Nightwalker Read Online Free PDF Page A

don’t want someone like that. There’s plenty fish in the sea.”
    â€œI’m sick of trolling for them. I always end up getting the pointy end of the hook. Men are pigs.” Takala banged her head on the steering wheel, making the whole car shake.
    â€œTell me about it, honey,” Lilly said.
    Takala felt Lilly Smith’s comforting hand on her shoulder, the hand of the woman who might possibly be her mother, and her sobs became uncontrollable.

Chapter 4
    â€œY ou can’t take those.”
    Striker shoved the sunglasses down onto the bridge of his nose and eyed the kid who’d just accused him of stealing. He looked about sixteen, with freckles and red hair, too young and naive to know he was annoying a vampire. Normally, Striker would have stopped to purchase the sunglasses and baseball cap, but he couldn’t let Culler and the woman out of his sight. He held the boy’s gaze while his will seeped into the young man’s conscience.
    â€œI have paid for these,” Striker said, hypnotizing the kid with his eyes.
    â€œRight, sorry, sir.” Like a puppet, the boy moved back behind the counter of the little gift shop.
    Striker shoved the glasses back up on his nose, made sure the cap covered his hair, then he picked up a USAToday on his way out. He stepped into the flow of people moving toward the various airline ticket windows.
    He spotted Culler and her friend about fifty yards ahead. It was hard to miss her companion, not because the scent of blood was all over her and his predatory sense of smell could find her in a twenty-story building in seconds, or that she was tall and head and shoulders above the crowd, but because she dressed like a rock star. Thick ginger-blond curls hung down past her shoulders. Her long legs were stuffed into tight black hip-hugger pants. Several spike belts of varying widths hung around her slender hips. She wore a tie-dyed T-shirt that left three inches of her flat belly showing. A pink scarf, dotted with blood, draped her neck. And over it a black leather bomber jacket. Silver studs spelled “Virgin” across the back of the coat. Black cowboy boots covered her feet and calves. Lethal silver points jutted from the tips of her boots. She held a small carry-on suitcase, and she kept scratching at the scarf around her neck. He didn’t much care for women who dressed ostentatiously or had an I-own-the-world air about them. The modest feminine medieval fashion for women was his favorite style, but that look was long gone, obsolete, just like that part of his life.
    They went through the line, and Culler bought Rock Star a first-class ticket to Paris. On their way to Gate 5, they stopped at a row of shops.
    Rock Star turned and looked nervously around. Striker was leaning on the wall near a water fountain, pretending to read the newspaper. She glanced past him as they paused at Arlene’s Tid Bits, a woman’s clothing boutique.
    He zoned in his sensitive hearing and listened to their conversation.
    â€œLet’s go in,” Culler said. “I need a toothbrush and makeup and clothes. It’s not fair. You carry an overnight bag in your car. I had to leave home with nothing.”
    â€œSorry.” Rock Star shrugged her shoulders. “Hazards of my job. When following people, you have to be ready at a moment’s notice to leave.”
    What was her job? How deeply was she connected to Raithe? Rock Star could be higher up in his organization. What was the connection between Rock Star and Culler? Maybe Rock Star was the ticket he needed to find Raithe. By the enticing odor of her blood, he knew vampires would kill to have a taste of her. He’d like to see below the scarf. Was she just covering the scratches Tongue had left on her neck, or was Raithe’s mark on her neck? The thought brought a sadistic grin to Striker’s lips. He’d like nothing more than to find leverage with Raithe by using one of his own