Intrepid Read Online Free

fine,” I barely managed to say.  
    “A headache?”  
    I reached behind me and squeezed my fingers into the counter to balance myself. There was a sledgehammer thudding on my temples, and I grunted out an answer that made no sense to either of us.  
    “Is it a headache?” he repeated. There was an ounce of concern, an ounce of panic, and an ounce of pity in his voice that startled me almost as much as the pain. He stepped towards me and placed his fingers on my temples, alternating circles with his forefingers. I was about to knock his hands away, but the pain started to pull back so I could breathe again. It wasn’t as if he was trying to be intimate with the gesture—that’d just be gross. The movement was more surgical than that, like he was a doctor who knew just what to do to make the pain lessen.  
    “See. You’re okay.”  
    But I wasn’t okay.  
    Things felt far from okay.  
    I started to step away from him, but the counter bit into my hip reminding me I had nowhere to go. His fingernails had moved on to scraping lines along my scalp just above my ears, as if he was pushing the headache out of my skull, and it was working. I ground my teeth and yanked his hands out of my hair so I could shove him away with my hip.    
    “You can finish the dishes. Tell Ringo I walked home.”  
    “But—”
    “Just don’t,” I said, and walked to the kitchen door. When I shut it behind me and stepped into the backyard, I felt the weight of something big coming. I looked up into the night sky, and watched black, blotchy clouds race across the stars. They made it darker than normal, but I didn’t need the starlight to lead me home. I knew the entire one-and-a-half-mile walk back to the cabin on our ranch like the back of my hand.  
    Still, as I walked home, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was terribly, horribly wrong.  
    I just didn’t know what yet.  

Chapter Three  

    “You’re a bit late this morning,” Rebecca said as she put down the chart she was working on. The green scrubs she wore had teddy bears on them. She was sweet, but what self-respecting adult wore teddy bears?  
    I rapped my knuckles on the raised countertop wrapping around the desk that faced the door and sighed. I checked the clock above her desk, and realized I only had about twenty minutes before I had to be at school. It’d have to be a short visit. “Not my fault. Blame my moron father. He couldn’t find his keys,” I said.  
    “Moron or not, I wouldn’t exactly mind if your father stopped by more often. I’m still waiting on him to wake up and ask me out on that date,” Rebecca said.  
    “Gross.”  
    “Gee. Thanks.”  
    I laughed. “I don’t mean you’re gross. I just can’t picture Ringo on a date… with anyone.”  
    She frowned. “Both you Nicholsons are drier than ice. A love life is a good thing to have. Speaking of, you’d be surprised to know that Sheriff Garza and you have not been the only visitors this week. On Tuesday, a handsome Hispanic boy showed up. Does the name Sully ring a bell?”  
    “Sully was here?”  
    Rebecca winked, and I sucked in a breath. I’d been more worried than normal about my grandfather for the past few months, but when I spilled my guts to Sully, I didn’t think it’d spur him into a visit of his own. Friday and Wednesday mornings were my days with Papa, and the old man was getting worse and worse and remembering less and less. Sometimes he wasn’t even aware of his surroundings, and he sat in silence the entire visit. It made the conversations with him tricky to navigate.  
    Alzheimer’s Disease is an evil, evil beast.  
    “If I were you, I’d snatch that boy up! He’s a hottie,” Rebecca said.  
    I crossed my eyes.  
    “You know, if you keep doing that, they may get stuck that way.”  
    “You should know that statement is a scientific impossibility created as a last-ditch effort by parents to scare their children into submission.