Comes the Night Read Online Free PDF Page A

there... She leaned in to examine the spine.
    A diary! That’s abso-friggin’-lutely what it was!
    Heart beating unaccountably fast, Brooke reached for the little tan-colored book. Damn, it was old. How long had Alex been keeping it? Since kindergarten?
    She flipped the cover open, her gaze racing over the yellowed page. Within seconds she realized it wasn’t her roommate’s diary. It belonged to some chick named Connie. She turned the first page, then another and another.
    “Holy shit!” Brooke sank down on Alex’s bed, completely engrossed. So engrossed that she failed to heed the sound of feet on the stairs and the creak of the floorboards right outside the door. The echo of those sounds only registered when the door flew open and Maryanne breezed into the room.
    Breezed in and then froze.
    “Brooke? What are you doing over there? And is that a diary ?” Her voice rose with accusation as she looked down at the handwritten pages. “You’re reading Alex’s diary?”
    “It’s not Alex’s.”
    “But you got it out of her things.”
    Brooke rolled her eyes. “So sue me.”
    “Have you been looking through my things, too? Is that why you skipped out early? To snoop?”
    Brooke felt her face flushing, but managed to give Maryanne a coolly derisive smile. “Sweetie, I haven’t seen anything about you so far that’s remotely interesting enough to make me want to look through your things.”
    Something flashed in the other girl’s eyes, and Brooke almost regretted being such a bitch. Almost.
    “So my stuff is safe, but Alex’s is fair game?” There was no mistaking the coldness in Maryanne’s voice. “Why’s that, Brooke? Because Alex is obviously sad? Hurt over something? Pain interests you?”
    Brooke stood, huffing out an angry breath. “Because she’s acting all straight-edge all of a sudden and I want to know why.”
    “How about maybe she grew up a little over the summer?”
    “Yeah, right. That must be why she went out and got that new snakebite, to prove how grown up she is now. And here I was thinking she’d done it just to be all scener-than-thou with the scene crowd.”
    The other girl’s face went blank. “Snakebite?”
    “Duh. The lip rings, one on either side. Looks kinda like a—”
    “Snakebite,” Maryanne finished.
    “I’m telling you, that girl is hardcore. I don’t know what this act is about, but don’t expect it to last for long. Alex Robbins is a party animal.”
    “So it’s okay to read her diary?”
    “I told you, it’s not her diary! It’s way old. Belongs to some chick called Connie Harvell. I think she must have lived right here, at Harvell House. And omigod, you should read it! I just read a page or two, but—”
    A thump interrupted them. Both girls looked up to see Alex standing in the open doorway. The thump they’d heard was her book bag hitting the floor.
    “That’s mine!” An ashen-faced Alex flew across the room and tore the diary from Brooke’s unresisting hands. She stood there, chest heaving, looking every bit as badass as her reputation. “What the hell are you doing with it? With any of my stuff?”
    Because she couldn’t resist, Brooke turned to Maryanne. “Yeah, what are we doing with Alex’s stuff?”
    “What the—” Maryanne sputtered. “ I wasn’t doing anything with her stuff and you know it!”
    Brooke laughed. “Just teasing. God, girl, you have to learn to chill or you’re going to be one big fat target, living in this house.” Then she turned to Alex. “So this is yours, huh?”
    “Yes.” Alex thrust out her chin, a clear giveaway.
    “Funny, because it seems to belong to a girl named Connie Harvell, who used to live here decades ago. So I’m thinking, maybe you found it laying around the house somewhere. But a document like this—an artifact like this—I don’t think you can claim ownership. In fact, we should probably turn it in to Mrs. Betts.”
    At the mention of the housemother’s name, Alex paled further.