Turn to Darkness (Offspring 5.6) Read Online Free Page A

“Are you sure you don’t need anything? I can come over . . . All right. I want to be there for you, this time . . . You’re sure you’re fine? . . . Call me if you need me . . . Okay.”
    She hung up, her mouth turned down in a frown. He could sense sadness emanating from her. Because his people lacked emotions, they could pick them up easily from the humans here.
    He took note of the number on that write-on board but gave her a concerned look. “This concerns . . . our daughter?”
    “The police questioned her. She’s barely over five feet tall, and they questioned her about the attack on that creep.” She flung her hands in the air. “Like she could have done it!”
    She didn’t have Darkness; otherwise she could have. But her connection to the victim was too much of a coincidence to ignore. “Does she have a husband or boyfriend, someone who might have done it for her? To protect her?”
    Melina shook her head. “I doubt it. She hasn’t dated in a long time, at least from what she tells me. She was hurt pretty bad inside, too.” Her hand fisted at her chest. “After she moved out, she was living with some guys. I thought that was strange, but she felt safe with them.”
    “These guys, do you know them?”
    “No.” She let out a bitter laugh. “Some mother I am, huh? We don’t see each other much, only meeting for lunch sometimes. Even then, she doesn’t tell me much about her personal life. She’s happy to talk about the landscaping business she started, going on and on about cacti, xeriscaping, stuff I don’t know much about. She always loved plants and flowers.” She walked over to a miniature plant on the windowsill, lifted it to show him. “She makes these for fun. For meditation, she says. She tried to teach me how to prune it, but I’m useless.”
    He needed to know as much about her as possible. But learning more made it harder to do what he had to do. “She’s only twenty and owns her own business?”
    “She’s twenty-two. I wasn’t sure I wanted you to know . . .”
    He nodded. Of course, it would have been better if she hadn’t told him, but Cheyenne’s eyes gave her heritage away. He found a business card tucked into the side of the cork board: SHEA’S LANDSCAPE DESIGN with a bonsai plant for the logo.
    Melina picked up her own mug and took a sip. “Why did you come to see me? Your wife is . . .”
    “Fine. I probably shouldn’t have come, but I’ve been thinking of you lately. I miss you.”
    Several expression crossed her face, a smile that turned quickly sad. “I don’t want to continue what we were doing. It’s too hard being second fiddle.”
    “I know. I’m sorry.” He reached into his pocket and extracted his wallet, pulling out all the cash he had, several hundred dollar bills. “Use this for something. Consider it belated child support.”
    She took it but didn’t look at the stack. “You should probably go.”
    When she turned to pour out the contents of her mug into the sink, he took the card and tucked it into his wallet.
    “Goodbye, Melina.”
    He understood why having emotions was troublesome. On so many levels. Because he couldn’t see this woman who had made him happy. Because he was going to be making her very unhappy.

 
    Chapter Three
    “S O HOW DOES it feel having that sick son of a bitch out of your hair?”
    Shea turned to Darius, who was handing her another plate from the table. Her stomach twisted as she took it from him and scrubbed it. “I’m relieved that he won’t be bothering me anymore. But it was a horrible way for it to happen.”
    She rinsed the plate and set it in the rack. The man being mauled by someone who turned into smoke and then a beast, according to the lone witness, was scary enough. Because that sounded like Darkness, and the only people she’d known with it were the four men in her life. That had been gnawing at her all evening, the coincidence of it. Or, rather, that it couldn’t be a