Chapter 21 Maeve
MAEVE
Everything in Blackwell was off Main Street so we decided to walk. The sun had started to break through the clouds but I still shivered in my sweatshirt.
“You’re cold.” Poe stopped walking and pulled off his sweatshirt.
“I’m fine. It’s… fine.” The protest died on my lips. He was already pulling his sweatshirt over my head.
“Can’t have you cold, little bird.”
It was the first time he’d used the nickname since I’d been back, and I hated how warm and fuzzy it made me feel inside.
“How are your grandparents?” I asked as we made our way up Main.
“They’re good,” he said.
“And Whit?”
His expression darkened. “He’s better. For now. Thanks for asking.”
"Aren’t we going to Debbie’s?” I asked when he stopped at a light that would take us deeper into Southside.
Debbie’s Donuts was a Blackwell Falls institution.
He scowled. “Overpriced and mediocre.”
I lifted my eyebrows. “I won’t fight you on mediocre, but aren’t all donuts kind of mediocre? Except the homemade kind, I mean.”
He clutched at his chest like I’d wounded him. “Are you trying to tell me you’ve never been to Marv’s?”
“Um… I’ve never been to Marv’s?”
The light changed and we crossed the street.
“Then I’m about to change your life.”
He took my hand like it was the most natural thing in the world, and in that moment, it felt like it was.
Shit.
“How have things been for you?” he asked. “While you’ve been gone, I mean.”
“Okay,” I said. “I was just working and…”
He looked down at me and my heart stuttered a little in my chest. “And…?”
“And preparing for the Hunt.”
His dark blue eyes sparkled. “Yeah? What did you do to prepare?”
I hesitated, not wanting to give away all my secrets, then decided it didn’t really matter. I seemed destined to be found by the Butchers. I was beginning to wonder if it had been written in the stars.
“I studied old plans for the town for one,” I said.
He nodded. “Smart. Did it help?”
“A little. I didn’t feel quite as disoriented as I had the first time.”
“What else?” he asked as we crossed one of the side streets on the west side of town.
“I brought the granola bars. And electrolyte powder.”
He chuckled. “Titus told us. You were prepared.”
“I’d hoped to last longer than I did.” I sounded miserable, even to myself.
“I didn’t smell you this time,” Poe said.
I nodded. “I didn’t use my usual body wash.”
“Strawberries,” he said, with a hint of longing.
“Yeah.”
“Good for you.”
“For all the good it did me.”
He slowed as we reached a plain shop with a glass front and a sign that simply read Marv’s.
“This is the place.”
He reached for the door and waited for me to enter first, because even monsters could be gentlemen I guess.
Or my monsters could anyway.
No, they weren’t mine. I took that part back.
Before it could do any real damage.