“I just feel lost,” I finally said, letting the camera hang from my chest. It wasn’t the whole truth, but it wasn’t a lie. I felt lost in the impossible, in the way I was starting to feel about Finn. There was a silent tug-of-war ripping me apart inside. One side telling me to do what was sane, the other pulling me over the edge of reason where nothing made sense. “I feel like I’m coasting on fumes and I don’t know where I’m going to land and it terrifies me.”
“I think everybody feels that way sometimes.” Cash stared out his window. He drew the outline of a woman’s profile on the fogged-up glass with his fingertip.
“What happens when you always feel like that?” I asked. “What happens when you finally run out of gas?”
He sighed and leaned his head back on his seat to look at me. “Then you realize that I’m right behind you with a can of fuel and you stop worrying so damn much.”
I smiled and we both laughed a little. Cash turned down the heater and slid on his jacket as the movie started. It opened with a desolate street and a lone man walking through a city empty of living things. It didn’t take long for the dead to rise, though. Rotting and starving, they filled the alleys, consumed every hollow space, like cattle called to feed. Cash yelled at the screen, calling the man an
“effing idiot” when he got himself cornered in an alleyway. I sighed. Whoever came up with this grotesque concept of living dead had obviously never met a soul.
“I’m back,” Finn said behind me. “Get rid of him. We need to talk. Now.”
Something in the tone of his voice made my chest constrict. I knew it wasn’t fair that I was sending him out into the cold so I could have a conversation with a nonexistent person, but hopefully whatever Finn had to say wouldn’t take long. “Cash, could you get me a Coke from the concession stand?”
“You have two feet last time I checked.”
“Yes, and I’ll kick your ass with one of them if you don’t get over yourself and be a gentleman.”
Cash frowned. “What’s a gentleman?”
I forced a laugh, needing him to leave. “Please.”
“Fine.” He nodded and grabbed my purse out of the floor to dig for my wallet. “But you’re buying.”
“Deal.” When he was gone, I spun around in my seat. Finn looked upset and, for the first time since we’d met, disheveled. Was that even possible for a soul? “What’s wrong?”
“Something’s happened. And I’m not sure…I don’t know how to handle it. But I don’t want you freaking out on me. I’m going to figure it out.” He braced his palms on the seat and stared at the floorboards like he was trying to calm himself. “I’m going to figure it out,” he whispered to himself again.
“Just say it,” I said, forcing the tremble out of my voice. “I can handle it.” It’s nothing I hadn’t been through before. Two years of this…was there really anything he could say that could surprise me?
“Emma, look at me.” He leaned close enough that I was enveloped in the warm scent of Finn, trapped in my own personal summer while the rest of the world battled the cold outside. I stared into his green eyes, churning with emotion. “It doesn’t matter. I’m going to keep you safe. There’s no sense in you worrying about something that you can’t do anything about.”
“But that’s just it. I can do something. I stopped her, Finn.” I grabbed the back of the seat. “At the house. I used a chant, and she left.”
Finn shook his head and looked away. “Emma…”
“No, I’m serious. I’m more than capable of—”
“She left because of me,” he said, softly. “The sage, the chant… They’re just as useless as the Ouija board. None of it works.”
My vision blurred as my gaze drifted to the window. Cash was making his way through the row of cars, a Coke in each hand. The colored lights from the movie screen reflected off the shiny black leather on his jacket, making him shimmer like Finn.
It hadn’t worked. Oh my God…it hadn’t worked.
“Just calm down. Breathe,” Finn whispered into my ear.
I closed my eyes, took a breath, and nodded.
Finn stiffened, peering out the back window into the night. “Emma…” he started, never taking his eyes off of whatever he saw out the window. “Stay in the car.”
A gust of wind ruffled my hair and before I could say anything, Finn was gone. He was gone, and Maeve could be anywhere. I braced myself on the dashboard. My breaths were coming in too fast, making me dizzy. I fumbled with the glove compartment and popped it open. Cash used to keep a utility knife in here.
Cash swung open the door, and I crammed the napkins and papers back into the compartment and slammed it shut. I felt stupid for even looking. A knife wasn’t going to stop Maeve. And the sage, the chants…none of that had worked. I didn’t have anything to defend myself. I felt like I was bobbing in open water, waiting for a shark to finish me off.
Cash shoved a cup into my hand and nodded at the glove compartment. “What were you doing?”
I grabbed both drinks as he shivered and shook like a wet dog once he was in the safety of the truck.
“N-nothing. Just looking for a napkin.”
He grabbed his drink and looked me over. “You’re being weird tonight. What’s going on?”
“Nothing. I’m fine.” I took a sip of the Coke, letting the caffeine race through my system and chase away the violent, unraveling feeling inside me. Peering into the night and not finding a trace of Finn, I couldn’t stop shaking. She was here. She was here and Finn was out there trying to stop her.
Cash set his popcorn on the seat between us and stared at me.
I couldn’t look at him. All I could think about was Finn. What had he seen out there? Where had he gone? What if he couldn’t stop her?
“Em…”
I shook my head, knowing that if I didn’t get out of that truck within the next ten seconds, I was going to lose it in front of him. “I’m going to go to the bathroom. Be right back.”
Chapter 24
Finn Maeve. I may not have been able to see her, but I could feel the wintry chill trickling down my spine.
The whisper of nearness that another soul left across my skin. I made my way through the menagerie of cars, letting the soft pull in my veins guide me. To my right, I heard a shrill peal of laughter echo across the lot. I catapulted over a car, heading in the direction of the sound, then stopped. The chill faded and the pull tugged me in the opposite direction. I spun around, shaking my head, trying to clear it. To get some focus.
“Maeve!” I rounded another car and started across the lot. “I know you’re out there.” But the pull faded again, and then pulsed with life, tugging me in the opposite direction. What the hell? I rolled my shoulders and gritted my teeth. Get it together, Finn. I stopped, looking for anything—the hint of a red shimmer, a spark of silver—anything to tell me which way to turn. There were too many people here.
Too many ways for her to bait me. Realization hit me.
She’s trying to bait me.
I spun around, slid over the hood of a yellow Volkswagen. I had to get back to Emma-“Looking for someone?”
I froze at the sound of Maeve’s voice. She stood on the roof of an old pickup that once upon a time had probably been red. Now it was mottled with rust and made creaking sounds every time the kids inside moved.
“There are so many options here. So many ways to die, don’t you think?” She tapped her finger on her chin, calling attention to the black veins standing out on her throat. A dull silver color was strangling the lively red from her hair one strand at a time.