Page 61 of January Bell

CHAPTER

TWENTY

LILY

Having to assemble a flat-pack piece of furniture while a ticking clock toward my death literally looms overhead, and a partner who has become much more than just a partner battles a horde of zombies to defend me from certain death—or at least something really gross from happening—is absolutely diabolical.

It’s something straight out of one of my worst nightmares.

IKEA flat-pack included. Allen wrench checked off the list of nightmare objects as well.

But I get it done. Or almost done.

I glance up at the red lit-up clock that descended at some point after Zan jumped off the platform to go battle zombies—truly a sentence I never thought I’d think, much less have happen—and there’s around forty-five seconds left.

I finish tightening the second-to-last screw just as Zan lets out a blood-curdling, guttural howl that tears my attention completely away from the goddamned piece of furniture.

Three zombies are on him, one worrying at the hole started by the worm.

My heart nearly stops as I take in the damage.

The hole the worm created is bigger now, black, necrotic, like something I saw in a science textbook once, showing the damage that a brown recluse spider could do.

My stomach roils, and suddenly I don’t give a shit about the fucking flat-pack or the ticking timer or the goddamned zombies straight from one of my worst nightmares.

All I care about is that the male I love, who has come to be one of my closest friends over the last week and a half or so, is hurt and is facing one of the worst things I’ve ever seen by himself.

I throw the last screw into the joint, and don’t bother tightening it. Then fling myself off the platform, racing forward.

Zan is struggling to keep the zombies off him. No matter how he tears at them with his teeth and talons, they’re latched on.

It’s vile, and yet I don’t stop. I don’t falter.

He sucks in a huge breath, and I wince as a growing purple light begins to emanate from his chest and neck.

I have no idea what’s causing it or how he’s doing it, but I know deep down in my bones it isn’t good.

“Stop,” I tell him. “Get off of him, you nasty⁠—”

I struggle to find the right word, because they’re not exactly zombies, and they’re definitely not humans, and I’m not really sure how you address dead, reanimated things.

I kick the one on his wing, and I’m surprised when it goes absolutely flying. If it was that easy to get off, then how come they’re still crawling all over him?

Panic and adrenaline make my hands shake.

“Get back, Lily,” Zan yells, his voice about thirteen times deeper than usual and almost unrecognizable. He takes another deep breath, his chest expanding, heat now radiating from him too.

More zombies are coming, a Black Friday sign pulled off the ceiling and dangling as they surge forward toward us.

“Get back on the platform with the furniture,” Zan says. Smoke unfurls from his nostrils and mouth, and I kick the other zombie that’s on him.

“Zan, I’m almost done. Just get away from them so we can finish. I just have to screw in the last⁠—”

“Save yourself,” he bellows. He takes a huge, deep breath, his chest glowing brighter than before.

And those two words decide what I’m going to do before my brain has fully caught up to it. I knock the second zombie off him, again surprised at how light it is and how quickly it detaches from him. Something is really wrong with him, and my hands go clammy with fear.

He’s burning up.