Page 55
Story: Ghosts of the Dead
Now he’s tending to the fire in silence, keeping Autumn safe in another way I’ll never be able to.
I should be over there. I should be with her, making sure she’s okay. Patching up her fresh wounds like I’ve been taking care of her wrist.
Then I remember I’ve never been able to protect anyone I’ve ever cared about. So instead, I’m by the car, elbows deep in an engine that doesn’t need fixing.
We already know what’s wrong with the car. We’ve known for two days, but I can’t sit still. Can’t look at her sitting there with her shoulders curled forward and her whole body dimmed like someone turned her brightness down from the inside.
I slam my palm against the hood and move to the trunk of the car. Maybe there’s something in here that can distract me.
Mars glances over at the noise. There’s something in his eyes I don’t want to read. Something that looks too much like the guilt I already carry. I reach up and touch the scar running through my brow. Another reminder.
I look away and turn back to the trunk. Back to the largepiece of metal filled with bolts and rust and wires I keep pretending to understand. My fingers curl around the wrench I grab, then I drop it.
Shit.
My hand clenches around the edge of the trunk, and something in my chest snaps. The sound I make isn’t even human. I grab the crowbar and swing.
The back window of the car shatters with a sharp, glittering scream. Glass rains down onto the dirt around my boots.
I swing again. Driver’s side mirror. Gone.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Plastic, metal, and glass shower my body and the dirt. I don’t even feel a thing.
I don’t stop until I’m panting. Until my grip on the crowbar aches. Until the edges of the world go sharp and red. My pulse roars like thunder in my ears, and I raise the crowbar one more time. Then…I see her.
She’s there, right in front of me.
Autumn.
Fire demon.
Her eyes are wide as they take in the scene. She doesn’t say anything, but she doesn’t move, either. She plants herself between me and the car. If she thinks I’d go straight through her to get it, then she’s wrong, and she knows it. Luna flanks her, ready to sink her teeth into me if I even dare try.
My arm drops. The crowbar falls to the dirt with a heavy thud. Autumn’s hands rise and she presses her palms flat to my chest, right over my pounding heart that’s wearing a hole in my chest. I can feel the warmth of her skin radiating through my shirt, and it grounds me more than it should.
“Jace?” Her voice comes out soft and sweet, a stark contrast to the storm inside of me. “Are you okay? Becausewe’ll need to create a rotating breakdown schedule if you’re not. We can’t survive if both of us lose it.”
I glance down at her wrist. The bandage hangs loose from her arm. She must’ve been in the middle of letting Mars rewrap it when I caught her attention instead. She shouldn’t have stopped for me.
My gaze drifts over her, and I really look at her for the first time today.
Her tank top has gotten even shorter from all the fabric she’s torn off for bandages and a makeshift torch. If she keeps this up, she won’t have a shirt left at all.
The thought sends an unexpected heat through me that’s immediately followed by concern about her being protected from the elements.
“Does it still bother you?”
She blinks in surprise. “What?”
“Your wrist. Is it still hurting?”
She hesitates, and that tells me all I need to know. “No…not really. It’s healing.”
Table of Contents
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 54
- Page 55 (Reading here)
- Page 56
- Page 57
- Page 58
- Page 59
- Page 60
- Page 61
- Page 62
- Page 63
- Page 64
- Page 65
- Page 66
- Page 67
- Page 68
- Page 69
- Page 70
- Page 71
- Page 72
- Page 73
- Page 74
- Page 75
- Page 76
- Page 77
- Page 78
- Page 79
- Page 80
- Page 81
- Page 82
- Page 83
- Page 84
- Page 85
- Page 86
- Page 87
- Page 88
- Page 89
- Page 90
- Page 91
- Page 92
- Page 93
- Page 94
- Page 95
- Page 96
- Page 97
- Page 98
- Page 99
- Page 100
- Page 101
- Page 102
- Page 103
- Page 104
- Page 105
- Page 106
- Page 107
- Page 108
- Page 109
- Page 110
- Page 111
- Page 112
- Page 113
- Page 114
- Page 115
- Page 116
- Page 117
- Page 118
- Page 119
- Page 120