Deep Freeze (West Coast 1)

He didn’t waste any time but fired up his rig and drove out of the lot just in time to see her veer off the main road a few blocks ahead of him. He followed at a safe distance, a Ford Explorer and a feed truck between his vehicle and hers.

Still he caught glimpses of her, and he felt a thrill being this close, knowing she didn’t realize how near he was.

She doesn’t even know who you really are.

“She will,” he said aloud and felt the familiar thrill that came with winter trembling through his blood. Being this close was dangerous, though he had an alibi in place if anyone noticed him here. That was the convenient thing about this town; he could walk and talk with the townsfolk and no one knew who he really was or what he really did. He was everyone’s friend and a stranger to them all. He watched as she drove into the parking lot of the junior high. He followed and slid into an empty space not too far away.

She didn’t notice.

So focused was she on her mission that she dashed into the school and didn’t realize he was nearby.

He licked his lips and caught the reflection of his eyes in the mirror.

Ice blue.

Intense.

Deadly.

But she didn’t know that.

Yet.

CHAPTER 6

The school wasn’t far from the middle of town. Jenna parked and attempted to ignore the cold air that rushed through the schoolyard as she carried Allie’s backpack into the red-brick building. The first bell had already rung and kids who had clustered around the central commons area were shooting off in different directions, talking wildly, hurrying this way and that, laughing and teasing. Jenna didn’t see Allie in the group, but she did notice a knot of girls near the doors to the gym. They were staring at her and one was actually pointing.

You should be used to this by now. As long as there are DVDs and videos, someone’s going to realize who you are. She smiled right at the kid and waved. The blonde who was pointing immediately dropped her hand, her cheeks suddenly flooding with color.

“Fame,” a male voice said, “a real pain sometimes, right?”

Jenna turned and found Travis Settler striding into the school. The father of Allie’s friend Dani, Travis was a widower who’d shown mild interest in her. They’d met a couple of times for coffee and even sat together during Back to School Night, much to her daughter’s dismay.

She remembered the conversation vividly.

“Mom, you can’t date Mr. Settler,” Allie had said, obviously mortified at the thought that her mother was seeing Dani’s father. Dani had been the one to spill the beans that Jenna and Travis had met at the local espresso house earlier in the day, and Allie had let Jenna have it with both barrels as they’d driven home from her school.

“And I can’t date Mr. Brennan, either,” Jenna had clarified as they’d driven through town.

“Right! You can’t date anyone. It’s too embarrassing!”

“I do have a life, you know,” Jenna had countered.

“But you’re already famous…and…kids have seen you in the movies and…well,” Allie had shrugged and blushed, then looked out the side window of the Jeep. “You know.”

“They’ve seen me almost naked on the screen.”

“Yeah!” Allie had said. “Do you know how weird that is?”

As a matter of fact, Jenna did. Every person she’d met in this small town had probably seen her in various states of undress either on the big screen or on televisions in the privacy of their living or bedrooms.

“So…you can’t go out with…Mr. Settler,” Allie, red-faced, had insisted. “He’s seen those movies. I know. I saw DVDs on his shelf. Resurrection, Summer’s End, Beneath the Shadows, Bystander. All of them! Even Innocence Lost! It was in the DVD player! How old were you when you were in that one, like fourteen?”

“Almost,” Jenna had admitted.

“My age. That is so creepy.”

Jenna hadn’t been able to argue with Allie’s logic.