Shadowkiller by Wendy Corsi Staub Page A

wry expression.
    â€œI guess that’s kind of ironic for me to say, since I’ve been talking your ear off for miles. You probably can’t wait to get rid of me, right?”
    â€œRight,” she said, like she was teasing, but she half meant it. The sooner they went in opposite directions, the sooner things would be back to normal for Carrie. No more sparks of longing for things she couldn’t have.
    Yet there was that other part of her that didn’t mean it at all; the wistful, foolish, lonely part that was reluctant to “get rid of him,” as he put it.
    â€œI don’t blame you,” he said. “I’m getting on my own nerves tonight, too. Good thing I changed my mind about going to McSorley’s. My friends wouldn’t have been up for listening to all this—that’s for sure.”
    â€œMaybe you need some new friends.”
    â€œNah, I’ve known these guys for years. It’s just me. It’s just . . . tonight . . .”
    She nodded. She got it.
    Tonight was different for him.
    It was different for her, too.
    What she didn’t realize then was that things weren’t ever going to go back to the way they were. Things had changed. For the better, she would soon come to believe.
    A llison shivered—again—and Luis interrupted his lament about the latest snakeskin trend to say, “If you’re that cold, put on your coat! Who cares if it’s ugly?”
    Ugly?
    She sighed inwardly. Leave it to Luis.
    â€œI’m not cold—”
    â€œThen why are you shivering?”
    â€œâ€”and this coat”—she gestured with the fake-fur-collared Escada slung over the crook of her arm—“is not ugly!”
    â€œIt’s hideous.”
    â€œIt is not!”
    â€œThe poor dear is delusional,” he murmured to an imaginary companion. To Allison, he said, unconvincingly, “All right. It’s not hideous.”
    â€œIt’s not!”
    â€œThat’s what I said.”
    â€œBut you didn’t mean it.”
    â€œCalm down, Sass.” He’d been calling her that—an abbreviated version of Sasquatch—since they left the building.
    Affectionately, of course. Everything Luis did was offered with utmost affection. Even trashing the gorgeous designer coat she’d gotten for a song at a Saks end-of-season sale.
    But right now, she wasn’t in the mood.
    â€œStop calling me Sass.”
    â€œSorry.” He put an arm around her shoulder. “Apology accepted?”
    Why did she always find it impossible to stay peeved at Luis? “Apology accepted.”
    â€œAnd if you’re cold, put on that . . . um . . . attractive . . . coat of yours.”
    â€œI’m not cold. I told you.”
    â€œThen why are you shivering?”
    â€œI have no idea. I just feel funny.”
    â€œAre you getting sick?”
    â€œMaybe.”
    The malaise had swept over her about fifteen minutes ago with the grim, all-consuming persistence of a physical illness that takes hold in an instant, accompanied by that familiar sinking feeling of grim inevitability. With a stomach bug, it was the realization that you were about to spend the better part of the next twenty-four hours on your knees.
    With this chill, there was a similar feeling of foreboding; that same sensation that something unpleasant was about to happen to her.
    But of course, it wasn’t true.
    Unless this was some kind of weird premonition, and she was about to be hit by a crosstown bus.
    She hugged herself, shivering again.
    â€œMaybe you shouldn’t be going to class if you’re sick.”
    Luis, she noticed, had removed his arm from her shoulders, considerably widening the berth between them as they walked on down Fifth Avenue toward the next intersection.
    â€œDon’t worry. I’m not sick.”
    â€œThen what are you? Scared?”
    She hesitated. “Maybe. I don’t