Free Siphon (Siphon Chronicles, Book One) by Cyndi Goodgame Page B

me.”
    All this happened in the span of maybe three minutes’ time.  Not one worker in the place saw an ounce of it.

DANE  The Lark
     
    “I’m getting you out of here,” I rasped in her ear.  Her body was shaking and felt like jelly in my hold.  I took her hand only to keep her friends from making fun of her though my instinct was to carry her in my arms.  The crowd watched on as I dropped money on the table, and walked us to the front door saying nothing. 
    Sly and clever, but inexperienced.  She moved like lightning to save the situation, but it wasn’t fast enough.  She could have saved that incident from unwanted outcomes if done right.  With proper training, her body could move through shadows and not be seen.  My guess is she had always taken from the old, who didn't need a stealthy siphon attempt.
    The murmuring began the second the door closed.  Since the place was covered up in high-schoolers, gossip was a given.  We’d deal with it tomorrow.
    I took her to the car and fastened her in where she finally woke out of the stupor and told me to stop.  I looked up at her since she was sitting in my Jeep and not her own car.  If she ran, now would be the moment for it.
    “Are you okay?”
    She huffed at my question and looked forward.  Was she angry at what I did?
    I stopped at the gas station by the school and practically jumped out of the car and back in after two minutes flat with sodas and bags of chips.  Her distant eyes focused, zoning in on the bag. 
    “Pickle chips?”
    I think it might have been a question, but maybe just an observance.  I dropped my gaze to the bags finding that I never even looked at what I snagged.
    “Yeah.  Sorry.”
    She didn’t smile, nor turn them down.  Hunger took over after a taking.  I heard her snicker and maybe even pucker her lips eating the bag up in seconds.  I knew the feeling well.  I drove her back to her car and pulled into the space beside her Dodge.
    Out of the blue, she asked me a question I wouldn’t have guessed coming from the incident that had just happened.
    “Why do you call me a pigeon?” She turned her face making her hair go behind to her shoulders. 
    I smiled inside.  She would just laugh.  “I’d heard of your kind for years.  The ones who got to live out their lives unaware of the ways we lived by.  You were shielded from that life.  When I found out about you, I was a little weary of what I’d find.”
    As with all ciphors—those who sadly remained unaware.
    Her face went through three different turns before she said, “I will ask you later how it is possible you already knew me for I don’t believe that is something you meant to slip up on yet.  However, when one has secrets sometimes they leak at our weakest moments.”
    She saw my shock.  I’m not weak!
              “I meant me, Daniel.  I keep telling you things I shouldn’t.  I should go home right now and never look back at the last three days because something about you showing up scares me to death.  So don’t pretend to go all tough guy on me now.  I am very aware of how tough you are under that shirt.”
    Her face turned the color of my shirt and the irony was all too great for me to pass up.  I couldn’t resist.
    “Your cheeks match,” I pulled my collar down, “Are you asking to see under my shirt, Lark?”
    She closed her eyes clearly not happy she’d slipped that one out quite the way she did.  I was.
    “The Lark was a plane in the nineteen-twenties that was modeled after another called the Pigeon.  You are like the pigeon to me. You carried your message on the wind calling to me to come here.”  To make a comeback I didn’t deserve.  Redeeming qualities weren’t my forte, but I was not sure I could take her into the council if their intentions weren’t for good.
    She liked what I said, I think.  Would she ask more?
    When a smile perked up on her lips I felt like nothing could stop this turn of