Sun & Moon - a contemporary romance (The Minstrel Series #1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

with people eating. A girl, the same one she’d spotted a few days before, sat in the corner playing guitar. She noticed Katja looking in the window, her eyes falling to the guitar case in her hand. The girl smiled and motioned with her head that she should come in.
    Katja let out a long breath.
    This was a place for poor people.
    For homeless people.
    She wasn’t one of those.
    Yet, she was now, wasn’t she?
    She went in.

 
     
     
     
     

     
    “Hi, I’m Eva,” she said with a smile when Katja walked in. “The soup’s free. Make yourself at home.”
    Katja hesitated in the doorway, feeling even more apprehensive. With the exception of Eva, the people here looked unkempt. The place smelled funny.
    Eva didn’t sing, just plucked melodies on the strings and strummed. Katja admitted she was pretty good. She could at least stay a while and listen. Warm up.
    The girl was thin and looked small behind her big instrument. She had straight brown hair cut bluntly at her shoulder blades and matching blunt bangs that stopped just above her eyebrows. Katja was disappointed when she stopped playing.
    The girl set her guitar down awkwardly and then to Katja’s surprise, limped noticeably toward a black cane propped in the corner. A shot of anxiety crept up Katja’s neck as she watched the girl maneuver off the stage, worried she would fall.
    The girl flashed her an embarrassed smile. Then with her free hand, she pointed to the kitchen.
    “I’ll watch your stuff,” she said. “If you want to get something.”
    Katja glanced around at the others who were finishing their meals. Spoons scraped along the bottoms of porcelain bowls, and butter knives dropped on the tables after use with the buns. The food looked and smelled okay.
    Her hunger beat out her pride.
    “Thanks,” she said. The soup line was in sight so she kept her eye on her belongings the whole time, but she was grateful that the girl was watching, too.
    The place started to empty out by the time Katja began to eat.
    “We’re closing soon,” Eva said, hobbling toward her. Katja looked away from the cane, not wanting to be rude.
    “I’ll be quick.”
    “Take your time.” Eva pointed to Katja’s guitar case. “You play?”
    Well, she didn’t haul around the heavy instrument for the fun of it. Katja swallowed her soup and nodded. She didn’t want to be rude, but she really didn’t feel like talking to this girl. She kept her eyes on her food hoping the girl would get the hint, and felt a twinge of regret when the girl left her. Katja cleared her table when she was done and hefted her things back out into the frigid air.
    Now what? It didn’t take long for the damp cold to seep through her clothing and into her bones. She meandered through a couple shops to warm up. The owners eyed her suspiciously, like she was the type to slip wares into her pocket without paying. She wasn’t that type, but she understood the temptation. Would they miss one candy bar? Or a banana?
    She was like a bull in a china shop with her bulky guitar case in these small stores. She needed some place bigger, like a mall. She could hang out in the hall and crash on one of the benches. There was a large one in the old town, but it was a cold twenty-minute walk away. Plus, she couldn’t live at the mall. She’d have to leave when it closed in a few hours and then where would she go?
    She remembered Micah’s note. It was humiliating to go back there, but he had extended the invitation, if not directly, definitely by suggestion. At least it would give her time to think. Time to make a new plan.
    His place was clean and dry and warm. She was glad she had left the door unlocked. She shoved her things out of sight behind the door. What would Micah do when he discovered she hadn’t left? When he found out she was homeless? She hoped he’d let her infringe on his hospitality for one more night.
    She groaned. He might cash in on the sex this time.
    She warmed up over the radiator and