The End of Never Read Online Free Page A

send you an e-mail,” she said, blushing.
    â€œNonsense,” he said, swallowing the last of the forbidden pastry. “Let’s get together for dinner tonight. Do you think you could get away for a little while?”
    â€œI will for you,” she said eagerly.
    â€œThen it’s a date,” Jim said, rising to his feet and brushing crumbs from his khaki slacks. “Call me around seven.”
    â€œOkay,” Angela said, twirling her auburn hair around her finger as she spoke.
    â€œHey Angela,” he said before ending the call, “did you hear that our girls don’t have school today?”
    â€œWhat?” Angela stammered.
    â€œThe storm last night in Atlanta knocked out the power on campus. Apparently those grand magnolia trees our tuition money pays to keep up around campus toppled over and knocked out power lines and windows.”
    â€œHow do you know?” Angela asked, wincing. Alexandra still had not called her back.
    â€œTaylor called with an update this morning. She wanted me to know in case I checked her Facebook page and saw the pictures she plans to upload of her lounging by the pool today.”
    â€œWhat a mess,” Angela remarked and then lied, “Alexandra called me about it this morning, too.”
    â€œSo I’ll see you tonight then, Angela? I’m looking forward to it already.”
    Angela licked her battered lips and told herself not to bite them again. “Yes,” she said and hit the end button on her cell phone. Immediately she found her daughter’s number on the phone and tried calling again. “Pick up,” she said aloud, anger and fear rising in her chest.
    Five rings later, a weak voice answered, “Hello?”
    â€œSleeping in?” Angela asked angrily.
    â€œHi Mom,” Alexandra said. “I guess you heard school was cancelled. That storm was pretty bad last night.”
    â€œAre you okay?” Angela asked, rising to her tired feet.
    â€œYeah,” Alexandra promised. “I’m just tired.”
    â€œWell, go back to bed,” Angela said softly, as she paced back and forth.
    â€œOkay,” Alexandra agreed, as the sound of an ambulance siren screeched into her ear through the receiver.
    â€œCall me later,” Angela asked once the siren passed. But only a dead connection rang in her ear. Shaking the phone, she scowled and huffed toward the curb to hail a taxi back to the hospital.
    Meanwhile, Alexandra was really in her Jeep, resting her head back against the passenger’s seat. She sighed and glanced over at Kraven, who was sitting quietly next to her. She stroked the back of his hand, which tensely gripped the steering wheel.
    â€œRelax,” she said, shoving her cell phone in her skirt pocket. “Please take me home, and we’ll figure out how to tell her later.”
    Kraven kept his blue eyes locked on the windshield, but Alexandra detected a deep gulp in his throat.
    He burns like fire , she thought.
    Alexandra snapped her fingers back, instinctively checking the tips of her fingers to see if they had been singed. She did not want to damage the powers she was just learning to harness from her fingertips. She blew at them softly and held her hands out the rolled-down window.
    The Jeep crept through the heavy morning traffic. Kraven snaked through the snarled downtown Atlanta avenues and side streets toward Park View Tower, where Alexandra’s tenth-floor apartment was located.
    â€œIt would be easier if we could just fly home,” she sighed.
    â€œWe will later,” said Kraven solemnly and she was beginning to sense that he did not break a promise.

3

Digging Up Bones
    The headmaster of Collinsworth had already suspected trouble would be waiting for him on campus as he eased from the interstate to the side streets of South Atlanta before the break of dawn. Holding his breath, he barreled full speed ahead through the blinking red traffic lights.
    Behind