Darksider: Reveler Series 3 Read Online Free Page A

preparing.
    She chuckled in spite of the circumstances. “Hungry?”
    “Starved, woman,” he said. “I’ve consumed a lot of basic sustenance in my life, but yours is the only food I’ve ever really known. And you know how long it’s been.”
    The compliment, as well as the food-lust in his tone, told her he meant it. He had no idea what that did to her.
    “I cook six nights a week at Marina de Sel. No need to be deprived.”
    “I’ll come by.”
    “Do.”
    “Count on it.”
    God. The man still had the power to ruin her. All dark and sexy, and then sweet? Jerk. He’d been hot at twenty-one. Age him like fine wine and he was…irresistible. Was breaking her heart over Harlen—again—worth catching the creeper who’d infiltrated her dreams?
    She had a second restaurant to open. Yes, she’d risk ruining herself over him if she could achieve her other, better dream.
    She set the plate in front of him. Beat that.
    Flirting felt good. It meant nothing, and it kept things light when the reality still made her shiver, even though she’d been working over a hot stove. Some guy had been shadowing her for months . “So what’s the protocol? You bring me in?”
    It’d been a while since she’d had a Rêve induced, but she still remembered the free-fall into sleep, the rush of the waters around her, sensation after sensation crashing over her—most of them erotic. But then she’d been with him, in love. Crazy.
    Harlen was brooding. “If it’s okay, I’d like to see what I can find out tonight. But don’t worry, I won’t let him get close to you again. You won’t be sleeping alone for the foreseeable future.”
    The whole situation made her feel weak, which she hated.
    “I’m not a victim.” Harlen hadn’t touched his food, but she took the plate from him anyway to make him acknowledge her point. “He’s my victim, as soon as I get my hands on him.”
    “Noted.” His fork hovered in the air, suspended mid-plunge. He looked pointedly at the plate.
    She huffed. Replaced it. She took a dishtowel from the tuck at her waist and wiped away an errant drizzle of sauce from the edge. “Sorry. I’m angry.”
    She could blame Harlen for many things, but not for this.
    He wrapped an arm around the outside edge of the plate and hunkered over it to protect his food. Glanced up at her, wary, to let her know he’d fight if she tried take it from him a second time.
    “Your food is safe, I promise. But I don’t think I want to go anywhere tonight.” This was enough for her. She was so tired. She’d meet him at his office or whatever tomorrow.
    He smiled with a full mouth and then swallowed. “We don’t have to. Sweetheart, I’ve got skills you’ve never seen before.”
    She didn’t doubt it. He was trying to relax her. Joke. It was working; she felt better. Distracted. “Is that so?”
    “We can do it right here since the security on your building is top of the line and will keep your stalker away.”
    Security was one of the reasons she’d taken the apartment. She liked to feel safe. “He can’t get in here without clearance from the desk and a code for the elevator.”
    “Then you simply go to sleep,” he said, “and I’ll find you in your dreamspace. You don’t have to do a thing. I’m the Dream—”
    “—Master,” she finished for him. “I remember.”
    Their first day in the sleep study, first induced sleep, first fall, first lucid moment, he’d taken to Rêve like he was born to breathe dreamwater. The next day he’d dropped his engineering courses and had gone fully into the Rêve program.
    “What about the caps?” Wait, people wore crowns now, narrow ones that lightly banded the head. That’s what she saw in commercials anyway. Back in college they’d had to wear these ridiculous netted caps over their heads to stimulate the right frequency for shared dreaming.
    “I don’t need one anymore. Gifted is what I am.”
    “So you’ve said.”
    “It bears repeating.”
    Rolling her