Читать книгу Ecstasy: The Shadowdwellers - Jacquelyn Frank - Страница 8

Ashla Townsend was afraid to drive on New Year’s Eve.

Since this was a well-known fact, she was at a huge loss when she asked herself for the sixtieth time how she had managed to end up being the designated driver for the night. It wasn’t that she wanted to be one of the drinking revelers herself, just that she dreaded the idea of being on the roads with the untold numbers of other drinking revelers who hadn’t taken the time to choose a designated driver.

“Ashla, sweetie, relax,” Diana Quaid scolded with knowing sympathy from the passenger seat. She reached to touch soothing fingertips to one of the hands Ashla had clenched around the steering wheel in a legitimate white-knuckle hold.

“I’ll relax when we’re all at home safe and sound like all those designated driving ads promise us,” Ashla qualified with a nervous glance in the SUV’s rearview at the four other passengers. They had all finally wound down from the excitement of the party they’d attended, and Cristine, her younger sister, had even fallen asleep against her boyfriend’s tuxedoed chest. “We should never have come so far out on New Year’s. Or we should have at least gotten a room at the hotel or something.”

“Oh, c’mon!” Diana groaned, rolling her eyes. “How could we not go? It was a once-in-a-lifetime chance! To party at the Theodore Hotel with so many rotten rich people? It’s one of the hottest parties in the tri-state area. Plus, that guy who gave you the invites is totally into you. He danced with you so many times you’re going to have to have a funeral for those shoes.”

“Bite your tongue.” Ashla couldn’t help her grin at that. “These cost three hundred bucks.”

“And worth every cent.” Diana chuckled. “You looked hot tonight. That man all but grabbed you at midnight to kiss you.”

Ashla flushed with the memory, keeping her eyes glued to the road as she recalled the possessive grasp of Samuel Benson’s hands on her waist and back as he had pulled her into that kiss. The midnight tradition had allowed him to breach usual dating protocols, and he had taken full advantage of it. Ashla had surprised herself with her willingness to go along with him. Sam’s kiss had been one of intensity and impressive skill. Not an entirely unpleasant experience and, now that she thought about it, one she might not be averse to repeating in the future.

“It was just a kiss,” she noted aloud with a single-shouldered shrug. “A very nice kiss. It’s not as though the Earth moved or heavenly choirs sang.”

“God! Ashla, I swear you are so…so…!”

Diana never finished the expression of her frustration with her tightly wound friend. The oncoming truck that crossed into their lane and hit them head-on at ninety miles per hour killed her instantly.