The Den Read Online Free Page B

color of coal.  Time stood still.  A tear ran down Skyla’s face as their eyes locked.  Then he just turned, walked up to the counter, paid for a cup of coffee, and walked away. 
    Maybe Skyla was mistaken.  Maybe she made things up in her head.  She thought this was the man of her nightmares, but she had to be crazy.  Skyla would tell Brooke, though, and Brooke would tell her that she wasn’t crazy.  She would remind Skyla of all the other times she’d had to tell her she wasn’t crazy.  Brooke would mention the other strange things that had happened since they’d known each other.  There was the time when they were playing with Barbie dolls and Skyla made the doll’s hair grow longer.  There was the time during a school dance when Skyla realized she could read minds if she wanted to.  That resulted in Brooke’s dating Mike Connell for a few weeks.  Skyla and Brooke would use this skill to their benefit more than a few times during the next few years.  Oh, right, and there was the time in high school when she literally heated up a room.  That was Brooke’s all-time favorite. 
    Brooke had been having a few girls sleep over after her sweet-sixteen birthday party.  Skyla was so anxious that night.  She’d never felt comfortable around those girls.  All of a sudden, the room heated up to the point where they had to open the windows despite the fact that it was the middle of February. 
    “Weird,” Brooke said. 
    “Cool,” the others said. 
    But Brooke was always the honest one.
    A voice broke through Skyla’s thoughts. “Hey.  Hey.  You okay?” 
    “Huh?”
    “You okay?  You look … I don’t know.”   He was a nice-looking guy: dirty-blond hair and greenish-gray eyes.  Not from here, that’s for sure. 
    He helped himself to the seat across from Skyla.  If Skyla hadn’t been so glad to have friendly company, she would have been quite offended by his boldness in interrupting her reading.
    “I mean, sorry, but you looked like you just saw a ghost.  Are you going to faint or something?  Your face is white as a sheet.”  He stammered a bit. 
    “Were you watching me?” Skyla asked him, but her attention was really focused on the side window.  Watching the dark-haired man walk away.  She noticed he had a dark glow about him, too.  Was it was red?  It was hard to tell under the streetlights.
    “Do you know that guy?” he asked.
    “Uh, no.  No.  I am okay.  I just, well, I thought I knew him at first, but I don’t.  Everything is fine.”  Actually, everything did start to feel fine again.  She felt the panic leave her.  It trailed right out the door and followed the dark-haired man out onto Third Street and made a left on Avenue D. 
    “Hi,” he said.
    “Hi,” Skyla said.  She smiled in spite of herself.
    He introduced himself, and she did the same.  His name was Alex LaBauve.  That is a pretty name . Those are pretty eyes, too.
    Skyla took better notice of her companion.  She sat up a bit straighter and tucked her hair behind her ears.  Is he famous?  There was something about him that seemed so familiar.  Skyla was about to ask Alex if they had met before but decided not to do that.  He was probably famous, a model or an actor. 
    He was obviously a nice guy, caring and observant.  Looking past the chiseled jaw and broad shoulders, he seemed pretty normal, pretty ordinary. But what did Skyla know about normal and ordinary anyway?  Maybe Alex tried just a bit too hard, though: jeans and a polo shirt, hair not too neat but definitely messed up in the right way, teeth very, very white.  Maybe he was trying really hard to fit in.  That was odd for such a good-looking guy. 
    “So, you aren’t from here, are you?”  Skyla thought she would get a background check.
    “Well, I am from here now.”
    “Right, but where did you come from?”
    “All over,” Alex said.
    “Well, your accent sounds a bit Southern.  Are you from the South?” she