I rip open the doughnuts, stuff one into my mouth, chew it, and swallow it quickly. Very attractive. “Wow, so you are king of all that is the late-night drugstore. You’re a pretty lucky guy. Do you get a crown?”
Niko laughs, and snags one of my doughnuts. His fingers brush mine, and a thrill runs down my spine. “Nope, but I do get a nifty scepter. Of course, it looks like a mop.”
I look around the place, taking in the soda coolers and shelves crowded with everything from tampons to Hot Wheels. I would go crazy if I had to spend eight hours in such a confined space. Already my skin feels like it’s a size too small. That, of course, could be the guilt from staring at Niko’s mouth as he talks. Kevin Eames, Kevin Eames, I chant mentally. Still, I can’t help but wonder if his lips are as soft as they look. “So, what do you do while you’re here? Surely you don’t get that many customers.”
“Naw. Only a few on the late shift. To be honest, this is all still kind of new to me. I’ve only worked here for about a month, since I turned eighteen. You can’t pull the overnight shift if you’re a minor, so before that I could only work until midnight.” He stretches and yawns, even though he’s very much awake. His eyes don’t look at all sleepy. I barely notice since I’m watching the way his shirt pulls across his chest and lifts a little, revealing his midriff at the bottom. Dark hair sprinkles across the tan flatness of his belly. My mouth is suddenly dry. He doesn’t seem to notice that I’m staring. “I mostly just watch the counter, and read the magazines.”
I take a deep breath and reach over. “These?” I pick up a flashy-looking magazine that promises a story entitled “Fifteen Ways to Wow! Your Guy in Bed.” My face heats.
Niko waves a hand. “Pshaw. Not even close. Those are actually good compared to the stuff I read. I’m talking the stuff like this.” Niko comes around the counter and picks up off a rack what looks like a newspaper. His shoulder brushes against mine as he leans against the counter right next to me, and my heart flutters at the contact. I shove another doughnut into my mouth to hide my sigh.
Niko is oblivious, and he shakes out the pages of the paper and shows me the cover, bending his head toward mine. GIANT BIRD WOMAN RAINS DOWN JUSTICE is the headline, and for a panicked second I think he knows my secret. Then he laughs and taps the page. “Can you believe this? People actually pay money to read this stuff.”
I choke down the doughnut and follow it with a swallow of carbonated sugar water. The liquid tingles all the way down, but it gives me time to recover. My heart pounds and I widen my eyes to cover my nervousness. “Oh, my God. People seriously pay money for that?” I sound like an idiot. But Niko doesn’t even notice.
He snorts and nods, flipping through the pages before he finds what he’s searching for. “Listen to this.” He clears his throat and begins speaking in a newscaster-type voice, “‘A large birdlike woman was seen killing a man in a small town north of Charlotte last July. A lone witness, eighty-three-year-old Grace Perkins, said the creature looked to her like a Fury, a mythological creature that killed violent offenders in ancient Greece.’” Niko shakes his head and laughs. “How would some old lady in North Carolina know what a Fury looked like? I wonder how much they pay people for these stories.”
I laugh hollowly, because when he reads it out loud, it sounds silly. Who would believe that Furies exist? I look down at my ripped sweater sleeve and the newly pink scar underneath. Anxiety pools in my stomach and swirls through my middle, and an awful thought stops me.
Niko turns the page, and stops with a laugh. “This one’s even better—”
“Do you like me?” The words tumble out, and at Niko’s raised eyebrow I wish I could call them back. But I don’t. I plunge on ahead. “You were sort of a jerk in the library, and you never even said hi at Tina’s party. But then today, in the lunchroom . . .” I trail off, unsure how to put what I’m feeling into words. “I don’t get you.”
His expression softens, and he sets down the paper. His gaze meets mine unwaveringly. “I wanted to talk to you at Tina’s party.” He says it so low, I can barely hear him.
I cross my arms. “Yeah, so why didn’t you?” Some inner demon spurs me on. I listen for Their telltale whispers. But They are still silent, still slumbering. This alarm, it’s all me.
He shrugs and puts the tabloid away in the display rack. “I don’t know. Maybe I was afraid you were out of my league, you know?” He’s close enough that his body heat warms my side, and I’m hyperaware of him. I’ve never felt so alive. Or so afraid.
“No, I don’t know. Maybe you should tell me.”
His eyes meet mine, a smile crinkling the corners. “I think maybe I was wrong about you. When you first showed up, I thought you were one of those girls who fall for the first douche bag who hits on them, and when I found you with Dylan, I was sure of it. I didn’t want to waste my time just to end up dumped for some jock.” He shrugs. “But you aren’t who you pretend to be. I could tell that when I saw you standing over Dylan on Saturday.”
I tense. “You saw that?” My voice is too high and my heart picks up. I feel sick.
He puts a calming hand on my arm. “Not really. I just saw him on the ground and you next to him. Don’t worry. I’m not going to tell anyone. With Dylan I can fill in the blanks. It was pretty impressive, though.”
Relief washes over me. I don’t say anything, just cram the last doughnut into my mouth. He didn’t see Them. And he touched me. My skin burns from the contact. He doesn’t seem to notice my distress, and keeps talking. “You pretend to be this good girl Southern belle, but you change when you don’t think anyone is looking. I want to get to know that girl, the girl who comes out in the middle of the night to buy her mom cough medicine, but could also take down a guy who brags about benching three hundy.”
I blink, and my tongue feels too thick. I can’t find the words, so I just stare at Niko, wishing I could dive into his ocean eyes and escape the awkwardness of this conversation that I started.
He laughs bitterly, and shakes his head. He’s taken my silence to mean something else, disbelief or anger. He pushes his hand through his hair, causing it to stick up in a dozen different directions. “Is it so hard to believe that I might like you and want to get to know who you really are?” It’s a ragged plea, and his voice strikes a chord deep within me. Because what he’s asking is exactly what I want, someone to know who I really am.
I’m just terrified that if he knows the truth, he’ll run for the hills.
Everything is so tangled up together in my mind. I want him, but I can’t have him, even though They’re quiet and far away. It’s Their silence that spurs me on. Maybe They’re tired enough that I can have just a little happiness, just a single moment with Niko. I have to believe that he’ll be safe.
Because I want to kiss him so badly, I can taste it.
I lean forward, closing the distance between us, and my lips touch his. Niko seems startled at first, but then his arms are wrapping around me, pulling me close. Everything falls away but his lips, his arms around me, and the scent of rain and pine. He tastes like doughnuts, and I press into him. I need more. So much more.
But that single kiss is all I get. Someone clears their throat behind me, and we jump apart. A bedraggled-looking guy stands behind me.
“Diapers?” he asks, exhaustion heavy in his voice.
“Aisle three,” Niko answers, and the guy is gone and back before I can say anything to Niko.
“Thank God you guys are open,” the guy says, digging out his wallet as Niko rings up the diapers. “I went to the truck stop down the road, but they’re closed.”
Niko frowns. “That’s $25.63. I didn’t know they ever closed. I thought they were twenty-four hours just like us.”
“They are,” the guy says. He slides his card and picks up his purchase. “There were all kinds of cops and stuff there. I guess maybe they got robbed or something. You be careful,” the guys says as he leaves. He gives me a pointed look, and embarrassment heats my face.<
br />
It’s in that moment that I realize I forgot all about the woman in the truck, Medina’s near miss. Guilt sours my stomach. How could I have forgotten about her so easily? She could’ve been seriously hurt, and I was ready to head home without a backward glance.
What’s wrong with me?
“I should get home,” I say abruptly. It sounds like a blow-off, even though I don’t mean it that way. Niko nods, and I walk out of the drugstore with a heavy heart.
“Hey.” He runs out as I’m almost to my car. “Don’t forget the cough syrup for your mom.” He tosses me a red bottle, and I catch it in midair. I was so caught up in the moment that I completely forgot my cover story.
“Oh, thanks.”
He wears a small grin. “This isn’t over, you know.”
I shrug, but the heated look in his eyes coupled with the compliment warms me. I return his smile. “If you say so.”
He closes the distance between us, grabs my arms, and pulls me to him for a quick kiss. It melts my middle, and shivers of delight run across my skin. “I say so,” he murmurs, voice low. Then he’s gone, running back inside.
I head to my car, wondering how I can feel so alive and so scared all at the same time.
THIRD DEGREE
It’s hard not to sigh in frustration when I open my eyes to the red desert of the dreamscape. Mostly because I was in the middle of a delicious dream about Niko. I can’t remember the contents of the dream, only that it involved hot cocoa and Niko without a shirt. Really, that’s enough for me.
“You are getting careless, Amelie,” Alekto says, her voice low and even. She sits cross-legged on a red boulder in the middle of the landscape, her eyes closed as though she’s meditating. Her hair and white robes flutter in the breeze. “Twice They have slipped through your leash and people have been injured. My sisters will not be so gentle a third time.”
“Yeah, I’m not worried. They didn’t hurt anyone important. And I was able to hold Them.”
Alekto opens one of her eyes to peer at me before closing it and settling back into position. “Perhaps, but you also lost control over Them during justice. If this keeps happening, They will control you, and you will not be safe. And no man will be safe. Is that what you want?”
Her words send a chill down my spine, despite the hot wind blowing against my face. Kevin Eames’s face swims into my mind’s eye, and is immediately replaced by Niko, bruised and battered. I think about how awful it would be if anything happened to him. Despair clutches at my chest at the image of Niko hurt, but I don’t ponder what that might mean.
I open my mouth to object, to tell her it won’t happen again. But she’s right. If They’d gotten loose, I wouldn’t have been able to stop Them, and it would have been a massacre.
The problem is, beyond keeping Niko safe, I’m not sure why I care.
I shrug at her admonishment and change the subject. “Wow, this is the most I’ve seen you in probably forever. So, what’s the occasion? You know it’s still a month and a half until my birthday, right? I do have my eye on a new sweater, if you’re interested.”
She stretches and stands, a pillar of beautiful golden skin in the ugly landscape. I’m a spindly scrub bush next to her. “Your sarcasm is unnecessary.”
“And your visits are a waste of time. What is it you want from me, anyway?”
“The same thing you want. You to regain your freedom. They are bound to you, which gives Them access to your world, making Them stronger. I want you to break those bonds.”
I laugh, the sound harsh. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m doing everything I can just to hang on.”
She turns away slightly, looking off into the distance. “Here in the other realms the paths in the world of man are sometimes revealed. The time is coming soon when you can be free of Them, but only if you are the one in control. If you keep letting Them kill, They will be too strong and I will not be able to help you.”
Bitterness surges through me at her words. She wants to show up every once in a while and chastise me for not controlling Them better, but she was the one who abandoned Them in the first place. Who’s she to judge me?
“How have you helped me up to now?” I snap. “I can barely keep Them from driving me insane, even with all of your ‘help.’ Every day They’re in my head, and I’m not sure if the urges I feel are even all Theirs anymore. I like—” The words stick, and I have to force them past the lump in my throat. “I like the way I feel when I’m with Them. Powerful. Unstoppable. And the guilty deserve their fate. They prey on innocents, and if we don’t stop them, who will?”
Alekto looks at me sadly and shakes her head. “Is that really how you feel, or is this the result of listening to Them? You used to be disgusted by Their bloodlust.”
“Yeah, that was a long time ago. And what I need now are answers, not another lecture.”
“If I could tell you how to break your bonds, I would. But I too am bound by a promise made.”
I laugh again. “Then I guess we’re both screwed.”
But Alekto senses my weakness and presses on. “How did you feel tonight when They burned away Alex Medina’s soul? Did guilt and disgust not rip through your heart? Remember how you felt the night They killed Roland Thomas.” She doesn’t mention that I was just a kid when that happened, and I wonder if that’s her point. What if the Furies have just been using me this entire time?
Alekto walks away, but stops after only a couple of steps. “Remember how They were in the beginning? Pushing you even when you pleaded with Them to stop. Think of how They murdered heedlessly when you gave Them free rein in Savannah, and how They are unable to find the one man you want to hurt. They are not here for you. They are selfish, and if They have Their chance, They will turn you into Their puppet.”
The scorching wind picks up speed and red sand, blowing the grit directly into my face so that I have to blink. Alekto has to yell to be heard over the noise. “This truce you have brokered with Them will not last forever.”
When I look again, she’s gone, and I’m no closer to understanding how to win my freedom than I was before.
SNOWBLIND
I swallow a yawn as I follow Adam’s directions to the mountain. After a day of fighting to stay awake in class, the last thing I want to do is hang out and go sledding. But the mountaintop is the place to hang out. I take this to mean it’s where everyone goes to get drunk and make out. Despite my frequent daydreams about Niko’s very kissable lips, it’s not really my scene. Rolling around in the snow is not my idea of fun. In fact, I try to beg off with excuses about my mother expecting me, but no one is buying it. After Mindi gives me her scared-mouse look, I know I don’t really have a choice. I’m going sledding.
So here I am, sleep-deprived and heading out to play in the snow.
I drive up the narrow road behind Niko’s Jeep, the wheels of my car slipping every now and then as they struggle to find purchase. In the backseat Jocelyn and Tom chatter excitedly with Adam in the front. They mostly share gossip. After last night I’d almost forgotten that the whole incident with Amber was just yesterday. It feels like weeks ago. But thanks to her, I am very much at the top of the rumor mill right now.
For the most part I just ignored the looks and whispers, embarrassed and uncomfortable with all of the attention. It was only the thought of Niko that kept me going.
I have never wanted to kill someone as much as I want to kill Amber.
Jocelyn clears her throat and reaches over the seat to poke Adam in the back of the head. “So, where’s Amber? Is she avoiding us now?”
Adam flushes and sinks lower in the seat. “How would I know where she is? I’m not her keeper.”
Jocelyn leans back, and in the rearview mirror she makes a face at Adam’s back. “Sheesh. All right. I just thought you were her BFF now that Mindi’s not talking to her. You guys used to be pretty tight.”
He shrugs and stares out the window. “Yeah, well, she’s mad at me about something, and she told
me she’s working on some really important project right now and can’t be bothered.”
I check out Jocelyn’s expression in my rearview mirror. She smiles. “Really? Because I heard the project she’s working on is hooking up with Dylan Larchmont. Up to her old tricks again.” Amber and Dylan? Really? How do I keep missing all of the good gossip?
The car falls into an awkward silence as Adam’s jaw clenches. “That’s just a rumor. Amber’s no worse than”—he looks at me, then pauses and swallows before continuing—“anyone else. You know, you could call her, Jocelyn. You have her number.”
I’m angry that Adam gave me that look. He actually believed Amber. Maybe she has more power than I thought.
Jocelyn shrugs and studies her fingernails. “I could, but then I’d have to talk to her. I’d much rather just get the info from you.”
Adam stares out the window, but I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who hears him mutter “Bitch” under his breath.
No one says much after that.
I focus on navigating my car down the narrow road and ignore the weighty silence. The lull in the conversation is finally interrupted by Adam pointing to a stand of spindly trees. “You can park right there. We’ll have to hike the rest of the way in.”
I nod and park the car. My hundred-dollar boots are going to be ruined after tramping through the snow. I ordered them with part of Hank Meacham’s money, a total impulse buy. They arrived yesterday, and I couldn’t wait to wear them to school. Now I kind of think I should have paid the rent instead. Forget looking good. I still need somewhere to live.
I wish I could have worn the hiking boots I had on last night, but they’re still spattered with Chuck’s blood and tobacco juice. I make a mental note to get a pair of snow boots like Jocelyn’s, a cross between hiking boots and mukluks. Utilitarian, yet surprisingly stylish. I hope they aren’t too expensive. Unless I try to tap into the money from my parents’ estate, I’m broke.
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