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It was the first child I’d seen, and after the conversation with Grant, it shook me all the more.
The kid lifted his arm to ward off a hit. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I said, reaching down to help him to his feet. “You okay?”
He brushed off his legs, as if that did anything about the layers of filth caked to him. “Fine. I didn’t mean to get in your way, though. Really sorry.” His gaze flited to the side.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all.” He went to take off, but I shifted into his way.
“Wait a minute. Are you running from something?”
The kid paused, trading his weight from one foot to the other. “See…”
Grant caught my arm and leaned in. “He isn’t akid, Ava.”
“Look at him. He’s scared.”
Grant shook his head. “You don’t know what hell is like.”
I remembered that man who had nearly killed me, the way he’d held that machete. “I’m a quick learner, and I’ve had a few lessons taught to me.”
“Nothing here is what it looks like.”
“So you’ll just turn your back on a child?”
“If he’shere,then he isn’t as innocent as he looks.”
I stared back at the boy, but try as I might, I couldn’t see any evil in him.
He looked back, then cowered when Grant met his gaze. “I don’t want any trouble,” he swore. “I’ll go.”
Before I could stop him, he scurried off, leaving me facing Grant, my hands on my hips. “How do you know he didn’t need help?”
“Because kids don’t get sent to hell, Ava.”
“And spirits look like they do when they die.” I thought about the twisted forms I’d seen and amended my statement. “Except when they’re here in hell, where they look worse after a while. They don’t turn into sweet-looking kids, though.”
“Ava,” he started to say, but I shrugged off his hand.
“We should get to the rooms.”
He let out a long sigh, one that said he didn’t appreciate my dodging of the conversation, but I didn’t care. Turnabout was fair play, and Grant had keptplentyfrom me.
I didn’t owe him anything.
The hotel this time was a far cry from the small inn we’d stayed at before. It reminded me of something that would fit in in the living world, a tall building that stretched up into the sky with flat glass windows across the front. Still, without regular electricity, it held the same orange and green glow that lit everything else.
Hunter waved us over from the counter, and I pushed past Grant, eager to put him out of my mind. Funny that these men could annoy me so much one moment, and I could worry about them the next.
It infuriated me.
“Rooms will be ready in an hour or two,” Hunter said.
“That long?”
“Do you really want them to skimp when it comes to cleaning roomshere?”
