    “Okay, it’s a little weird, but hopefully it will make sense to you. Basically, she said to let you know she is in Nevada, and she said you can’t tell anyone what you guys saw that night. She also told me to call you Tinker Bell … I guess that must mean something to you, right? Unless she was just kidding around.”
    My mouth felt so dry I couldn’t speak.
    I swallowed. “Is that it? That can’t be all she said. When did Claire give you the phone?”
    “Three days ago.”
    Three days ago. That meant that Claire was alive, or at least she had been three days ago.
    “The Tinker Bell thing… she was messing with me, right? Or was it some kind of codeword?”
    “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “Thank you for the message.”
    Tinker Bell wasn’t a codeword exactly. It was the pet name my dad used to call me. Hardly anyone knew that, but I had told Claire. She’d used it because she wanted me to know the message was really from her.
    After I hung up, my hands were shaking and my heart was still racing.  
    This was the best news I could have received. Claire was okay .  
    But even though I knew she was alive somewhere in Nevada, it still didn’t explain what she was still doing here.  
    Then there was the fact she said not to tell anyone what we’d seen…  
    Did that mean she remembered what happened that night?  
    It must do. She was there with me, and she saw everything that happened, too.

9

    After my mind had stopped racing, and I’d managed to get my emotions under control, I shoved the cell phone into the pocket of my jeans and left the bedroom.  
    I needed to get the phone back to the girl behind the bar before anybody noticed I’d had it, especially Nick or Jackson. She’d promised to come back for it in half an hour, but I couldn’t risk waiting for her.
    I didn’t want Nick coming back and finding me with the cell phone.
    I saw the girl behind the bar and gave her a thumbs up sign as I slid her cell phone between two trays of drinks.
    She winked at me, and I quickly left the bar before Nick or anyone else could see me.
    I intended to go back to the room and have some alone time. I needed to think this whole thing through.  
    But I didn’t get very far.  
    I’d only taken a couple of steps down the dark corridor back towards the bedroom when I felt a hand clamp down over my mouth.
    It was so sudden that I