Free Shadow Bloodlines (Shadow Bloodlines #1) by A. R. Cooper Page A

me. “And I’m going to call my dad and see if he knows anything about these people after you or where we should go.”
    “Find a place that’s safe for Amar to unfold, then you can call your dad.”
    She looked at me with her eyebrow raised.
    “What?” I asked.
    “Nothing.” When I grabbed a hold of her arm as she turned to leave, she winked. “Just the way you say his name… Amar like it’s got several syllables in it.” With a flip of her hair, she opened the car and shut it with a loud thunk.
    Did she think I liked him? I didn’t… I mean he was handsome, but like thousands of years older than me even though he only looked about twenty-ish. If he was my boyfriend, I shook my head; no, he wouldn’t be for long. All the girls in my entire school would be after him.
    I was eighteen and never been kissed. Never even had a boyfriend. Once, when I was ten, a neighborhood boy tried to kiss me, but I didn’t know what he was doing. He had me pinned against the wall of my house, but I ducked under his arm and ran. Looking back, I assume he was going to kiss me. If I had known at the time, I would have stayed trapped.
    I climbed into the passenger’s seat and offered Amar my chocolate. He took a few, but I could tell his legs and wings were cramping from his curled shoulders, the wings folded against the ceiling of the car.
    Finally, Jacqui found a dirt road that led to a cabin, surrounded by woods. “This looks like some hillbilly place with serial killers inside.”
    “Perfect.” I was being sarcastic, but I guessed Amar would do fine against ordinary humans. Maybe I needed to tell him not to hurt them if any attacked us.
    “Hurry and do what you have to,” she said as she waved a red licorice stick around, “I don’t want to have to pay a fine for trespassing.”
    “That would be the least of our worries.” I got out of the car and paced around to make sure no one could see us.
    Amar rose out of the car and shook himself, his black wings quivering as they unfolded and stretched out to twice his height. They were amazing, shining a brilliant black onyx color with the edges as if dipped in dark purple, almost like a raven’s wing in sunlight.
    “Let’s go over to the trees.” More coverage in case anyone drove down this dirt road.
    “Here is fine.” He grimaced.
    “How’s the wing?” I shoved my hands in the pockets of my shorts.
    “Good. It’s nearly healed. I can fly fine; even carry you if you don’t believe me.” He took a step closer. “Shifters heal faster than humans.”
    “No, I’m good… but thanks.”
    I guess he thought of himself as my protector and didn’t want me out of his sight. Part of me wished it was because he liked me, not that I was some weird octopus shifter girl. Another part believed he’d bail as soon as Ms. Moor and her creatures weren’t after me anymore.
    “How about we walk through the woods for a while? And you can tell me all about how to find a shifter whose been hiding for over eighteen years.” Hopefully, he would know something about my dad. Or at least how to find him.
    We hiked through the woods in silence for a bit, then he unfurled his wings again and shook them. My stomach did a flip. I saw one of his wings was covered in blood along the edge, and where he had lost a few feathers during the fight; each wing was massive, and I felt the wind stir my hair from his flapping. Jacqueline was wrong to call him birdboy. He was much more and gorgeous. He had saved me and continued to put his life in danger to protect me… maybe even to be with me. What did he get out of it?
    “I need to stretch my wings and test flying.” His grey eyes twinkled mischievously. “Want to fly with me?”
    My nails bit into my palms. I was afraid of heights. Or falling from heights was more accurate. He hadn’t dropped me, but he was injured now. Could he hold our weight?
    “Trust me, I will not allow you to fall.” He gestured to his injured wing. “I have been