Read Winter (Four Seasons #1) for Free Online Page A

Uncle
B.
     
    Thanks for
the offer but I don’t think I can face coming back there just yet.
Maybe you could come to the city? We could rent an apartment and go
ice-skating or something. I know you hate it here, but it would be
better than sitting back at the house moping. I’ll even watch the
game with you!
    So, I need
you to confirm something for me. I met up with Luke Reid last
night, and he told me what’s been going on back in Break. Is it
true? Does everyone think Dad killed all those girls? I know
there’s no real way to know what happened with those men that day,
but he would never have attacked teenaged girls. They were the same
age as me! There’s just no way. Please tell me no one’s listening
to Mayor Bright.
     
    Love
you,
     
    Avery.
     
    I should make
more of an effort to reassure Brandon; I know he worries about me.
I should tell him how much I’m enjoying college and about the new
friends I’ve made, but I don’t have the energy. The nightmare from
four and a half years ago is still replaying in even the brightest
aspects of my life, and I’m never going to escape it. I go to sleep
with my heart pounding in my chest, unable to escape the feeling
that something terrible is looming on the horizon, about to ruin
everything I’ve worked so hard to build for myself.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Four
    Noah
     
     
    “ NOAH’S ON
exchange. This isn’t high school; I can hardly punish you for your
actions at college, Ms. Patterson, everything’s down to you. But I
can suggest that you could make up for your pyjama day by helping
our visitor adjust to life at Columbia. It isn’t easy joining a
subject mid semester. He’s going to need all the help he can get.”
Professor Lang is sterner than I’ve ever seen him before. Actually,
I’ve only ever seen him at ease and happy as we talk about class
topics, but obviously he is a different person when you get on his
bad side. Now I understand what everyone is complaining about all
the time. “Aren’t you going to spin me some yarn about unexpected
kidnappings or retrograde amnesia, Miss Patterson?”
    I kick at the
table leg of his desk and curve my shoulders, trying to shrink away
from the fact that I can’t even be bothered to make up an excuse
for my non-attendance.
    “ I was hung
over.”
    Silence.
    I slowly raise
my eyes up from the floor and face him, holding my breath. I don’t
know what I was expecting—that maybe he’d find my honesty charming
and send me on my merry way with a neatly typed up sheet of notes.
Not so much. He looks disappointed, which is about the very worst
thing he could be right now. I hug my file tighter to my chest and
go back to looking at the floor.
    “ Are you
serious about this course, Miss Patterson?”
    “ Yes. I know
I’ve dropped the ball this week but I swear it was a one
off.”
    “ You have dropped the ball,
and at the very point when you should be concentrating the most.
You know these midterms are pivotal if you want to gain entry into
our journalism program, yes?”
    “ I
do.”
    “ And I know
that’s the career you’ve chosen for yourself. I really thought you
were committed to building something for yourself here, Avery. Was
I wrong?”
    I feel like
utter crap. I’m twelve years old again and Dad has just caught me
lifting a twenty from his wallet. “You weren’t wrong, Professor
Lang. I will catch
up on the information I missed and I will do well on my exams. I
have to.” I have nothing else
left.
    Professor Lang
pushes off from leaning against his desk and paces over to the
window. He folds his arms across his chest and sighs. “Why do you
want to be a journalist? What is it that appeals to you so greatly
about this particular career path?”
    I really don’t
feel like getting into this with him, but like with the hangover
confession, I’m still too delicate to summon up the energy to lie.
It appears two-day hangovers are going to be in full effect from
here on in.
    “ It’s hard