Chasing Daybreak (Dark of Night Book 1) Read Online Free Page A

The idea of him out in the world alone, scavenging like a stray dog, twisted knots in my heart.
    He shrugged.
    “Come in, Shane, please,” I whispered shakily.
    He turned, searching my face with his eyes.
    “I can’t be with you,” he said finally. “I don’t trust myself not to hurt you.”
    I wanted to reassure him, to tell him that none of it mattered. But deep down, I knew it would be a lie. Everything had changed. Nothing would ever be the same again.
    “We can’t go back, I know that. But maybe we can start something new. We can be friends,” I offered, though it physically hurt to utter the words.
    He nodded. “Friends.”
    He’d stepped inside my door, and we’d been working on the whole ‘friends’ thing ever since. It didn’t erase the past. It didn’t stop me from missing him. It was messy, complicated, and painful, but it worked when so few things in my life had.
    “Here’s the check, Ma.” I stuffed it in her hands and scooped up the unfinished sandwich. “I gotta run.”
    Mom kissed me on the cheek as I practically launched myself out the door, waving quickly to Phoebe, the only daughter who still had the patience to listen to her lectures.
     
    The shades were all drawn when I got back to the office, signaling Shane’s presence downstairs. I opened the door slowly, letting as little light as possible into the house and flipping over the OPEN sign as I went. I found Shane in the kitchen, chugging a bag of A-positive straight from the fridge, making my newly full stomach lurch violently.
    “Morning, Sleeping Ugly,” I greeted him, trying to hide my revulsion as I strode in and sat down to look over the day’s mail.
    “Same to you.” He gulped between sucking noises. My stomach rolled again, and I swallowed a gag.
    “Anything good?” he asked, tossing the empty bag in the trash, finally done with his liquid breakfast.
    “Bills, bills, and a Victoria’s Secret catalog,” I answered mechanically.
    He snatched the magazine from my hands. “Mine.”
    I tossed the bills aside. “I had the meeting with Mr. Curtis today.”
    “How’d it go?” He flipped through the pages, whistling occasionally.
    “I told him we’d go over the file. Try to find some new leads, see if the investigators overlooked anything.”
    “You think they did?” He was serious now, all business.
    “I doubt it. But it’s worth a fresh look. Maybe we can pick up on something. Either way, it’s a place to start.”
    He opened his mouth to say something, but he was interrupted by the chime of the doorbell.
    The UPS guy was there to drop off some packages. He glared at me as I signed on the electronic clipboard. He’d left one too many of my packages in the rain, and I’d finally called to complain to his boss. I wasn’t sure what came of it, only that we now exchanged angry looks whenever forced to interact.
    I scooped up the boxes and headed back inside, slamming the door with my foot. Setting them carefully on the kitchen counter, I turned and pulled a knife from a drawer. Cutting the tape made me feel like a kid at Christmas. Even if I ordered them myself, getting packages was one of my favorite things.
    The first box fell open, showering packing peanuts on the floor as I pulled out my shiny, new night-vision camera. It was actually a combination of night vision and thermal, so it could take video in the dark with no light and read heat signatures through walls. I felt like James fucking Bond just holding it.
    “This would have been helpful last night,” I grumbled to myself.
    “Hold up. I’m sleeping on the twin bed you had when you were fourteen, and yet you can afford these?” Shane complained.
    I shot him a challenging glance. “If you don’t like the bed, I’ll just take it out and put in a nice, roomy coffin for you…”
    He shuddered. Claustrophobia, apparently, was not one of the things you got over after becoming a vampire. Without another word, he pulled open the next box, revealing a