Part 16 (2/2)

”This is human,” I said, ”but you knew that.”

”All of us took a piece of that woman,” she said quietly, as though speaking only to herself. ”We were told to by your grandmother.”

I sat back. Grant cleared his throat. ”How many of you?”

”Just the four. Ernie, me, Lizbet, and Samuel.”

”And where are the last two?”

”Dead,” Winifred whispered. ”They married, later, after their families came to the United States in '47. Lived in Florida for the past ten years. Police found them shot to death in their home more than a week ago.”

”I'm sorry,” I said, as gently as I could. ”But what made you and Ernie think their murders had anything to do with the both of you?”

Winifred tore her gaze from the sc.r.a.p of dried human skin. ”Because their killer mailed Ernie and me the...mementos...that Samuel and Lizbet had kept in their home safe. A warning, you see. A promise.”

Her wrinkled mouth tightened with bitterness. ”And because Jean told us what would happen for playing with the devil.”

SUNSET. I fled to the bathroom. Waved along in the right direction by an old woman whose eyes were haunted, knowing. When I walked away, I felt naked, like there was a target drawn on my back. I fled to the bathroom. Waved along in the right direction by an old woman whose eyes were haunted, knowing. When I walked away, I felt naked, like there was a target drawn on my back.

The bathroom was small and simply decorated in white tile and a white fuzzy rug on the gleaming floor. Sparkling clean, a faint scent of shampoo mixed with bleach. I shut the door just as I felt the sun slip beneath the horizon-so much a part of my senses that it was easy as breathing to know the time. Survival instinct.

I leaned on the sink, staring at myself in the mirror, counting down the seconds. Watching my eyes. Remembering countless evenings watching my mother's eyes, or trying to, at that exact moment of the s.h.i.+ft. She had never shown pain. Just smiled and laughed, and acted like it was a game, the old hard game, which would be mine one day, after she died. She had not wanted me to be scared of that future, even though I should have been terrified. She had wanted to keep me innocent for as long as possible-and she had, best as she could. I hadn't realized then what a gift that was, but I understood now. I understood too well. And there was no repaying that kindness except to pa.s.s it on, one day.

The sun ticked down, swallowed into my body. Zee and the boys woke up.

I had tried once to explain the sensation to Grant, but there were only so many ways of describing what it felt like to be skinned alive with acid and knives, before a girl felt like a whiner.

It hurt. It would always hurt. From my toes to between my legs, to my fingernails and nipples and scalp, to the very top of my neck. No part of me unscathed, except for my face. My hands tightened around the rim of the sink. I closed my eyes, unable to look at myself.

The boys dissolved from my skin in a cloud of smoke and silver shadows, red lightning flickering through the ghosts of their bodies as they flowed from beneath my clothes and coalesced inside the bathroom. I smelled burnt hair and a whiff of something stiff and cold, as though a tunnel had been opened to some cavern miles deep below the earth, where the air was so pure that a person could grow drunk on just one breath.

My eyes were still closed. Muscles quivered and sweat rolled. Strong arms wrapped around my legs, while two long bodies coiled over my shoulders.

Zee whispered, ”Maxine.”

I forced a smile on my face and drew in a long quivering breath; several, before I found my voice. ”Hey, bad boys.”

Dek and Mal licked the backs of my ears. I patted their heads. Raw disappeared into the shadows behind the toilet and reappeared moments later with a giant bag full of M&Ms and a six-pack of beer. He handed those to Aaz, and then disappeared again-returning with a bucket of fried chicken, a nail gun, and a plastic bin full of dirty syringes, plastered in orange BIOHAZARD stickers.

I sat on the edge of the toilet, scratching behind Zee's pointed little ears as he grabbed a fistful of individually wrapped packages of M&Ms and shoved them, paper and all, into his mouth. Behind him, Raw had picked up the nail gun and was shooting studs down his brother's throat. Aaz giggled, swallowing each one. Dek, watching them, made a small sound of protest-and I opened a beer, which he fitted his entire mouth over and then knocked back with a sigh. Mal, who had disappeared from my shoulders, poked his head up from within the fried chicken bucket, too much like some crazed demonic gopher. He licked his chops and gave me a toothy grin.

I nudged the container of used syringes toward Raw. He cracked it open and began popping each one into his mouth like candy bars. Over the crunching sounds of plastic, chicken, paper, and aluminum, I said, ”Tell me about the Black Cat.”

”Bad news,” Zee rasped, licking his claws. ”Gave our old mother a hard run.”

”And that's the reason three people a.s.sociated with this woman have been murdered?”

Zee lowered his hand, sharing a long look with the others, who stopped eating. ”Price to pay. No good road from that hunt. Bleed for darkness and darkness gets a taste.”

Winifred was going to wonder why her bathroom smelled like fried chicken and beer. ”Why? Was she a demon?”

Zee sighed, resting his chin upon my knee. Hair spikes flexed, and his red eyes narrowed with memory as his claws gently tapped the tile floor. ”Almost.”

”Almost. What does that mean?”

”Means almost almost.” Zee scrunched up his face. ”Blood never lies, Maxine.”

I gave him a long look, suspicions and theories rumbling through my head. But before I could ask, Dek lifted his head and froze. All the boys did, staring at the door.

I was up in moments, out of the bathroom, running down the hall. Grant and Winifred were still seated in the living room, talking softly, but they stopped when they saw me. Grant did not need to hear my warning. He braced himself on his cane and rose in one smooth movement, knuckles white around the carved oak handle.

”Winifred,” he rumbled quietly, still staring into my eyes. ”You need to come with us now.”

The old woman paled. No arguments, though. She stood, swaying, and Grant steadied her with his free hand. I moved ahead of them, Dek and Mal settling heavily in my hair. Red eyes winked at me from the shadows of the long hall. I listened hard, heard nothing.

The door loomed. Grant and Winifred lingered behind me. I held out my hand, gesturing for them to wait as I crept forward. From the shadows of the closet, Zee whispered, ”Clear.”

And it was, when I opened the door. Nothing there.

We left the apartment without incident, and took the elevator down to the first floor. Winifred watched me the entire time, with such intensity my skin crawled. So many stories in her eyes, so much she knew that had not been spoken. I hated secrets. I hated the mysteries in the past that no one, even if they tried, would ever be able to explain. To understand something you had to live it-or live something so close that the empathy was second hand. What this woman had gone through-the events chasing her now-was beyond me. But that didn't mean I wasn't going to try.

As the elevator doors opened I said, ”You have ten seconds to tell me why you're being hunted. No riddles. I want answers.”

”We were children,” Winifred said tightly, still evading my question. ”We didn't know what we were doing.”

I noticed she clenched that tightly folded square of linen in her hands, a hint of human leather peeking out from beneath the edge of cloth. I stuck my foot in the elevator door, holding it open. ”Right. Because taking that that from a dead woman is from a dead woman is morally ambiguous morally ambiguous. Try another one, Ms. Cohen.”

Winifred gave me a haunted look. ”She wasn't dead when we took it.”

And then, almost at a run, she rushed past me into the lobby. Grant began to follow, and stumbled. I grabbed his elbow, clinging tight, feeling as though he was holding me up just as much as I was holding him. I stared at the old woman's rounded shoulders and whispered, ”What is this?”

”Something worth killing over,” he replied, voice strained. ”She wouldn't say much to me, but whatever happened when she was a child left a black stain in her aura. Almost like a...handprint. I saw something similar in Ernie, but I didn't think much of it at the time. He was dying. He might have shot someone. Any of that would cause a shadow.”

”I don't believe in coincidences,” I muttered, and let go of him to hurry after Winifred, who had stopped by the gla.s.s entrance and was looking back at us with those old dark eyes. We were alone. No one around to hear more confessions. I reached for the old woman, intending comfort, strength-something, anything, that would rea.s.sure her that it was safe to tell me the truth.

Before I could reach her, the gla.s.s in the door shattered. Winifred staggered into my arms, collapsing against me. I gasped, stunned, falling down with her-and my fingers touched wet heat. Came away red. She had been shot in the back.

A roar filled my ears, deafening and cold. Grant began talking into his cell phone. I hardly heard him. Winifred was still breathing. I slid out from under her, trying to keep my hand on her wound. Pressing down with all my strength.

Save them.

Blood seeped past my fingers. Winifred's breathing was rough, little more than a strangled hiss-but except for that and the quiet persistence of Grant's voice, silence seemed to press around us. Such terrible silence, as though what little sounds we were making meant nothing to the crush of empty air surrounding our bodies.

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