Free The Glass Wall (Return of the Ancients Book 1) by Carmen Caine, Madison Adler Page B

It would be a slap in the face if I didn’t go, but I was still terrified. I wondered if I could get sick.
    I didn’t have much time to think about it, as Betty pulled up to one of those monolithic discount stores that sold everything from TVs to groceries. After showing me the bus stop and making me repeat the bus number several times, she finally let me go. I kept on telling her not to worry. After all, I had my cell phone, but I actually felt happy that she worried about me. It made me feel loved.
    They drove away and taking a deep breath, I strode through the automatic doors. My heart was pounding loudly, and I told it to shut up as I pretended that I had a hundred dollars in my pocket and that I was just a normal person browsing for a present.
    I didn’t have a clue about what I should get for Betty.
    I looked at the clothes, but I really didn’t know what she liked to wear. The jewelry and make-up aisles didn’t seem right either. I wandered through shoes, home décor, and art supplies before I stumbled upon the electronics department.
    I wondered briefly if she’d like a movie or a CD, when my eyes fell upon the perfect gift.
    It was a wireless computer mouse.
    I grinned.
    It was the perfect gift. After all, she’d help me get a cage for my mouse.
    I reached over to pick it up, but it had a cable attached that anchored it to the shelf. It was one of those theft prevention things.
    “Ah, you want one of those?” a voice asked. An overeager woman in her forties at the checkout stand rushed over and grabbed a key that dangled from her neck. “I’ll just unlock it for you and take it to the counter.”
    “Yeah,” I said, a little taken aback by her aggressiveness.
    “We have to lock these up, you know,” she said as she freed the computer mouse from the shelf. “Kids are always trying to steal these.”
    “How terrible,” I said.
    “Well, it’s bad parenting!” She pursed her lips in disapproval. “Kids these days have no values!”
    “Yeah.” I nodded, wondering if I should just go steal something else.
    “Are you going to pay now?” she asked.
    “I’ve got to get something else,” I replied, pointing back over my shoulder.
    “Well, then, I’ll just keep it up here for you. I have another customer. Got to run!” She smiled at me and trotted back to her checkout stand, setting the mouse on the cluttered countertop behind her.
    I watched her chatting intently with her new customer.
    It was now or never.
    That mouse was the perfect gift.
    Not allowing myself to think, I walked by the counter and snagged the package. She still had her back to me. Walking down the aisle, I turned and darted down another one. At the corner, I dropped my backpack, as if by accident and bent to tie my shoe. In a flash, I had the mouse stuffed in there and my shoe retied.
    Pleased, I shouldered my backpack and looked for a way to get out of the electronics department. I was sure the mouse had one of those tag sensors on it that had to be demagnetized, and I knew it would go off as soon as I walked past the detection point at the exit.
    There were several other customers milling around. I browsed a little, waiting for a woman with a big cartload of items to leave. Finally, she checked out and as she pushed her purchases out of the electronics blockade, I zipped past her cart.
    The beeper went off and the woman stopped in the middle of the exit. She looked at her bags in confusion and the clerk rushed over.
    “I must have forgotten to demagnetize something!” she was saying as I hurried away.
    I grinned. I was halfway there. I just had to employ the same technique as I left the store, but that was easy. There were hoards of people trying to leave.
    Slipping behind a woman with two bratty kids, I calmly walked out of the store’s main exit to the sidewalk and expelled a sigh of relief.
    I had taken only a single step toward the bus stop when I heard a voice.
    “Miss, you’ll have to come with me.”
    Two burly