"Aren't you happy to see me?" She inquired in such a hoarse, grating voice. If it were not for the evidence on her face that she had been crying, Harris would have thought that she had swallowed a frog and a few stones besides. On that thought, Haris looked at her and laughed in such infectious glee that all and sundry could count his thirty-two clean and strong sets of teeth.

Alina clicked agrily at his behavior and walked to sit on his neatly arranged bed. "What's so funny?" She inquired.

Harris stopped laughing; his eyes froze and narrowed so that the deep blue in them seemed to freeze Alina's...