Lure of Obsession (The Muse Chronicles Book 1) Read Online Free Page B

after work.”
    After Trinity left, Nate struggled to keep his eyes off the mask on the wall. “I wasn’t expecting to find you working today.”
    Mel leaned against the edge of her desk. “Sitting around crying at Callie’s place isn’t going to bring Nia back. And the kids were really excited about the poetry project today. I couldn’t call in a sub. They’d probably send some fresh-out-of-college Algebra teacher who would make them watch Good Will Hunting or something…” She pressed her lips together. “Sorry. I’m not feeling very optimistic at the moment.”
    He almost smiled. Her devotion to her students was admirable, regardless of her current state of mind. “I’ve got a couple questions about the case for you. Do you have time now, or should I come back later?”

    Mel straightened to her full height. Usually that meant she’d be adjusting her gaze downward, but Detective Malone still had a few inches on her. “If you don’t mind watching me eat my sandwich, I’ve got an hour.”
    “Works for me.”
    She brought a black Velcro lunch sack out of her desk and led him to a large round worktable at the back of the room. Once they were seated, she withdrew a sandwich, an apple, and a soda from her bag.
    “Do you still think it was an accident?” She pulled out her apple and took a bite.
    He ignored her question and set a few printouts of masks before her. “Do any of these look familiar?”
    She looked down at the images and nodded. “These are all masks of Kronos.” She took a closer look. “Yeah. Different time periods maybe, but that’s definitely Kronos.” She lifted her gaze to meet his. “What do these masks have to do with any of this?”
    He shifted in his chair and pulled out a pen. “Kronos. He was a Greek god or something, right?”
    “Actually, he was a Titan. Zeus imprisoned him in the center of the Earth.” She set her apple down. Her appetite was nonexistent today anyway. The meal was more out of habit than hunger. “And this will help us catch Nia’s killer how?”
    “I’m not sure.” His green eyes mesmerized her for a moment. “But I think you’re right… It wasn’t an accident.”
    Dark thoughts whizzed through her mind. Everything from Detective Malone slapping cuffs on her wrists, to him confessing he killed Nia and she was about to be next. Mel let her hands slip off the table into her lap. She flexed her fingers before clenching them into tight fists in an effort to release some of the anxiety that her worst-case scenarios were dredging up.
    “What changed your mind?”
    A muscle jumped in his cheek as his attention shifted to the pages of Kronos’s likenesses, but he didn’t answer her question.
    She nudged one of them. “If it will help, I have a great Greek mythology book I could loan you.”
    He slumped back in his chair, bringing one hand up behind his neck. His shirt barely contained his bicep. She swallowed and forced her gaze elsewhere. This was no time to get distracted, regardless of how well built this detective might be.
    “The book couldn’t hurt at this point,” he said.
    “Great.” Mel got up, relieved for an excuse to put a little distance between them. She needed to stay focused on figuring out what happened to Nia, not how good Nate Malone might look without that shirt. She crossed to the bookcase on the far wall, running an index finger along the spines of collections of Edgar Allen Poe, Mary Shelley, and Shakespeare. “Do you have any leads?”
    “Not anything to convince the medical examiner it wasn’t an accidental fall.”
    She slid a small jade-colored hardcover from the shelf and turned around. His eyes moved up to her face. Had he been staring at her ass? Suddenly she didn’t feel so bad about ogling his biceps. She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling.
    Seriously? Smiling?
    She must’ve been in some kind of shock.
    Mustering up as much indifference as she could, she walked over and placed the book in front of