Chapter 18 #2
I steel myself as Chessa approaches, fury written in every line of her face.
“Where the hell were you?” she demands in a loud whisper, folding her arms across herself. “You said you would stay with Carter!”
Then, before I can even respond, she bursts into tears.
“Shit.” My hands flap helplessly at my sides for a second because I’m not sure what to do between the conflicting signals of anger and sadness. Then I finally take a chance and reach out to hug her. Gingerly. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I … had some stuff to do and I—”
Chessa jerks back from me, eyes red and overflowing through her visibly smudged and blurry glasses. “Excuse me? You had stuff to do?”
Great job, Jo. “I was just trying to find out what happened with Lennie and I—”
“Did you ever think that I would be worried about you, too?” Chessa asks. “You’re the one who was talking about murder yesterday. Lennie’s dead, Daan is…” Her throat works convulsively. “And you promised, you promised you would stay in touch—”
She holds her hand up and then stalks off in the opposite direction, disappearing down a hallway on the other side of the lounge.
“Chessa!” I stare after her. I’ve seen her upset before. But Chessa upset is Chessa yelling, crying, then dropping into “solve everything” mode. Assess the problem logically, create a plan of attack, and execute. She’s practical, almost clinical. Her fury burns hot but clean.
I’ve never seen her walk away before, as if it’s all too much.
“Just give her a second. It’s been a rough night,” Carter says, his hands stuffed into his jeans pockets.
Misplaced irritation flares in me, and I want to push back at him. Who is he to tell me what Chessa, my friend, needs? Last I checked, she didn’t even like him.
Except … he’s the one who answered her call, the one who came to the hospital to sit with her when she couldn’t get me.
Carter looks worn out, his normally perfect hair ruffled from where he’s been running his hands through it. His crumpled button-down shirt is not the same one as yesterday, this one a solid blue, but it looks like it came straight out of the laundry basket, creases and all.
“Hi,” I manage.
His lips quirk upward. “Hi.” He reaches out and flips up the collar on the peacoat I’m wearing, his peacoat. “Nice coat.”
“Thanks.” I grimace. “I didn’t mean to—”
He pulls his hands from his pockets and tugs me into him in one swift motion. “Jesus, Jocasta. You scared the shit out of me.” His voice is muffled against the top of my head. His larger body quakes slightly against mine, giving truth to his words.
Stunned, I automatically wrap my arms around him.
The heat of him sinks into me, even through all of our layers, and I feel warm and safe for the first time in hours.
“It’s okay, I’m okay.” My cheek rests against his chest, and the steady thrum of his heart is the soothing lullaby I’ve been missing.
But I’m also struggling to readjust my understanding of reality to encompass this moment.
What is this world, where Carter is hugging me in public? Where we might be seen? And it’s not one of those awkward, back patting, no-lower-body-contact hugs that you see between colleagues or distant family members.
His arms are tight around me, his head bent over mine. I’m enveloped by him, wrapped in his clean laundry scent mixed with pine and citrus. My hands are clutching at the back of his shirt. This is all I’ve ever wanted.
But also, there is no mistaking this body language, should anyone be trying to read it. Short of making out on the quad, I can’t imagine a more scandalous scenario, one that Carter would have previously rejected, keeping a careful, polite distance.
His hand slides up my back and under my hair, his thumb resting under my jaw lightly. It sends a delighted shiver through me.
“All this crazy stuff is happening,” he murmurs against my hair. “And I had no idea where you were, or who—” he stops and straightens up abruptly, his attention caught by something behind me.
More likely someone.
Damnit. I squeeze my eyes shut for a second, then open them and step back, out of his embrace.
“Carter Lowden, this is Devon.” I turn to include Devon in my vague introductory hand gesture. It dawns on me then that I have absolutely no idea what Devon’s last name is, assuming he has one that isn’t like Child of Aphrodite or something else strange, assigned by the cult.
Carter’s eyes narrow, and he pulls me closer to his side protectively.
“It’s okay,” I say. “He had nothing to do with what happened to Lennie.”
“Yeah?” Carter asks, sounding less than convinced.
“And he’s, um, a friend.”
Devon glances from me to Carter and then back again, a slow smile spreading across his face.
“A good friend,” Devon says, with an audacious wink at me, his flirty guy mask firmly back in place.
Well, fuck. My face goes hot. Of course Devon can pick up on the vibes between Carter and me, but it would be lovely if he could be a little less obvious about it. Or amused by it.
Devon holds out a hand for Carter to shake, which Carter does, reluctantly.
“Devon has been, uh, helping me,” I add brightly. God, why does everything I say sound like we’ve been holed up in a cheap motel doing drugs and unspeakable things to each other? Only the cheap motel part of that is true.
“Helping you with what?” Carter asks. His tone is light, but his brow is furrowed in a frown.
I’m making this worse by the second.
“Just comparing notes,” Devon answers without hesitation. “Seeing if we can piece together what happened on Friday night.” But the amusement has vanished from Devon’s expression. Instead, he’s got his head tipped to one side, eyeing Carter with a hardened edge of curiosity.
Carter is staring back at him with much the same expression.
I roll my eyes. Oh, come on. Are they really doing this now?
I clear my throat. “Carter, can you tell me what happened to Daan?” I ask, since Chessa hasn’t yet returned from the bathroom or wherever she went to get away from me.
Fresh hurt slices through me, like a forgotten paper cut in a bath of hand sanitizer. I need to fix things with her, but I’m not sure how, not without lying even more.
“I don’t know everything,” Carter says after a moment, relenting in his staring contest with Devon to turn his attention back to me.
“I think the authorities are still investigating. But supposedly, a gas main exploded last night, tore up the street between the Foreign Language House and Greek Row. While the fire department was there checking things out, they found Daan and one of his residents outside on the ground. They’d collapsed.
” He hesitated. “Everyone else inside was dead. They think that Daan and the other kid, Emile, I think, survived because they were still awake.”
“Carbon monoxide,” Devon says, not bothering to hide his skepticism.
Visibly irritated, Carter jerks his head in a nod. “That’s the theory, but as I said, they’re still investigating.”
I make a frustrated noise. None of this is right.
I get the gas main explosion and the carbon monoxide leak stories—they’re just stories.
Humans trying to put the pieces together in a way that makes sense to them.
They don’t have the full picture so they’re trying to work with what they’ve got.
Just like they did when they made up tales about vampires seeking blood and gods who demanded a sacrifice.
All it tells me, though, is that it likely isn’t a War spawn or even Sanguine. No blood, no violence.
But what does that mean? Lennie’s death and the attack on Izzy at Delta Pi Gamma definitely included both of those elements. So does that mean more than one spawn is involved?
I picture Devon’s campus sketch in my mind, with the now torn up road and added splashes of red near the Foreign Language House. Again, on Old Campus. Again, right where I’d been. Hours earlier.
This is clearly more of the same.
But if this was meant to be an attack on someone I care about, to scare me or motivate me to surrender, how is Daan one of the only survivors? Obviously, I don’t want anyone on campus dead, but to come so close and not follow through? I’m not understanding the strategy here.
Also, why keep hiding? Why not just come at me directly, like JT did?
Maybe several spawn are colluding. But why? Power isn’t an issue, obviously. Whoever is doing this is plenty strong enough. So it’s not like these sneak attacks are necessary.
Sharp-edged panic swells in me. Make it make sense!
“I met that detective,” Carter adds, startling me out of my thoughts.
“Morales?” As if there would be another one.
He nods. “She came by not long after I got here. I guess she heard about the explosion and came to check on the survivors. She seemed extremely interested in where you were. I guess someone saw you at that sorority house when…” He pauses.
“A girl jumped from the roof yesterday. She … she didn’t survive. ”
Izzy. Fuck, fuck, fuck! I was so hoping …
Lennie, Izzy, Daan’s residents, Daan himself. Who will be next?
A weight settles on my chest. It now seems more inevitable than ever that there will be a “next.” This isn’t going to stop unless I stop it.
But I don’t know how.
A wave of helplessness washes over me. I’ve done everything I know to do.
All the other spawn found me without issue, even if they didn’t approach right away.
Why is this one different? Even Devon doesn’t seem to understand what’s happening.
And in the time it takes us to figure it out, more people are going to die.
Aadesh at Theta Iota, my friend Carly who has classes in the old art building on Old Campus, random students who happen by at the wrong time … Carter. Chessa.
The pressure in my chest increases until it feels like a fist is clenching around my heart, digging its nails in. Fuck my father for doing this. For doing this and then not even bothering to contact me or show up.
I step away from Carter, shaking my head. “I need to go back to campus,” I say, more to myself than anyone else. I can’t stand around here and wait. I have to do something.
Plus, the fact that the incidents are all limited to Old Campus, that has to mean something. Right? Maybe if I look at everything again, visit all the locations on Devon’s sketch, I’ll see something I missed before.
Assuming I don’t get arrested by Morales the second I set foot there.
Right.
“Aren’t you going to see Daan first?” Chessa asks.
I turn, startled. I hadn’t even seen her return. She’s waiting at the far edge of the lounge, arms still folded tightly across her middle. Her eyes, red and swollen, are narrowed in suspicion.
“I feel like that’s the least you could do before disappearing again to ‘do stuff,’” she says. “He would visit you. Hell, he would probably stay until the nurses kicked him out.”
My throat tightens. “Of course,” I say hoarsely. “Of course I’m going to see him.”
She nods, but it’s clear she doesn’t believe me.
The worst part is, she’s right—I don’t want to see Daan like this. I just want to take action, fix everything, and get back to normal. I guess Chessa and I aren’t that different in that regard.
But I don’t know if there’s a “normal” to get back to anymore. And I owe Daan this, if nothing else.
I pull my phone from my pocket and set it on the nearest table, obeying the rules posted on the wall. Then I head for the double doors in the corner, my stomach leaden with dread.
It’s time to face up to the consequences of my decisions.