Page 18

CHAPTER

EIGHTEEN

Theo sped out of the gym changing rooms and almost ran down Felicity, who was checking her eye makeup in her phone reflection.

“Watch it,” she told him as he steadied her. “You—oh.”

She gave him a surprised look. He’d yanked her up too easily.

“You’ve been lifting ,” she said, squeezing his arms. “Has Aaron gotten snippy yet?”

Theo glanced nervously at the changing rooms behind them. “No, and he’s not going to get the chance. Move.”

She stopped and stood in front of him, twirling a strand of wet hair around her fingers. She hadn’t even taken the time to blow-dry it. She’d been dripping with exertion by the end of class, sprinting laps like she was being chased. Bruises showed under her gym shorts, dark purple and vomit-yellow.

My body’s not used to it anymore, Felicity had sighed when Theo asked her about it. It'll stop bruising so much when it remembers.

He walked past her, pulling her down the hallway. She leaned back, resisting.

“Come on ,” Theo hissed. “It’s the only class we have without him! It’s my one chance!”

“Sure,” Felicity said, all faux sweetness. “He’ll totally forget by lunch. So what the hell is going on with you and Kade Renfield?”

Theo shushed her. More students were piling out of the changing rooms, wisely stepping out of their way. You didn’t just ask Theo Fairgood and Felicity Sloan to move .

“There’s nothing going on , I just stopped the guy from beating Aaron to a pulp.”

His phone vibrated in his pocket. He dug it out. It was a text from Kade: yeah he’s not gonna tell us SHIT we gotta take this into our own hands. meet me after school u WIMP

Felicity swayed forward. “What’s got you all worried?”

“Nothing. Shut up,” Theo said, holding the phone away from her prying eyes. “What’s with you lately? Huh? Why are you suddenly throwing yourself into gymnastics like your life depends on it?”

“It might,” Felicity said, laughing like she was an unwilling participant in someone else’s inside joke. “I told you, it’ll calm down once my body gets used to hitting a mat again.”

She lunged for his phone. Theo held it higher.

“Good luck stealing my phone again,” Theo spat. “I changed the passcode.”

He stopped as the phone was swiped unceremoniously from his hands. Theo turned to find Aaron, damp-haired, face dangerously blank, looking down at the text.

“Hey,” Theo barked. He swiped the phone back, panicked, but it was too late.

Aaron stared at him. “You’re…you’re actually hanging out with Monster?”

“No,” Theo said. He stuffed his phone deep in his pocket like that would cancel out what Aaron had seen. “Guys, it’s not like that.”

“I thought Tommy H’s girlfriend was lying for attention when she said she’d seen you guys driving around,” Aaron said. “But you’re actually hanging out.”

“It’s for drugs,” Theo said. He winced, looking around, but no one was close enough to hear.

“You don’t do —” Aaron bit the inside of his cheek, nodding to himself. He was rigid, a muscle twitching in his cheek. Felicity sauntered up next to him and put a hesitant hand on his arm. He twitched like he was going to hold it. Then at the last second he pushed it off.

“You were…weird, in class. With him.” Aaron said. “Are you guys hooking up? You can tell us. ”

“No!” Theo cleared his throat. “With him ? God, no. Why would I ever…he’s…no.”

Aaron nodded again, sharper than before. “Right. Cool. Lie to my face.”

“I’m not lying! Look,” Theo said, desperate to stop this before it got ugly. “I know I’ve been…distant, this week. But Kade’s nothing! You really think it could be anything else?” He hesitated, meeting Felicity’s gaze. Felicity just stared back at him, tired and wired, like she had a hundred other things to worry about that had nothing to do with Theo’s boy troubles.

Theo cautiously touched Aaron’s arm. Aaron twitched again, but didn’t shove it off.

“Come on,” Theo said softly. “It’s you and me and Liss. Always.”

He met Felicity’s gaze again, pleading. Curiosity burned behind her clear blue eyes. She wanted to know. But today, she took pity on him. She slid an arm around Aaron’s hips, holding him fast when he stiffened. She didn’t have muscles like back when she did gymnastics, but she could still dig her nails in.

“Come on, babe,” she said, resting her sharp chin on his shoulder. “Quit needling our boy and let us get to class. Ms. Day told me if I’m ever on time after gym, she’ll pee herself from happiness. Don’t you want me and Theo to see her pee?”

Aaron finally looked at her. She dug her chin in harder. It had to hurt. Theo didn’t get them sometimes, all their pulling away, slapping each other’s hands. Sometimes they pinched each other hard enough to leave marks.

Love and hurt always go together, dumbass , Felicity told him the only time he asked about it. She’d even given him a funny look, like she was surprised he was asking.

Aaron’s jaw flexed. Felicity let up the pressure: showing a reaction meant you lost. At least, it did for Aaron.

“My parents want to have dinner with us again. They’ve been weirdly pushy about it. You especially,” he told Theo. “Dad wants to talk about your training regime. Mom wants to talk about…” He frowned. “Your uniform, or something.”

“We can have a celebration dinner after the make-up game,” Theo offered. “After we win.”

The bell rang.

Felicity sighed. “Guess nobody’s seeing Ms. Day pee.”

“Stand behind her and scream,” Aaron suggested darkly, and turned toward the gym doors.

Felicity sauntered after him. Theo eyed her jeans, remembering the giant bruises on her thighs as she ran relentless laps around the gym.

It was a quiet drive to Coach Cheech’s after school. Mostly because Kade spent the ride crouching low in the backseat so nobody could see him.

“You said somebody already spotted me,” Kade called, muffled. His mouth was pressed into his knees. “Surely we can just?—”

“There’s a lot of talk in this car with just me in it,” Theo said.

Kade flipped him off.

“This is what you get for being a hothead idiot,” Theo told him.

Kade made a noise against his legs. It sounded like takes one to know one, so reminiscent of Felicity that Theo huffed a laugh. If those two ever became friends, the world would tremble.

Theo thought about asking if Cheech caught up with him after class and gave him detention. Asking him how Kade could do something so stupid, especially if he was convinced Aaron was involved in all this.

He sighed instead. “You okay?”

Kade let out a startled laugh. “I’ve had worse, golden boy. Don’t trouble your pretty head about it.”

Theo paused, Kade’s words rolling over in his head. “Did you call me pretty?”

“No,” Kade said, too fast. “I was mocking you.”

“Oh,” Theo said. “Here I thought we were being nice.”

“We can do both,” Kade said, the words muffled against torn denim.

Theo’s mouth twitched in a reluctant smile. He chewed his cheek until it went away .

Coach Cheech’s house was nice, until you looked closer. Faded paint, chips in the wood. Rot creeping up the foundations. It had been in his family for generations, two stories tucked one road over from the only supermarket in town.

“He doesn’t let anybody in to clean it,” Theo told Kade as they crept into the backyard. “I just hope it’s better than the Lemmings place. Cheech doesn’t seem like much of a cleaner.”

Kade made a dubious noise, looking around. The grass was long and brown, the flowerbeds long empty. Old garden stakes protruded from the dirt. Cheech’s parents had kept tomatoes before they died and left him the house.

“You’re sure he won’t be home?” Kade asked as they headed up the concrete steps to the back door.

“He’s at his bowling club,” Theo replied. He reached for the shiny doorknob. “Do you think he’s the kind of guy who locks his back—ow!”

He leapt back with a yelp as pain flared through his hand.

Kade let out a shocked laugh. “Holy shit! Is it?—?”

“Silver,” Theo said through gritted teeth. He shook his seared hand hopefully. The burn stayed. He sighed and stepped back. “You try it.”

Kade slipped past him. His hand hovered over the doorknob.

Theo rolled his eyes. “Come on. ”

Kade grabbed the doorknob and jerked, a pained gasp spilling from his throat.

“What?” Theo reached for his shirt, ready to yank him back. But before he could?—

“Psych.” Kade turned, holding up an unscathed hand.

If Theo had a heartbeat, it would be thundering.

“Asshole,” he spat. “Don’t yell when you’re breaking into someone’s house!”

“I didn’t yell ,” Kade mumbled. He took the doorknob and rattled it. “Locked.”

It took only two minutes of searching to come up with a key. Theo floated a few inches above the ground and caught sight of a silver flash tucked above the doorframe.

He grabbed it and hissed. The key clattered onto the steps, Theo shaking his burned fingers.

Kade cackled. “He got you again! This is hilarious, mate. I bet everything in there’s lined with silver.”

Theo took his burned fingers out of his cool mouth. “Shut up and grab the key.”

Kade bowed, like an asshole. “Of course, your undead majesty.”

Theo hid a snort and floated down to the bottom step. When his feet hit the concrete, the door was still closed. Theo found Kade watching him with a goofy little grin that made Theo’s mouth twitch unwillingly.

“What? ”

“Nothing,” Kade said, too fast. He scratched his face to hide his smile. “’S cool you can fly, is all. Didn’t really appreciate it when you had me shoved against my own ceiling.”

The door clicked. Kade swung it open, gesturing with a flourish. He did that a lot, Theo was noticing—little flourishes. Like an actor in a play.

“The adventure continues,” Kade said.

“Great,” Theo replied. “Let’s get this little vampire adventure over with.”

He pushed past Kade, ignoring Kade’s annoyed grumble.

It was better than the Lemmings house. No stink of decay, just neglect. Everything was sparse, long hallways of dusty family photographs and bedrooms that hadn’t been used in a decade, woodwork falling into disrepair.

The kitchen was the first room they found that looked lived in: a fruit bowl full of bananas and oranges, empty cans of Bud Lite, and a dehydrator on the bench with dried fruits waiting inside. Then the living room, which had no family photographs on the walls. Instead there were framed movie posters and a calligraphy that said, I’M NOT RACIST—I HATE EVERYONE EQUALLY!

“Yikes,” Kade said.

Theo nodded. He couldn’t help thinking of the Lemmings house, where they’d rooted around for ages and come up with nothing. Theo had thought they were wasting their time. Then that monster had lurched in out of nowhere, making the trip not useless after all .

He turned to Kade. “If this was some stupid monster story, where would he hide something important?”

Kade stared at him, parting his chapped lips in surprise.

Theo sighed. “I don’t want to spend my time rooting through old sci-fi books or going through his laundry for nothing. If you have any ideas, now’s the time.”

Kade considered. His gaze skimmed the room—the expensive couch covered in Cheeto dust, the bookcase stuffed with yellowing sci-fi tomes from the eighties.

“I don’t know about you,” he said, “But I’m betting on another secret room.”

Theo groaned. “Just because Lemmings had one?—”

“You can’t say it’s not realistic?—”

“Lemmings was a vampire, Coach Cheech is a hunter!”

“Exactly! Cheech is from a long line of hunters, and this is the family home, there should be a ton of weird secrets hidden away in a—holy SHIT!”

“What?”

Kade ignored him, running over to the bookcase so fast and gesturing at the books. Theo was about to ask him again when he noticed what Kade was pointing at: amid all the old paperbacks sat a big, black leather book with a golden sun on the spine.

“Holy shit,” Theo echoed.

“Right?” Kade giggled. Theo had never heard him giggle before. It was weirdly cute. “Now, if I know my stories…”

Kade pulled the book out. Something clicked behind it. The bookcase creaked out from the wall.

Theo stared. “No way.”

“YES way,” Kade hissed joyously. “Secret room part two, baby!”

He jumped up and down on the spot. Theo couldn’t help it: he grinned. He tried to stop it as soon as he felt it, but Kade didn’t see, too busy pulling the bookcase all the way out to reveal the room behind it.

Theo’s grin faded when he stepped into the dark room.

Weapons lined one wall. Crossbows, axes, one huge sword that looked like it would burn Theo to a crisp if he even went near it. Family photographs lined another wall. There were fancy clothes, like the photographs in the hall. Except the fine clothes in these photographs were dressed in dirt and blood. Generations of Cheeches lifting silver crossbows and axes. They got less bloody with each decade: by the time Theo spotted a young Cheech, they looked like they were posing. Like their hunting gear were props. Nothing like the older photos—in the oldest one, a beaming toddler was holding a severed head.

“Jesus,” Theo whispered. He lifted a hand and wiped away the dust. Everything in this room was covered in dust—the white wallpaper, the display case holding an old scroll unfolded to show unintelligible writing, the wooden floor. The only thing that looked used was a desk and chair tucked in the corner.

Theo started toward it.

“God, you must suck at video games,” Kade told him. His gaze was glued to the glass case and the scroll displayed inside. “ Everything in this room points to this. Might as well be a giant spotlight going THIS WILL PROGRESS THE PLOT.”

“Or we could check the only place in the room he actually bothers going,” Theo replied, walking over to the desk. “Just a thought.”

Kade grunted, distracted. He chewed his thumbnail, scraping blue polish with his teeth. Theo tore his gaze away from Kade’s mouth and turned toward the desk. It looked like it had been stolen out of the older classrooms at the high school. Same off-brown color, same bored doodles scratched into the wood. Papers were strewn across it. Some of the sheets were torn, like a pen had been pushed into it with such force it met the wood on the other side.

Most of the pages were crossed out. Only one thing remained: a date, written huge and circled twice.

Theo touched the numbers. “There’s a date here. That’s next Friday…and then it just says dark ? So, nighttime, I guess?”

“Awesome,” Kade said, still hovering around the glass case like he was checking for booby traps. “Anything else?”

Theo sifted through the papers. There was a strange, gnarled tree doodled in the margins of most of them. That same tree was carved into the table, branches twisted and spindly. Theo touched the divots in the wood. He’d seen it before, a long time ago. Maybe in a dream.

He slid a finger down the etched trunk and shivered.

“What?”

“Uh, nothing.” Theo pulled his hand away. “Hey—that date.”

“Yeah?”

“That’s the game.”

Kade looked at him blankly.

“The game that got rescheduled,” Theo explained. “Coach tried to talk them into making it a different day. He was yelling and everything. My dad told me.”

“Coach does love to yell,” Kade said slowly. He tapped the glass case thoughtfully. “Shit. Guess something’s going down on Friday.”

Far away, something clicked. Theo froze.

Kade’s hand stilled on the glass case. “What is it?”

Theo shook his head, listening hard. There—the creak of a door opening.

“He’s here.”