Page 106 of 1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Forty-Two

She wondered if Donovan was wearing similar garb. He worepants so well, surely an apron tied around his hips would look just asmagnificent. In fact, she imagined that anything would look good wrapped aroundhis hips—including her legs.

“Would you like some suggestions?” Eric prodded.

She snapped out of her thoughts and punished herself bydigging her nails into her palms. She’d lost contact with the only family she’dknown for the last twelve centuries and was now sitting in a bar drooling overthe biker who’d stolen her heart.

“No, thanks. I’ll just have—” The phone she’d set on thetable dinged, and her gaze darted hopefully to the screen. It paid off. It wasBenji. But why couldn’t she hear his thoughts? It didn’t matter where any ofthem were in the world, they could always communicate just as easily as theyhad in the void.

“I’m sorry,” she said, sliding out of the booth and raisingher phone in reference. “I have to take this.”

“No, problem, Doc. I’ll just get you a club soda for now.”

“That’s perfect. Thank you.”

He flashed her a Hollywood smile as she stepped into an areashe assumed led to the restrooms. Instead, she found herself in a small butindustrial kitchen.

“Sorry,” she said to the two employees who stopped what theywere doing to look at her. Then she spotted another door that seemed to leadoutside. That worked, too. “Sorry,” she said again, hurrying past metal preptables and a stainless-steel gas stove. She knew her presence in the kitchenwas a code violation.

She opened the metal door and stumbled down two steps into adark alley. A dumpster sat across from her, and several crates and boxeslittered the area closest to her. After glancing around to make sure that noone was listening, she reread the text before trying to call Benji mentally.His text had simply asked: Where are you?

She pressed the call button on her cell and waited.

A staticky voice picked up. “Zhou?”

“Benji?” she half-whispered, half-hissed into the phone.“Where have you been? I can’t hear you. I can’t hear anyone. What’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” His voice sounded garbled as if the signalwas cutting in and out. He lived in an area with horrible service, but that’dnever been an issue before. Not when they could carry on entire conversationsin their minds. “I can’t—”

Sia groaned when the connection dropped and tried callingback, to no avail. So, she texted. What is going on?

As she waited, she paced the uneven ground, looking over hershoulder every few seconds until her feet couldn’t handle it anymore. Even inlow heels, the balls of her feet were beginning to ache. She’d been on them allday, taking a turn at the clinic on 5th to keep hermind occupied. To stop it from racing with all the thoughts of what could’vehappened to the only family she’d ever known.

Five of them had made it out of the void on CharleyDavidson’s heels when she escaped, and they’d all found humans to inhabit soonafter. Benji, as he was called on this plane, lived the closest to her. Theothers had had to search farther for acceptable candidates.

In order to inhabit a body at thetime of its occupant’s passing, it had to be in a particular condition. Itssurvival had to be plausible. Others needed to believe thatthe human could live, no matter what ordeal they’d suffered. Thephysical form had to be intact and able to thrive, despitethe fact that, in reality, it hadn’t. Havingsomeone magically heal after being devoured by cancer for years was not a goodoption.

Zhou’s candidate hadn’t been in great condition when she’dfound her, but the doctor could have certainly survived since she’d gottenmedical attention relatively fast. And Zhou had liked that Sia was a doctor.She would be a respectable member of society and have a steady income.

On the other hand, Benji had stumbled upon a middle schoolstudent who’d fallen off a bridge into freezing water while roughhousing withhis friends. The fall had actually killed the kid. Thewater was shallow, and he’d broken his neck on some rocks. But his survivalcould be explained, in that the cold had slowed hisheart rate and allowed him to live for the forty-five minutes he’d beensubmerged in the water before his rescue. It’d taken a few weeks in thehospital to heal the broken neck, but his parents were overjoyed when he couldwalk and talk again.

Sia squelched the pang of jealousy that arose over the factthat Benji had found a host with a family—a loving family at that. It wassomething none of them had ever had. But why would he need to call her now?What was going on? Was there some kind of interference? If so, Sia wanted toknow what the hell kind of signal jammer could block their ability tocommunicate telepathically. If it wasn’t that, it would mean...

No. The alternative was too scary to even imagine. Besides,it had been five years. If he’d followed them from the void onto this plane,why would he wait half a decade to come after them?

Unless their plan had actually worked—fora time, anyway. They’d hoped that inhabiting humans would be like donningcamouflage. That it would make them invisible to other supernatural entitieswho might wish to do to them what their captor had. But maybe he had crossedwith them, after all. Perhaps it had simply taken him this long to figure outwhat they’d done and where they were hiding.

If he had followed them, and if their captor did find them,then Sia had way more to worry about than a communication barrier.

“What are you doing?” a smooth, deep voice asked from behindher.

Sia spun around, fear and guilt seizing her lungs, thoughshe couldn’t fathom what she had to feel guilty about. She clutched her phoneto her chest, her gaze darting about. Because that surely was a great look onher. “Nothing,” she said after a moment. “What are you doing?”

Donovan’s dark lashes lowered over irises shimmering softlyin the streetlamp’s light as he studied her. He tilted his head to one side,causing a lock of dark hair to fall over his brow. “Is everything okay, Doc?”

Forcing a smile at that point in her life was like peelingtaffy that had melted and then cooled again off her car dashboard, but shefinally managed to do it. “Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?” She tried to crossher arms over her chest and lean against a stack of crates. She failed andalmost landed face-first on the pavement.

He rushed forward, but she caught herself and smoothed ahand over her hair. “How’s Elwyn?” she asked, deflecting. Her cheeks burned,and she thanked the powers for low light. Blushing was another human trait shedespised.

After a long moment, Donovan lifted ashoulder. “You’d know better than me, you beingher medic and all.”