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I knocked on their door and waited to see if anyone was home. The place looked empty, but they were always off running about somewhere. I turned and settled on their stoop, not having much else to do while I waited for Charlie.
I’d thought this place was going to be our home for the long haul. That I’d raise Charlie here with these people. That he’d be off on whatever shenanigans the guys were doing right now.
My thoughts were wandering off to where we might end up in a few years, or in twenty, when Widow Herbert’s voice broke into my thoughts.
“You need to go get Charlie and get out of here,” she said, appearing right in front of me. “There’s something bad coming.Look!” She pointed down the street, where a crowd formed in the distance.
“What’s going on?” I got up, trying to get a better view.
“Groza is gathering them, and it’s for you. You need to get Charlie and get out of here.”
Only issue was Charlie was in that direction.
Chapter Thirty
I scanned the crowd.
Groza stood at the front, her gaze fixed intently on me as I approached.
The guys were gone. Duncan was gone. Most importantly, Kicks was gone. This was a trap. She’d lured them away. Groza had known we’d go for the mushrooms and we’d be back. She’d been watching. Waiting.
I stopped, afraid to get any closer to the crowd forming, my brain scrambling for a way to get to Charlie.
“I know what you did, Piper, and now so will everyone else.” Groza’s voice boomed, cutting through the silence of the pack watching intently. A murmur rippled through the crowd, who mostly looked concerned and confused.
A knot formed in my stomach. “What are you talking about?” I said, trying to keep my voice even.
On some level, I’d been waiting for this ever since I’d killed Walter and Berman. I hadn’t killed them intentionally, but it wouldn’t matter, especially if they saw how they’d died.
Groza’s cold eyes stared me down. “Don’t play stupid. I know you killed them. I don’t know what con you pulled off, butyou’re not the true spiritual guide. You stole Jaysa’s powers and distorted her gift, twisted it somehow.”
ThatI hadn’t expected. “What in the hell are you talking about? I wasn’t anywhere near Jaysa when she died. How could I have done anything of the sort?”
“You met with her shortly before she passed. Everyone knows you did, so there’s no denying it.”
“So what?” I yelled back. It was one thing to go down for something I did. This? Oh no, I wasn’t taking this rap.
“You poisoned her. You slipped poison into her home.” Her eyes lit as she made her case against me. How long had she been planning this?
“That’s bullshit, and you know it. I didn’t poison anyone. Where would I have even gotten something like that?”
“Maybe Lola? How long have you known her? Did she move close for you? You’re the only one she’d give the mushrooms to when all the fields around us just happened to be bare. Do you deny that?”
There were gasps in the crowd. I stood there, fumbling with what to say. She was piling up evidence, and if I was one of the pack, even I might’ve bought the story at this point.
“You don’t have time to panic,” Widow Herbert said. “You need to extricate yourself now. Groza will use this to drive you out, and it will work. These people were a suspicious lot before the end of the world. Hard times make people hold on to their beliefs even firmer.”
Extricate? Yeah, great idea. Would’ve been even better if she could tell me how I could do that, because I wasn’t seeing a real clear path through this horde that was growing larger by the minute.
“We are not a suspicious lot,” Jaysa said, showing up now too.
“You are, but we don’t have time to debate.” Widow Herbert was on the verge of yelling. It was the first time I’d ever really heard her get like this, and it didn’t help my nerves.
“What, because you say something it’s true?” Jaysa said.
“Piper, you don’t have time,” Widow Herbert said, ignoring Jaysa. “You need to go get Charlie and leave, now, before the pitchforks are out.”
How?I wanted to scream. Groza wasn’t going to let me walk away that easily.
