A Wizard for Christmas Read Online Free PDF Page A

it.” Hadrian was following her to the door. “You look so normal, too.” She patted Hadrian’s strong chest. “A shame. But sorry. I’m more interested in sitting on a sofa and watching TV at night than attending weird cult meetings.”
    “You don’t have to stay here,” Hadrian said, quietly. “I only brought you to the café, because you had nowhere else to go.”
    “We’re not a cult, Holly,” Frank said.
    “I’m out of here.” Holly pushed Hadrian out of her way on her way to the door.
    “You can’t push her like that,” she heard Hadrian scold as she charged out onto the street. She’d abandoned her luggage that had already been put in the room upstairs and had missed out on getting to taste the chocolate croissants for a second time.
    “We don’t have time, damn it,” Stone’s low voice followed her as she ran. “Her life is already in grave danger.”
     
    * * * *
     
    Hadrian wanted to punch a wall. He’d lost Holly. This time he had no idea where she went. She’d left her warm coat, her suitcase, and her purse at the café.
    She was scared. Obviously overwhelmed. And, for some unfathomable reason, unwilling to go back to her apartment. He wished he’d demanded she tell him why. What was she up to? What kind of trouble had she gotten herself into?
    He’d followed her that morning, expecting go to the airport and expecting to have to pay whatever it took to get a ticket on whatever flight she was taking to wherever it was she was going. Instead of having to scramble at the airport, he’d watched her go from hotel to hotel all day. Thanks to his use of a little “witchery” each hotel had turned her away.
    Still, an ache had pulsed through his chest as he’d watched her. There was no family waiting for her. There was no one.
    She was like them. But then, he already knew that.
    Trouble was—she didn’t.
    “Hey!” someone called out to Hadrian as he wandered through the park. Footsteps pounded behind him on the sidewalk. “Hey, wait up!”
    He slipped his hands in his pockets and turned. Detective Newton caught up to him.
    “Another body was found this morning,” Newton said, breathing hard.
    “I know,” Hadrian said.
    “Then where the hell were you?” Newton sounded as if he wanted to pound his fist against Hadrian’s face. Instead of hitting, he grabbed Hadrian’s arm and shook him.
    “I had a more important matter to attend to.” He had to follow Holly around town—for all the good that did him. He still couldn’t believe he’d lost her.
    “What’s killing these kids? Some kind of biological terrorism? An undetectable disease? I know you know.”
    Hadrian calmly peeled Newton’s hand from his sleeve.
    “Why the hell won’t you tell us what you do know?”
    What could Hadrian say? What did the detective really want from him? Newton was a good detective. And like all good detectives, he wanted things to be cut and dry. Easy.
    The shadowy world Hadrian inhabited was never easy.
    Even if he told Newton the full truth, the man wouldn’t believe it. “It’s hunting right now,” he told Newton something the detective could understand. “Come morning, you’ll have another body. So far, the media has ignored the deaths. I doubt that’ll continue much longer.”
    “Damn the media!” Newton shouted. “I don’t care about them! How do I stop him? Tell me that! That’s all I care about! How in the hell do I stop him?”
    “You don’t.” Hadrian used his voice to push his power.
    “What?” Newton blinked wildly, blocking all of Hadrian’s efforts to soothe him.
    Admitting defeat, Hadrian stepped back. “No matter what you do, you can’t make it stop.” He jammed his hands back into his pockets. “Right now”—without Holly—“no one can.”
     
    * * * *
     
    She couldn’t go home. Holly wanted to. Even if it meant telling her friends the truth, she wanted to go home and get warm. But those weirdoes from the cult had admitted to watching her, which