Read Mixed Feelings (Empathy in the PPNW Book 1) for Free Online Page B

massive apron and pulled out a copy of a paranormal romance book that had
seen better days. I took the book from her, perplexed.
    “Who was it? ”
    “Friend of the café, that’s
all I’m allowed to tell you. Said to give you the book and the health food. Did
you want a drink?”
    “ Uh, ” I mumbled , still staring at the
paperback. The spine was badly creased, the cover had been scrawled with red
scribbles, and the pages were folded back at the tops and bottoms. I recognized
the title, but this copy looked like it had gone through the wringer. I’m not
always the best with books, but even I didn’t torture them this much. “Ah, sure, yeah. Gimme a Chestburster.”
    “You got it.” Madeline rang
me up for my drink and cupcake, then shooed me out of the way of the next
customer. I took my haul to a small round table near the front window to wait
for my drink. It was a little chillier the further away from the horde of
excitable nerds at the back , but that just meant I got
more solitude. With a little distance between us, I could better block out the
buzz of emotions from the geeks and gamers swarming around. Despite the fact
that it was early, the place was jumping with the before school/work crowd.
    The tables at the back were
surrounded by people cramming together to take advantage of the free wireless
on their laptops and tablets, while the massive couch in front of the
gargantuan TV was packed with gamers watching each other take turns street
fighting through the magic of pixels and button mashing. Sitting next to the
front window left a few tables empty to stand guard between the cacophony and
me.
    The book intrigued me enough
that I held off forking into my treats until I’d given it a good look-see.
Nearly every page was covered in red pen, notes scrawled in the margins,
between the lines, along the header, below the text in neatly printed footnotes
that would have looked pre-printed if it weren’t for the color and slight
bleeding of ink. From the look of it, the friend of The Internets did not like
the book. I flipped through, reading notes like, “Whose hand is this?”, “Is
this a person's chest or a chest of drawers?”, and “Why does he have a Bedazzler?”
before I flipped to the title page and felt my mouth drop open.
    To Gwen,
    Since I know you’re not
getting any action in real life, at least enjoy something steamy to read!
    Love, Robin
    Now I knew why I recognized
it.   My sister had given me this book
as a birthday gift. It had been sitting in my home office waiting to be read
for two weeks and now it was here at The Internets, covered in red pen. As I
looked over the notes more carefully, I realized the handwriting looked
familiar and the nonsense phrases reminded me strongly of the notes I’d found
on my fridge.
    “Son of a bitch,” I sighed,
setting the book down.
    “What’ s up? ”
    I jumped. Holly, the
assistant manager, set my mug down and lifted a hand to her wide hip.
    “ I … Who left this here?” I asked, waved the book spastically at h er.
    Holly shrugged and shook her
head. “No idea. I didn’t even know Mad had it until
she handed it to you. Why?”
    “This is mine. Someone stole
it out of my desk at home and wrote all over it.”
    “Someone you know?” Holly
asked, taking the book out of my hand s.
    “I don't think so.”
    “ Has to be someone you know. That's your handwriting,”
she said, peeling a sticky note out of the middle of the book. She watched me
as she handed it over and then leafed through the book. I blinked down at the
little pink square I'd left on my fridge an hour before, feeling my face pull
into a snarl. The creature had somehow already found my retort and
evidently wrote all over my book as punishment for calling it a freak.
    Why you gotta be calling me
names? I was just being nice :(
    “Probably for the best,”
Holly said as she set the book on the table. “It’s a crappy book. Most of the
notes are dead on, though I can’t read