Incarnate Read Online Free PDF Page B

This is my very first real date. I’m not going to jump into bed with him.”
    Erin leaned over and gave the girl a brief hug. “How did you get so smart?”
    Mackenzie grumbled incoherently, which was a clear sign that the serious discussion had gone on long enough. So Erin got up.
    “You look beautiful,” Erin told her again, not quite able to let her go yet.
    “Thanks.” Mackenzie stood up and studied herself in the mirror again. “Can you…can you make sure Dad knows. That . I mean, if you can…I don’t want him to sit there worrying that I’m…”
    “I’ll make sure he knows.” Erin was oddly touched and felt a lump of emotion in her throat. “He’ll still worry. But it will help.”
    She gave her daughter one last look. She was so lovely, so grown-up. Her baby. “I hope you have a wonderful time tonight.”
    “Thanks. Unfortunately, first I have to get through poor Justin’s interview with Dad.”
    ***
    Erin headed off to find Seth so she could give him a few reminders on how to behave with Justin. But, as she was passing Anna’s room, an instinct compelled her to knock on the closed door.
    When a muffled response signaled she was allowed to enter, Erin went in and found her younger daughter flopped on her stomach on the bed.
    “Is everything all right?”
    Anna just grunted. Her head was turned toward the wall, so Erin couldn’t see it.
    Erin sat on the edge of the bed. “Anna, what’s wrong?”
    “Nothing.”
    From the stiff look of Anna’s back and the hoarseness of her voice, Erin knew the answer was a lie. She reached out to stroke the tousled blond hair but Anna jerked away from the touch.
    The prickly response was so unusual for Anna that Erin was immediately worried. But she didn’t press any further. She just sat silently and waited.
    Unlike Mackenzie, Anna would always open up to her eventually.
    Finally, Anna flipped over onto her back. She stared blankly at the ceiling, and her pretty features was twisted with a frown. But she hadn’t been crying, as Erin had suspected.
    “Do you think I’m pretty?” Anna asked without prelude.
    Erin’s mouth fell open. “What? Of course you’re pretty! Why would you ask such a thing?”
    Anna frowned more deeply—this time aimed at her mother. “Why shouldn’t I ask it?”
    The faint flickers of worry Erin had processed over the last week coalesced into sudden understanding. “Does this have to do with Mackenzie going on a date?”
    “No! Why does everything have to be about Mac?”
    “It doesn’t. But you’ve never seemed to be insecure about your appearance before. So I was just wondering—”
    “No one ever wants to go out with me.” The words seemed to be forced out of Anna involuntarily.
    Erin swallowed. She wanted to put an arm around her daughter but resisted the temptation, knowing Anna would just pull away. “She’s older than you—”
    Anna snorted in disgust. “What does that have to do with anything? I’m old enough to date. The only reason Mac didn’t go out before was because half the guys were scared of her and she turned all the others down flat. Everyone thinks she's gorgeous. They always have.”
    “She is very pretty,” Erin said carefully. “But you’re very pretty too.”
    Anna was pretty. Just as pretty as Mackenzie in her own way. She looked a lot like Erin, except she had Seth’s nose and eye-color—which, in Erin’s mind, only made her even prettier.
    Anna just sneered. “Then why do guys not like me?”
    “They do! You hang out with guys all the time.”
    “They like me as a friend .” Anna said the last word like a curse. “They don’t really like me.”
    The pang in her chest was so sharp it made Erin gasp. She knew exactly what Anna meant, exactly how she felt.
    She’d felt the same way all through high school.
    “Well, it’s not because you’re not pretty,” Erin declared, trying to search her memory of those long-past feelings to land on the right thing to say. “And they