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He stepped out and was revealed. My boyfriend was a patchwork quilt of a human being, but that didn’t matter in the least.
“You’re alive—”
Lips that were and were not his smiled. “Not technically. ” He held his hands out to Asher, who released me to him.
“I demand safe passage for my services,” Asher said to Sike.
“Granted,” she said, and he disappeared. She pointed behind Ti and me. “I’ve called a car. Go upstairs, now. ” Ti nodded, and turned to follow her commands.
* * *
From my vantage point, crushed against Ti’s chest, I could see-smell-feel where meat met meat and watch dust leaking out of each of Ti’s seams. He was like the Scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz, losing dust instead of straw.
“Who were they?” I asked him.
“Daytimers. They won’t last. ”
“And then?” I felt him lean forward, to climb us up the observation room’s hill.
“And then we’ll see. ”
I was quiet while he managed several large steps, navigating a path around pools of Shadows that were actively searching across the ground, with sticky tendrils waving in the air. I didn’t think they’d get us, as I thought the Shadows and I had a deal, but I didn’t want to put that to the test.
“Stop,” a voice ordered behind us. It sounded familiar. I looked up and saw recognition on Ti’s face. “Turn around. ”
Ti didn’t move.
“Turn around, or I’ll take your soul where you stand, zombie. ”
Ti squeezed me tighter to his chest and turned. Dren was there, pointing his sickle behind him. “Those things just ate my Hound. ” He took a menacing step nearer us, and Ti stepped back.
Ti answered for both of us. “It’s not our fault you backed the wrong team. ”
“I don’t expect to get paid after this mess—but your soul’s still up for grabs, girl,” he said with a leer. “And I need some recompense. ”
“Don’t do this, Dren,” I whispered.
“Husker,” Ti began, his voice low in warning.
Ti couldn’t fight back, not while holding me. And dropping me would only damage me more. We could rush Dren, but then there was still the sickle to account for—
“Dren, please—” I reached my arm out toward him. Muscles that didn’t connect right in my abdomen anymore twitched and slid out of place. I screamed in pain and my arm fell.
Drops of blood I hadn’t known were cradled in my hand sprinkled forward with the motion. Dren reached out with his free hand, lightning fast, and caught one in midair. Then while looking at us, he grinned, showing fangs, and brought his hand back toward his mouth, surely to lick from wrist to fingertip.
He stopped just as I realized I was looking at him. Not through his fingers, but through a hole that had appeared in the middle of his palm, as a portion of it crumbled into ash. His fingers teetered, and then one by one fell down, dusting like so many smoked cigarettes.
“Your blood—” he began, staring at his hand, transfixed, as the ash crept down his hand.
“Is spiked with pope water,” I answered him.
He looked at me for a moment, then reversed his hold upon his sickle, and brought it whistling down—not on us, like I’d feared, but through the meat and bone of his own wrist. The remnants of his hand dusted in midair.
“Let us pass, Husker,” Ti said. Dren didn’t answer. He was panting in anger, staring at his mutilated arm.
“How could you husk me without getting my blood on you?” I asked. My hand that wasn’t pressed against Ti found more blood to use as a weapon, just in case.
Dren put his sickle down. “Later,” he answered.
I sagged against Ti’s chest. Things were going gray. “Yes. It is. ”
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
Ti mounted the stairs two at a time when we reached them. I could see the trail of ash and gobbets of flesh behind us as we made our way back to Providence General’s lobby.
Zombies don’t have look-away like vampires do. And so while I could see the mass exodus of vampires pouring out of Providence General, no one else could. All they could see was Ti, holding me, as he strode through the bays of the emergency room, shedding ash and meat. People were picking up phones. I hid my face in Ti’s armpit as people tried to take our picture.
“Stay back!” Ti growled, and the good employees of Providence General did so. We made it to the ambulance entrance, just as a dark-tinted car flew into the drive.
Ti opened the back door, and we sank into the car together.
“Drive,” Ti commanded as he closed the door, and Sike’s car raced off.
* * *
Ti cradled me to his chest. I clung to him, feeling parts of him sift away like hourglass sand. And then I started to feel like that too—drifting and lost. “Edie, wake up,” he said.
“Are we there yet?” I asked without opening up my eyes.
“No. Edie—”
