Read Echoes for Free Online Page B

Then when I’d specifically mentioned the word
Upyri
, he’d walked away from me. I didn’t understand why he’d want to keep something like that from me, waving it off as a figment of my imagination or the result of a couple ounces of vodka consumed at a birthday party. If the Upyri had targeted me, if they’d known my name in particular, then I needed to know why and how I was supposed to protect myself if more of them came after me.
    My brain ached from trying to sort through what I’d seen and read. It was far fetched and made me want to throw up, but maybe—just maybe—it was true.
    As I pushed though the side exit of the library, somebody grabbed me from behind. All my thoughts shut off except for one—fight for my life. I dropped my backpack and I fought against whoever it was, wrenching my body from side to side, using every ounce of strength I had, but it wasn’t nearly enough to help me break free.
    “Your fingernails are very sharp, Olivia. You don’t want to hurt me, do you?” The male voice seemed familiar, but I couldn’t place it.
    I tried to scream for help, but he clamped his hand over my mouth and dragged me across the small, empty parking lot. He pulled me down a short flight of stairs, which led into a large park.
    Finally, the man let me go in a shaded, grassy area. Nobody else was around, but I could hear the hum of traffic on Main Street just past the thick line of trees. It was hot out and sweat dripped steadily down my back.
    Now I recognized him. He lived a couple doors down from us and ran the local used book store. My mom used to talk to him all the time when she took me in with her to buy her secondhand romance novels—Mr. Watkinson. I’d liked him. When I used to have my stand out in front of our house as a kid he always bought a glass of lemonade and told me to keep the change from a five dollar bill.
    Other than being dragged into the park by him against my will, there was another reason I didn’t relax even a fraction at seeing it was him. It was a conversation I’d heard between my parents this morning.
    My father said it before he left for work and my mother had been making breakfast. I was trying to slip past the both of them and out the front door without being pulled into yet another family conversation.
    “I just heard from John across the street. Mr. Watkinson had a fatal heart attack.”
    “What?” she exclaimed. “Oh, that’s horrible! He was such a nice man!”
    He nodded.
“Only sixty-three years old. Such a shame.”
    Mr. Watkinson watched me carefully from six feet away. He looked so normal. Healthy.
Alive.
Which would be extremely difficult to do if he’d died from a heart attack.
    I wanted to deny it, to find any other answer, but my mind kept coming back to what I’d just read on the Internet.
    “What do you want?” I demanded as fiercely as I could despite the tremble in my voice.
    “Olivia, dear, you look terrified.”
    I struggled to breathe. “I don’t typically have conversations with dead people.”
    He smiled and wrinkles fanned out from his eyes. “As you can see for yourself, I’m very much alive. A single day can change a great deal.”
    “What do you want?”
    “That’s a very complicated question.” He straightened his navy blue tie. “I didn’t want to do this alone, but I’m having difficulties finding my friend again.”
    “What friend?”
    “The one from the other night. She’s missing.”
    This only made me more confused as I remembered the old man who’d seemed weak and pale, but whose grip was like an iron vise. “But that wasn’t you. That—that was somebody else. A father and daughter.”
    “Yes. They were in a car crash. She was driving. She’d had one too many glasses of wine before getting behind the wheel.”
    I was so confused. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What do they have to do with you?”
    “She’s my companion, has been for a very long time. I am...” He frowned. “It’s