Shade Me Read Online Free PDF Page A

and looked down to see my mother’s outstretched arm, lying in the same pool of blood I was standing in. The numbers on her watch were covered, too, making them deep crimson.Mom’s hand twitched, the crimson pulsing at me. My hands relaxed, the Tootsie Rolls splashing in the blood. I looked at her face. Her eyes rolled to meet mine.
    â€œNikki . . . go . . . ,” she wheezed.
    But I couldn’t go. I could only stand there, feet frozen in her blood, and stare at her watch as its pulsing crimson numbers followed my mom’s heartbeat. They skipped fast while she turned her head to look directly at the ceiling, then slowed as her eyes closed. I watched in horror as time stretched between the beating of the numbers. The pulses got more uneven, and then shone a steady, thick crimson. I knew then that she was going to die.
    Crimson meant death.
    If the color in my head was right, if my intuition was spot-on, the girl in Bay 19 was going to die. And seeing her there like that—seeing all that crimson—practically knocked me down. Her face bent and swirled into my mother’s face, her blood my mom’s blood, the lifeless hand lying across her stomach my mom’s hand reaching for help on the tile floor. I blinked, trying to steady myself, trying to clear my mom out of my eyes. I wanted to vomit, to pass out, to run—all the things I didn’t, and couldn’t, do when I found my mother.
    â€œOh, God,” I rasped, as my breathing got faster. It felt like my heart was going to squeeze my chest dry. I pressed my fingers against my eyes and tried to push away the woozy feeling. But it wasn’t working, so I backed out of the bay,accidentally knocking into the wall that separated Bay 19 from Bay 20. My cell phone fell out of my jacket pocket and slid across the tile floor, coming to a stop under her bed. I didn’t go after it. I just needed to get out of all that crimson for a minute.
    I took two steps back, three, four, half doubled over. I felt myself bump into something from behind again. Scattered, I whirled to find myself face-to-face with a cop.
    â€œJesus!” I breathed.
    â€œWhoa,” he said, holding his hands out toward me. “Got to watch where you’re walking in here.” His forehead creased into concern. “You okay?” He took my elbow and led me toward a wheeled office chair at a computer station. “Here, sit down. You look faint.”
    I followed his guiding hand and eased into the chair. I took three deep breaths and willed my heart to slow, willed the images of my mother’s lifeless body out of my mind.
    â€œStay here, I’ll be right back.” The cop stepped away, during which time I closed my eyes and focused my breathing, trying to get back in command of the situation. I hated being out of control. I hated going back to that place with my mother. Back to the worst day of my life.
    Why was I even here? I wasn’t meant to be here. Not for this girl. Despite her bloodied and puffy face, and despite the little side trip down memory lane, I’d still recognized the girl in the bed, and it only deepened the mystery of why inthe hell they’d summoned me.
    She was Peyton Hollis, lovely, doe-eyed daughter of noted film producer Bill Hollis. As if his power and money didn’t make him sexy enough, Bill Hollis was known for having trotted out Peyton and her brother for the tabloids and entertainment shows, holding their tiny hands in his big, important ones, dolloping ketchup on their fries at the Malibu Country Mart, petting bunnies with them at Studio City Farmers Market. Most people, including me, couldn’t pick Peyton’s mom out of a crowd of two, but anyone who’d ever read a magazine in a dentist’s office would recognize the salt-and-pepper-haired movie executive and the beautiful children he doted on.
    Admittedly, I hadn’t seen Peyton in the press for a long time. And she definitely