Chapter Nine
W e search Gravesend until the sun goes down. I see no more signs of other zombies, but Mason seems not at all surprised by that. For a while after we leave the zombie I destroyed behind, he’s quiet.
He seems to sense the moment my heart returns to baseline because that’s when he begins to pepper me with questions, a behaviour that continues for the rest of the day.
They’re surprisingly… mundane. All the questions I get in the Citadel are about being a hunter. Not even about the places we visit, but about the fighting, the killing.
Mason asks what I remember from before the outbreak. What’s my first memory? What was my favourite animal as a child? What did I want to be when I grew up? I don’t know half the answers, but I reply anyway.
“Chocolate milk?” Mason says as we approach the churchyard. The sun has just about set, sky darkening overhead. When I glance up, I see Emma lingering by the church doors. “Too sweet for my tastes.”
“What did you like to drink as a child, then?” I ask.
Of course I haven’t forgotten seeing Mason last night. Or him running off when we first arrived. But it’s easier to compartmentalise than risk asking and angering him, and if we’re on friendlier terms when I eventually do ask, he might answer.
“Orange juice.”
I huff a laugh. “And that’s not sweet, is it?”
Mason stares at me. Specifically, at my mouth, and I swallow my smile. His lips curve up when he looks away. “I’ve tasted much sweeter.”
The back of my neck heats, though I don’t know why. Men have said worse to me, and I’ve reacted less than this.
Emma frowns when we reach the church. “It’s almost full dark.”
“We’re safe enough,” Mason says with a shrug. He pats me on the shoulder. “Isaac dealt deftly with the only threat.”
Her entire body tenses. “Threat?”
“One zombie,” I say, turning my bat in my hand. I cleaned it after we were sure no others were coming.
“It’ll need cleaning up tomorrow,” Mason adds. “Someone will be available for that, won’t they?”
“Yeah, of course,” she says, still eyeing me with some confusion. Did she not expect we’d be able to kill them? As strange as this town and its zombies might be, they go down the same as anywhere else.
“Come on.” Mason puts his hand on my lower back to guide me into the church.
The others are all up by the altar, Callum sitting on a pew, half-watching them. Autumn is asleep next to Rae, who is sitting on her sleeping bag and chatting to Otto. Blake paces, coming to a stop when he sees me walk inside.
Dane… Where’s Dane?
A couple of the other townspeople head for the door in the vestibule. One puts his hand on it to hold it open for the woman before him and I see a flash of blue near his wrist.
“Is that where you all live?”
“It’s the safest place,” Mason says conspiratorially. “Though sometimes some of the others stay in the town if they want some space.”
“You too?”
Something complicated crosses Mason’s face. “No,” he says finally. “I stay here all the time.”
“Isaac!” Rae stands and beckons me over. I give Mason a nod before I move away and let her visually check me over. I know I’m not injured, and she quickly realises it too. “All good?”
“Saw one, but I had to kill it. Hopefully, they’ll let us all out there tomorrow now that they know we’re not going to get ourselves murdered.”
“They know that, do they?”
My shoulders tense. Dane. I don’t like that I didn’t hear him coming. Then again, I’m exhausted—I haven’t slept since the night before last. The sleeping bags look so inviting, but I need to wash up first.
“Yeah.” I keep my tone as light as possible. The sooner I deal with his mood, the sooner I can clean up and go to sleep. Someone else can take the first watch.
Whether the zombies can get up here or not, we’ll deal with it. I’ll deal with it better if I’ve had some sleep.
“You killed some, then?”
“Just the one.” I turn to face him. He’s too close, has to look down at me at a strange angle. I don’t let go of my bat. “Maybe we can all take a look tomorrow.”
“Maybe?”
I swallow down what I want to say. If they let us. That’ll just set Dane off.
Better to cut him off now before he can really dig his heels in. I swing around to Otto, who’s been studiously avoiding looking at any of us.
“Somewhere to wash up?”
Otto opens his mouth, but Mason interrupts him before he can tell me where to go.
“I have somewhere,” he says, voice sly, and I don’t know why he’s taking that tone, but I’m not impressed.
Something about his smile tells me he knows that. Can I read him that well already, or is he just showing me what he wants me to see?
“He’s not going anywhere with you,” Dane snarls, but I slam the end of my bat on the ground to cut him off.
“I have brains on my fucking face ,” I snap. “I’m going to wash up, and then I’m going to sleep. All right?”
Dane glares at me, but I really am too tired for this. At least we ate while we were out and about today. Being hungry would only make things worse.
“Go, Isaac,” Rae says, and her tone brooks no argument either. Blake has wandered over, circling us all like some kind of angry beast. “We’ll take the watches tonight. You can sleep through.”
We both know I won’t do that. I nod all the same and grab my bathing stuff out of my pack before I leave the pack by Otto’s side. He’ll keep it away from Blake, but I think Callum’s unwavering presence has him and Dane on edge anyway.
Mason leads me to that little door, which is open now, candlelight spilling out into the church. It’s grown dark since we’ve come in, and Mason grins over at me.
“I’ll go first, shall I?”
I wave him on. He huffs but descends the spiral staircase in front of me, each narrow, crumbling step steady under his feet. I juggle my shower bag into the crook of my arm where I’m holding my bat so that I can cling to the metal banister as we go.
I see no one when we reach the base, and we must be ten or fifteen feet underground now. There are lights in the distance, but Mason leads me to the right, down a narrow, draughty corridor.
“They’re not catacombs,” he says, “so you won’t find any bodies down here.”
“Right.”
“We’re not sure if they were dug out during the war. Maybe not. Not a lot to bomb around here.”
“Does it make a difference?” I’m not being terse. I’m just so tired.
Ahead of me, Mason shrugs. “Probably not.”
He takes me to a small room, obviously his, with a narrow bed and shelves crammed with knickknacks that spill over onto the floor. Another, smaller room is connected to the first, with no door, the walls and floor all made of stone.
“Might not be the kind of working bathroom you’re used to,” he says, “but it should be fine for cleaning up.”
He’s not wrong, though there’s a toilet in the corner. Someone must have dragged a table in here at some point, and there’s a steaming bowl of water atop it. A mirror’s been hung on the wall, too, and all in all, it’s not the worst place I’ve cleaned up since I started going out on jobs.
I grabbed clothes, too, but a glance to my right tells me that Mason hasn’t moved.
He’s shut the door to his room—though not quite all the way, which makes me feel a little better—and he leans against the archway that leads to the not-bathroom, not even bothering to look abashed when I glance over at him.
“You don’t have to watch.”
“What if you were somehow injured? Your team would never forgive me.”
I roll my eyes. “What’s going to injure me? The water?”
He comes into the room with me, and with the low ceiling, he’s an imposing presence as he moves to my side. He dips his fingers in the water and mock winces. “You’re right,” he says, “that might be too hot. I suppose you’ll have to wait a while.”
“Like fuck I’m doing that,” I mutter. I finally put my bat down, though on the table, where it’s within reach, and well, if Mason wants a show, I suppose he can have one.
Not like I have the energy for much else anyway and if he starts to piss me off, I can just hit him a few times. I think he’ll get the message.
He doesn’t move away as I unlace my boots, but when I bend to take them off, he falls to his knees. My lips part, and he lifts my leg.
“Here,” he says, pulling off one, then the other. I don’t even register consciously telling my legs to lift. He tugs off my socks, too, then pushes them into my boots. “Need help with anything else?”
Help? My heart sits somewhere in my throat. His touch on my feet, my calves, is so gentle. Mason gets to his feet and his hands move towards my waistband but stop short of touching.
“Any help?” he repeats. “You look exhausted.”
“Yeah, I-I didn’t sleep.” I take a step back. “I’m fine. Thank you.”
“My pleasure.”
He doesn’t look away as I strip off, but his gaze isn’t heavy in the way Dane’s is when I’m fully clothed, either.
Not even when I’m naked, when I’ve dragged out a flannel to wipe myself clean.
I’m careful to clean my face last because I’m not kidding about what I said earlier—I definitely got brains on me.
I stare at my exhausted face in the mirror.
My dark eyes are red-rimmed with how tired I am, and even though I’ve been out in sunlight all day, there’s an ashen tint to my dark skin.
My curls are all a mess, longer than I’d like, though not long enough to be a danger.
I think. I sigh and reach for my clothes. I can hardly think at all.
I’m practically swaying on my feet as I try to dress in clean clothes. Mason holds me by the hips. His fingers don’t dig in, and his hands don’t wander. “Let me help.”
I make a frustrated sound. Fuck, I’m too tired. My mind is going all fuzzy at the edges, and the thought of traipsing all the way back up those stairs seems like an impossible dream.
I can’t stay down here, though. I can’t .
“Yeah, okay,” I say roughly, and Mason murmurs his agreement. He lets go of me to grab my underwear and holds it out so I can step into it.
Part of me rebels at the treatment, eerily familiar as it is to the handful of times I’ve been truly, seriously injured.
No.
Even those times, no one was as gentle as this. Mason tugs my underwear up around my hips, careful not to let the elastic snap against my skin. He helps me with my joggers next, then gently urges my hands up to pull my T-shirt over my head.
I sway into him when it’s in place, hands landing on his forearms, and I breathe in the spicy scent of him. “You’re…” I begin. I don’t know what I mean to say.
“I’m what?” Mason asks, because of course he does; why would he leave it alone?
“I saw you,” I say. “Didn’t I?”
His fingers ghost my cheek and down to my chin. “You did.”
“You ran.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t mean for any of you to see me. But you did. You see me, Isaac.”
Not right now. My eyelids are heavy, and it’s hard to keep my eyes open. Mason notices and chuckles.
“Maybe not right now,” he says, in line with my thoughts again, and has me leaning against the table as he packs up my things. I startle awake when I think of my bat, but he never touches it.
“Take it,” he says when he sees me looking. “You’ll feel safer with it up there.”
Doubt gnaws at my stomach. “Is it really safe up there?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t let you stay up there if it wasn’t.”
“Let me?”
We’re back in the bedroom and Mason pauses in the act of reaching for the door handle. He steps in close to me and for a moment, I can’t catch my breath.
“You’ll be safe up there tonight, Isaac. I promise.”
I shouldn’t trust him. I don’t trust him.
And yet…
My lips part and there’s a wild second where if he leaned in and took my mouth, I know I’d let him do that, too.
Only a second. My senses catch up quickly and I take a shaky step back.
“Okay,” I say. “Thanks.”
“Not a problem.”
He follows me back up the stairs, still carrying my shower bag and dirty clothes, though I take them from him once we walk through the door. Callum still sits on one of the pews. He gets to his feet when he sees Mason.
The church is all deep shadows except for where my team is resting. There, our small electric lanterns keep the darkness at bay, and in the silence around us, I can hear their faint hum.
“Go rest,” Mason says when Callum reaches us. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
“Yeah, okay.”
I don’t look back at him as I cross to the altar, though I’m aware of the prickle of eyes on my back. The sensation only fades when that side door shuts. I drop on my sleeping bag, next to Otto, who is sitting with his elbows resting on his knees.
“All sorted?” Rae murmurs. Maybe she wants to ask about Mason, but she won’t. Not unless he’s a threat, and right now he seems not to be.
“Mhm.” I shove my things back in my bag and climb awkwardly into my sleeping bag.
Dane tromps over. He and Blake are apparently on the first watch.
“What did you do down there?” Dane demands.
“Cleaned up,” I reply.
“He was with you the entire time?”
“Yeah.”
“The entire time?”
The positioning of the lights makes the shadows of his face even deeper. I groan. He’s hard enough to deal with when he’s not on a jealous rampage, and I’ve never had to handle this before.
“More or less.” I hunker down. “Can I go to sleep now, or do you have more questions?”
Dane opens his mouth, but Rae is faster. “Sleep,” she says, and I don’t know what look she levels Dane with, but he quickly backs off.
“Thanks,” I mutter when he’s far enough away.
I don’t hear her reply. I curl my fingers around my bat, drag it close, then shut my eyes and drop into slumber.