Page 77 of My Undead Love Life

“Because it’s cold.”

“Because it hurts.”

“Also that.”

Luck grabbed a blanket and draped it around my front without making a big thing of it, covering my chest and stomach while leaving my shoulder bare for the ice. The gesture was so gentle and sweet that it made my throat tighten.

“There,” he said softly. “Better?”

I nodded. “Thanks.”

He stepped back, but not far.

None of them went far.

Oxi adjusted the bundle against my bruise. “Tell me if it goes numb.”

“It’s ice. Isn’t that the point?”

“Not that numb.”

“Yes, doctor.”

His hand stilled.

I glanced back enough to catch his expression, and my heart squeezed at the way he looked at me.

“Thank you,” I said more quietly.

Mad’s thumb brushed once along my jaw before he lowered his hand. Luck looked down at the floor, smiling faintly.

My heart did something strange in my chest. Then, Keith’s face flashed through my mind. The memory hurt so sharply I almost flinched. Keith had told me many times that if anything ever happened to him, I wasn’t allowed to climb into the grave after him.

He’d told me to love again, too. Now, those words felt like a gift and a punishment at the same time. Keith had loved me. Really loved me. And I loved him. But still… Two months. Was that too soon? Was grief supposed to have a timeline? Was there some point where wanting someone else stopped being betrayal?

I wasn’t sure. But the way Mad and Luck were watching me, and the way Oxi stood behind me, holding ice to my bruised shoulder…

My feelings were about to get a lot more complicated.

15

OXI

The horde was finally out of sight from the rooftop, far away from the city…aside from the stragglers it left behind.

Stragglers were less intelligent than the ones in hordes usually were, and that gave me some hope that we could actually start our journey to get Spencer home again.

I’d learned early in life that hope was a dangerous thing. My parents had made damn sure of that. It was even more dangerous now that the world had ended, but here it was again, sitting behind my ribs while I stared out over the city. I imagined walking away from this mall with Spencer between us.

The streets were still as ugly as the hell it had become years ago. Snow covered everything in uneven layers, hiding cars, dead and undead bodies, shattered glass, and God knew what else beneath the dirty white drifts. The horde had left a trail behind it of trampled snow, crushed corpses, and dragged fleshy rot that cut through the parking lot and down the main road. A few undead still wandered aimlessly through it, half-frozen and slow, their movements clumsy.

The damn snow leopards were still out there, too, and I hated that more than I did the stragglers. Zombies were fucked up, but they were familiar. We knew what to expect from them—mostly, even the intelligent ones.

We didn’t know anything about the fucking snow leopards.

“It’s not the end of winter yet. I’m sure we’re due for another storm any day now,” I grumbled, crossing my arms as we sat in bed talking after body checks.

The four of us were bundled under the comforters we’d stolen from different stores, though we’d stripped down for sleep like usual.