“You drew the Flash enough, in detail. What’d you have? Visions of it? Dreams? That’s what you were doing in class each day.”
Leave it to Jackson to be resentful of something that hadn’t helped me whatsoever.
He narrowed his eyes. “No wonder you wanted that journal back—it was a goddamned playbook for the apocalypse. I saw Bagmen in your drawings before I ever saw ’em in real life. Saw the sun shining at night on one of those pages before it happened. Thanks for the heads-up, you.”
“Oh, like you would’ve believed me! I didn’t even believe my drawings were real!” I yelled, the frustration of the last week, the last several months, bubbling over. “I thought I was crazy! And so did anyone who knew about them!” When he looked unmoved, I bit out, “Let me tell you how prepared I was. I was so prepared that my boyfriend and his family became piles of ash. All our friends were destroyed. And Mel”—my voice broke, but I kept on—“she was a sister to me and she died alone, not three miles from my house!”
His hard gaze softened a touch—until I said, “I blame you for her death!”
“What the hell did I do?”
“When I first saw the light, I began to realize what was happening, that the things I’d seen might be real. I wanted to call Mel and tell her to get back here. But she didn’t have a phone!”
“I didn’t steal her phone, no.”
“You just kept me busy while Lionel took it.”
“If he did, then he’s paid for it. He’s as dead as she is.”
“You were just as much to blame.” I grasped my forehead, refusing to argue anymore. Jackson wasn’t worth my time. Unless . . .
“Have you passed a doctor—any kind of medic—on your way here?”
“Why you want to know? You sick? Or your mère? They said something in town.”
“Just answer me! Can you get a doctor here? We have things of value, things that would make the trip worth it.”
“Non. That’s not . . . it’s not possible.”
Swaying on my feet, I told him, “That’s the only thing I’ll barter for, Jackson. If a doc’s not happening, then leave.”
“You doan even know what I got to offer.”
“There is nothing I want—or need—except for a doctor.”
“And what about what I need? Maybe I’ll just go take what I’m hunting for.”
Fear skittered through me. He couldn’t get anywhere near my mom. We were so vulnerable! I flipped the safety off the shotgun.
He casually took a swig from his flask. “You even know how to fire that thing, you?”
God, he infuriated me! “I told you to leave!” I raised the shotgun.
He pocketed the flask, rising from his bike. “Doan you aim that at me,” he grated, starting for me.
As he stormed closer, he had that look in his eyes, the menacing one he’d given that drunken man.
The one promising pain.
Alarm flared. Which made me even madder. I had a loaded gun pointed at his head! He didn’t know I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn. “Gee, Jackson, I guess the little doll’s got teeth—”
He moved so fast he was a blur, knocking the barrel aside. The slightest touch of the trigger and the gun went off, kicking me back like a mule. I saw him lunge for me—too late—then felt my head snap back against the ground.
My vision was wavering as he crouched beside me, feeling the back of my head. “You’ll live, you coo-yôn. Now, ain’t you glad we got that out of the way?”
My eyes rolled back. Darkness.
Chapter 17
The red witch stood atop a raised dais overlooking a crowd of shadowy figures.
Villagers. They cowered before her.
Aggression sizzled through her veins as she surveyed them. She would destroy them all, every last one, her wrath unfathomable.
Lifting her claw-tipped fingers to a clear morning sky, she called on nearby plants to release their thorns. With a shriek, she unleashed a tornado of them.
Like a swarm of bees, the tempest descended upon her prey. People shoved one another down, scrabbling over the fallen to flee, but none could.
The razor-sharp thorns bit into their faces, scouring their features off, their noses and lips. Inch by vicious inch, those barbs sliced at their flesh, flaying the meat from their bodies. Blood spurt, gristle covering the ground.
One woman’s scalp was severed clean; her beautiful black mane of hair drifted on swirling winds. . . .
The witch’s tempest scoured them deeper, deeper. Even without most of their skin, the people managed to survive a surprisingly long time—which she particularly enjoyed.
As she cackled with delight, they crawled in place, mired in the thickening puddles of remains. . . .
I woke in my bed, squinting at the amount of light in my room, shivers still racing over me from my latest nightmare.
My gaze focused on a trio of burning candles. Three candles? I’d never be so wasteful.
I shrank back when I saw a blurry outline of a person. Slowly, my eyes adjusted.
Jackson was in my room! I’d never had a boy in my room—much less that boy.
He still had his crossbow strapped over his shoulder. In his hand? Yet another candle.
As I tried to shake off the remnants of that dream and get my bearings—how had I gotten in bed? why was he inside?—I feigned sleep, watching him as he snooped around like he owned the place.
He gazed at the storm clouds I’d painted on the walls, strolled into my closet and rummaged around, then emerged to check out my dance trophies and recital pictures. He flipped through a supply of sketchbooks—all blank.
Drawing held little interest for me these days. The voices made it impossible for me to sit still. And besides, my brain was already stained beyond repair.
As if he couldn’t help himself, he returned to the wall paintings, holding up the candle to trace his fingers over the clouds. The flickering light ghosted over a grisly-looking scar on his forearm.
I recognized that injury, had been in his home when a drunken man had slashed Jackson’s skin to the bone.
I’d witnessed how brutal this boy could be—he’d nearly beaten the man to death in front of me. Yet he was now touching my paintings gently, almost reverently.
I felt like a spy, like this was a moment I was never supposed to share. It seemed . . . intimate. When he touched the cane, I swore I could feel him aching for those fields, for that rain about to fall.
He abruptly dropped his hands. Without turning, he said, “So this is where Evangeline Greene grew up.”
“What are you doing in my room? How did I get into bed?”
He finally faced me, but ignored my questions. “That closet of yours—not quite big enough, no?”
I flushed to remember that he hadn’t even had a bedroom of his own.
He opened the top drawer of my dresser. “How many ribbons and bebins can one girl have?” With raised brows, he lifted a pink Victoria’s Secret bra from the next drawer. “I fondly recall this one.”