The Girl Who Chased the Moon: A Novel - By Sarah Addison Allen Page 0,66

bedrooms there, then up to the third-story loft, through a door in the linen closet. The space was occupied only by a low couch, a stack of books, a television, and some storage boxes. No one came up here but him. He loved his family, but when they were all out here, sometimes he needed a break from their togetherness. So this was where he went. He didn’t like their house on Main Street as much—with its cold marble and oppressive history—but it was a lot easier to avoid people there.

“I spend a lot of time in this loft when I’m here,” he said as she looked around. The only light was from the windows on the far wall, stacked in the shape of a triangle that followed the line of the sloping ceiling. Pink dust motes sparkled in the air.

“I can see why. It has a secret feel to it. It suits you.” She walked to the bank of windows. “Great view.”

He watched her from across the room, backlit against the windows. He was moving before he was even aware of what he was doing. He stopped directly behind her, mere inches away. Awareness immediately radiated from her like electricity.

A full minute passed before he said, “You’re suddenly quiet.”

He watched her swallow. “I don’t understand how you do this to me.”

He leaned in slightly. Her hair smelled like something flowery, like the fading scent of lilacs. “Do what?”

“Your touch.”

“I’m not touching you, Emily.”

She turned around. “That’s just it. It feels like you are. How do you do that? It’s like you have something surrounding you, something I can’t see, that reaches out. It doesn’t make sense.”

That startled him. She felt it. No one had ever felt it before.

She waited for him to say something, to explain or deny it, neither of which he could do. He took a step past her, closer to the window. “Your family once owned all of this,” he said.

She hesitated before deciding to accept the change of subject. “All of what?”

“All of Piney Woods Lake. Years ago, that’s how the Shelbys made their money, by selling it off, parcel by parcel.” He pointed to the trees in the distance. “All that wooded acreage on the other side of the lake still belongs to your grandfather. That’s millions of dollars of potential development. It drives my father crazy. He wants your grandfather to sell him some of it.”

“Why?”

“Coffeys have always liked to have a say in the growth of Mullaby. Homesites, businesses, things like that.”

“Why?” she asked again.

“Because this is our home. For years and years, we thought this was the only place we could live.”

“Is it?”

He turned to face her. “Do you really want to know?” My weakness.

“Yes. Yes, of course I do.”

This was it. There was no going back after he told her. He had to show her then. “The men in my family have an … affliction.”

She looked confused. “What sort of affliction?”

He left her at the window and paced across the room. “It’s genetic,” he said. “A simple mutation. But it’s particularly strong in my family. My grandfather had it. My uncle had it. My father has it.” He paused. “I have it.”

“Have what?”

He took a deep breath. “We call it The Glowing.”

Emily stared at him, still not understanding.

“Our skin gives off light at night,” he explained, and it was amazing, actually saying that to someone outside his family. It was as liberating as he thought it would be. It was even better. The words were out and he couldn’t take them back. He waited for Emily to say something. But she said nothing. “That’s what you feel,” he said eagerly, walking back to her and putting his hands on either side of her face, almost, but not quite, touching her.

She met his eyes. “You want me to believe that you glow in the dark,” she said in a monotone.

Win dropped his hands. “You’ll believe I’m a werewolf, but not this?”

“I never believed you were a werewolf.”

He stepped back, trying not to feel defeated. He had to go on. “It goes back generations. My ancestors left the old country to avoid persecution, because people assumed their affliction was the work of evil. They traveled by sea, and history is riddled with sightings of their ship, said to be a portent of doom. When they came to America, Native Americans called them Spirits of the Moon. They settled here when it was nothing but farmland, far away from everyone, but slowly the