The Lost Enchantress Read Online Free PDF Page B

opened her life and her heart to that birthright as if it was a blessing instead of a curse, and she paid for that mistake with a piece of her heart. When she turned away from magic, there was another hard price to be paid, and she paid that as well. That’s when she vowed she was never going to pay again. And, far more important, neither was anyone she cared about. She made sure of that by never, ever messing with magic, and in turn, it never messed with her.
    Until tonight.
    There was no doubt in her mind that magic was responsible for what had just happened. What she didn’t understand was why. Could it have been simply a fluke? A mystical glitch of some sort? Or was it something more personal, something meant for her? And what about the guy in the black coat . . . was he responsible for what had happened or on the receiving end of it the same as she had been?
    If it was a fluke, a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and getting caught in a stray energy field, she’d be more than happy to shrug it off. But if it was more, if someone, or some thing , had targeted her, then . . . then she probably wouldn’t have gotten off so easily, she acknowledged grimly.
    Unless, Eve thought, she wasn’t being targeted so much as tested.
    Frowning, she turned that possibility over in her mind. It didn’t make any sense. But then, she thought with a flash of resentment, magic didn’t have to make sense any more than it had to play by the rules laid out by man or physics. Magic had rules of its own; it was a world of ancient, arcane laws and mysterious, obscure prophecies, a world where knowledge was power and power was everything. Eve had neither, and she was certain—at least as certain as you could be about magic—of only two things. If she was a target, she was in trouble. And if she was being tested, it was in her best interest not to fail.
    For that reason alone she refused to give in to the so-strong-it-hurt urge to plead a headache, call it an early night and get the hell out of there. That had been her first instinct, and it was still clamoring to be heeded. But running smacked of weakness, and that wasn’t the signal she wanted to send.
    Her initial surprise had turned to resentment, and as she thought more about it, resentment gave way to anger, a controlled simmering anger that edged aside her fear. She could handle this. She would pull herself together and go back out there and enjoy the rest of the evening. Or at least pretend to. If anyone was watching, they weren’t going to see any cracks in her armor.
    She waited until she was breathing normally and her hands had stopped trembling before she left the stall, and then she purposely took her time freshening up, combing her hair as if it were a matter of national security that each and every copper strand was perfectly aligned, applying a slow dusting of shimmery translucent powder and two careful layers of Wicked Roses lip gloss. Only then did she stroll back to her table, smiling and pausing along the way to greet friends, her manner so relaxed and unruffled no one would ever suspect how very ruffled she was on the inside.
    She was sharing a table with other presenters, most of whom were also in the news business in one way or another. That meant there would be no shortage of opinions and friendly arguing to distract her and she was grateful for that.
    She slipped into her seat beside Jenna Jordan, who hosted a popular radio talk show. They’d started in broadcasting around the same time, with Jenna working for a competing television station before finding her true calling in talk radio. She listened as Jenna finished delivering a typically colorful soliloquy on people who drive and talk on their cell phones at the same time. She had everyone at the table laughing, even though most of them—Eve included—had been guilty as charged at one time or another. That was Jenna’s gift; she made people laugh . . . at her, at themselves, at life.
    “I