Nightshine: A Novel of the Kyndred Read Online Free PDF

globe—”
    “Oye, cabrón.”
    The high-pitched shout came from the tower beyond, and Charlotte’s eyes narrowed.
    “I know you hear me, pendejo .” A short laugh followed the shout, and then, “Hey, hermana, ese tipo tiene mucha lana , eh? Maybe after, he give you a big reward, eh?”
    Samuel frowned. “I don’t speak much Spanish.”
    “I do. He says you have a lot of money,” Charlotte said, her mouth tight. “You know this jackass?”
    “Not at all.” Half the truth was better than none. “Do you think you can persuade him to cease fire?”
    Charlotte rubbed her eyes and sighed before she called out, “Señor, deje lo que estás haciendo y escú-chame.”
    From that point Charlotte spoke too rapidly for Taske to follow, but he took advantage of her focus on the sniper to remove one glove and ease his hand inside his coat. Dragging James out of the car had torn some of the stitches in his side, but thanks to his body heat the blood-soaked linen of his shirt had partially dried and was beginning to stanch the old wound. He’d thought he might have to use it as an excuse to keep Charlotte with him, but now that she had engaged the sniper, there was no need to mention it.
    Not that he wished to. Charlotte would want to know how he had sustained the injury, and he couldn’t tell her the truth. She would never believe that he had been attacked by werewolves and wild animals, all of whom had been under the mind control of Lilah Devereaux, a powerful Kyndred friend whom Taske believed also held the key to a cure for his own condition. He’d stalked Lilah, hiring detectives to hunt her down for him, but his foolish actions had nearly gotten them both killed. In the end Lilah had forgiven him, but Taske had yet to overcome his own shame.
    The mellow contralto of Charlotte’s voice felt soothing to his ears, and he allowed himself to rest against the side of the car and watch her. For the first time since his ability had manifested it had been maddeningly short on details; unlike the other people he had rescued over the years, this woman’s time line had been shrouded in darkness. He’d been unable to discern who she was, where she lived and worked, her surname, or any clue of what her destiny was, although he sensed it to be of critical importance to humanity. In the end he had been forced to act on the only thing he did know: that unless he saved her, a woman named Charlotte would be murdered on the Golden Gate Bridge by a suicidal man.
    Until she had crawled out of the fog, Taske hadn’t even known exactly what Charlotte would look like, another first for him. For some reason he had expected her to be a dark, petite angel with a beguiling smile, not a fierce-eyed Amazon with as many muscles as she had curves. No doubt her statuesque proportions had drawn some criticism from those who kissed the bony, wasted feet of current fashion, but she made him think of the glory of forgotten eras, when towering warrior queens had been worshiped as goddesses.
    Acolytes of Apollo would have made her their high priestess; sunlight had scattered golden streaks through her dark brown hair and kissed her brown eyes with amber flecks. Her tanned skin had a delicious bloom to it, like the rose flush of a ripe peach. He had never met a woman who looked more vital and alive than Charlotte Marena, which made his mission all the more imperative. Something inside her made her glow like a beacon of hope; her mysterious destiny must be directly linked to hundreds if not thousands of other lives.
    After she repeated the same question three times, Charlotte fell silent and listened. After a minute and no response from the gunman she shook her head and glanced at Taske. “This guy isn’t a Chicano—a Mexican-American,” she tacked on as an explanation of the term. “I can’t place his accent, either. He’s trying to talk like a street thug but he’s using formal Spanish. He’s also slurring his words.”
    “How is that