Leaving Annalise (Katie & Annalise Book 2) Read Online Free Page B

Nick, and he tucked it into his. He leaned in toward my face, which prompted a whine from Sheila. I ducked away from him, lifted the side of my long, voluminous skirt and flipped it over my arm, then loped toward the house, tugging him behind me.
    We ran lightfooted, Nick trusting me to lead the way, the dogs all around us. When we came to the door of my big yellow house, I pulled Nick inside and the dogs stayed on the front step. The electricity wouldn’t be on until Crazy got one last permit, but I knew my way around even in the dark and I didn’t hesitate. I shut the door behind us, closing out the night-blooming jasmine and keeping in the sawdust and paint. Now the only sound was our panting breath.
    I pulled Nick through the kitchen, where there was enough moonlight streaming through the windows that I could make out the hulking, unfinished cabinetry and appliances.
    “Kitchen,” I said without slowing down.
    Onward we ran into the great room, where the ceilings opened up into a towering cavern thirty-five feet high. The moon was brighter there, shining through the second-story windows onto the tongue-in-groove cypress and mahogany ceiling and the rock and brick fireplace the original owner had installed for God knows what reason in the tropics.
    “Great room,” I announced. “Watch out for the scaffolding.”
    I ducked between the steel supports and made a sharp right down a short, dark hall to an empty bedroom whose magnificence echoed that of the great room. The moon beckoned through the glass panels in the back door. I stood in the middle of the room and dropped Nick’s hand and my dress to wave my hand over my head.
    “My room.”
    I took a step toward the balcony door, but Nick grabbed my arm and swung me back around to him, creating a collision reminiscent of the one outside the bizarre beauty pageant two hours earlier. Only this time, I didn’t bounce back from him. I stuck. Like glue.
    He slid his hands from the base of my neck up into my hair on both sides and leaned his face down to mine, his dark eyes intense. “Slow down.”
    I put my hands around his wrists and stood on tiptoe to whisper, breath-distance from his lips, “We’re almost there.”
    He closed the millimeters between us and pressed his warm, soft lips against mine.
    Oh, my merciful God in heaven.
    We stood there, lips clinging to each other as the seconds passed, until I disengaged. I pulled his hands down gently and backed toward the door without letting go of him. I reached behind me and turned the knob, pulling the door inward and hooking it open.
    “Watch your step,” I said, moving out onto the ten-foot-long red-tiled balcony. Someday soon it would have a black metal railing.
    “Whoa,” Nick said as I hung right and sat down at the far end of the narrow platform, my knees up and my back against the wall. It felt like sitting on thin air, except that thin air probably wouldn’t be quite as tough on the tush. Below, and beyond the patio tiled in pavers that matched the balcony’s, the pool shimmered, the moon dancing upon it like it was the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. The moonlight was so bright that I could make out the brilliance of the dark turquoise pool tiles underwater.
    The earth fell away fifteen feet past the pool, sloping dramatically into the valley that surrounded Annalise. It was like we were encircled by a moat of treetops. Rooftops off to the west marked the end of developed land on the island, and beyond them the moon glinted on white sand and the silver-streaked, undulating navy-blue sea. Three large ships dotted the horizon, one a cruise ship ringed with lights and two others, dark and lumbering.
    Movement caught my eye closer in. I looked down. A tall black woman was standing on the far edge of the pool. She wore a mid-calf plaid skirt, faded but full. She lifted it with both hands and swung one foot through the water with her toe pointed, as if to test its temperature. The young woman cut her