Nightstruck - Jenna Black Page 0,23
you all right? You looked pretty panicked when you ran into me. Did something happen?”
Yes, I was chased by an imaginary monster made of trash.
“I’m fine, really. And I’m sorry I was so clumsy. I, uh, thought I was going to miss my train.”
He raised an eyebrow, and I knew I was blushing again. It was a lame excuse that didn’t come close to explaining the headlong run—especially when there was no telltale rattle of a train approaching the station—but it was the best I could come up with on short notice.
Thankfully, he didn’t press. “Uh-huh.” He nodded skeptically. “Would you like me to walk you to the station?” He looked all around at the lingering fog and the dark that lurked beyond the halo of each streetlamp. “It feels kind of like the set of a horror movie around here, doesn’t it?”
I hesitated. The idea of walking alone through the fog and dark was not appealing, but the train station was so close, and I had no idea who this guy was. I would feel like the world’s biggest idiot if I encouraged him and he turned out to be some psycho.
He smiled at me in an obvious effort to put me at ease. “I’m Aleric, by the way.” He held out his hand for me to shake. “If you know my name, I’m not a stranger anymore, right?”
Yes, I was being completely transparent in my caution, but it didn’t seem to offend him. And really, if he was some kind of bad guy and wanted to do me harm, he wouldn’t need my permission to walk with me to the train station to do it.
“Becket,” I said, shaking his hand, braced for him to hold on too long once more, but he didn’t.
“Pleased to meet you. Now let’s get you to your train.”
We started walking toward the station, and I couldn’t decide whether I felt better for having him at my side or not. My whole body was still in red alert mode. Aleric seemed perfectly harmless as he walked beside me, and in truth he was being quite the gentleman, after I’d knocked him over like that. But knowing that didn’t lessen my paranoia.
“Do you go to Edith Goldman?” Aleric asked.
“What gave me away?” I responded with a forced smile. Normal, witty banter was just what I needed to get my head back on straight. Not that I’m usually good with witty banter, especially not with people I’ve just met.
Aleric laughed at my dumb joke, which made me feel a little better. “I don’t know. Maybe the backpack, the location, and the uniform? I’m a regular Sherlock Holmes, you know.”
“I can see that. Do you go to school around here?”
It seemed like a logical question, but I knew there weren’t any boys’ or coed schools within walking distance. And come to think about it, what was he doing walking around here by himself in the dark? There were sidewalks here, sure, but it wasn’t exactly a pedestrian thoroughfare. The vast majority of the foot traffic was from students going to or from the train station.
“Nope,” he said. “I’m not in school.”
I couldn’t tell if he meant he’d graduated already or if he was a dropout or what.
We reached the parking lot just outside the train station, and I could see a handful of people on the far side of the tracks, waiting for the train into the city. The train going deeper into the suburbs must have left recently, because the near side of the tracks was deserted.
Yet another knot of anxiety began to form in the pit of my stomach. You were supposed to walk through the tunnel under the tracks to get to the other side, but in my frazzled state of mind there was no way I was walking into a no doubt deserted tunnel, whether Aleric was by my side or not. In the bright light of day, I wouldn’t hesitate to run right across the tracks, but the fog and the dark gave me pause. I checked my watch and saw that I still had more than five minutes before my train arrived, and the empty platform on this side said this track should be clear too. But just because no trains were scheduled to stop here in the next couple of minutes, it didn’t mean there wouldn’t be some express train blowing through. I’d probably hear it coming from a mile away, but crossing the tracks with so little visibility was