FIVE #4
As it was, the back door cracks under another hit from the persistent Zeds, so I shove the gun into my holster and pull my knife free instead. “We can’t shoot unless we want the whole neighborhood to come for a nighttime barbecue.”
“Right again,” Kaito quips.
Sending him another look, I mutter, “Why did you sound surprised?”
“I didn’t,” he argues quickly, shaking his head just as fast.
“You did,” I counter, apparently itching for a fight today with anything that isn’t a Zed.
Kaito sighs. “I’m bleeding too much to argue with you about it.”
“Oh, great,” I quip, putting on a falsely cheerful voice while maintaining its false depth. “There’s finally a benefit.”
This time, he laughs. It’s quiet and rough, but it’s so very real, and it lands with a whole lot of warmth. Far more than I anticipated, and I lie to myself about hating it just to make myself feel better.
The door cracks again, and my heart hiccups in my chest just as Kaito suggests, “Window?”
I shake my head. “That won’t work. It’s too loud, slow, and there are too many jagged edges to safely get out.”
“How about upstairs?” he tries, jumping from one plan to the other without skipping a beat. Damn it, I don’t want to be impressed.
Peering around, I answer distractedly, “Bathroom window onto the porch roof. But if we go up, we’re trapped up there. Unless we cross to the next house.”
“Think we can?” he questions.
It’s then I give him more of my attention, eyeing him carefully before I answer. “I can.”
He looks at me, and I make a deal of looking down at his bleeding side, the bandage growing darker the longer he leaves it unattended. It very clearly needs to be stitched, and there’s no hiding the tightness around his eyes that tells me he’s in more pain than he’s trying to display.
Kaito exhales slowly before nodding once with determination. “I can do it.”
My lips twitch under my bandana. “That almost sounded convincing.”
“I’m working on it,” he jokes, but it lands a little flat when the door gives another warning groan.
Reaching for the stupid ceramic bunny, I shove it into Kaito’s hands. He blinks down at it, a little startled and a whole lot confused. “What am I meant to do with this?”
I shrug. “I don’t know, live up to your potential?”
Then I move, yanking open the kitchen drawer right next to the sink. I pull free the line of cutlery I twisted together yesterday, hooking it around the back door handle. There’s no hope that it’ll hold for long, but it very well might hold long enough to slow the door when it finally breaks.
Kaito watches intently before I see the lightbulb finally flash above his head, understanding coming to him quickly enough for him to step closer and wedge one shoulder against the wall near the door instead of the door itself.
Very good. He learns fast.
Suddenly, the glass pane nearest the latch cracks and a gray hand shoves through.
I waste no time in slamming my knife down into the wrist, pinning it grossly to the frame.
The Zed shrieks, a wet, furious sound that fills the kitchen.
Kaito follows it by bringing down the bunny on its skull, and the ceramic explodes into hundreds of shards.
The Zed falls out of sight and, for a whole second, Kaito and I both stare at the shattered remains of the ugliest bunny in the apocalypse.
Then Kaito jokes, “Consider my potential filled.”
I actually despise the laugh that bursts out of me. It’s small, sharp, and gone just as quickly as it came, but it still happens. And it’s made worse when Kaito looks at me as if I’ve just gifted him something precious enough to handle with delicate hands in case it breaks.
I’ll be eaten by Zeds if my chest doesn’t tighten at the sight, too.
Wait. Nope. Not happening. Absolutely not.
Thankfully, another Zed slams into the door, and the moment dies a swift and blessed death.
Snapping my eyes back to Kaito, I blurt, “Move.”
And boy, do we move. I lead the Alpha through the hall, skipping the screaming floorboard at the very last second.
He steps exactly where I step without once being told, following after me closely.
The door behind us cracks open as the cutlery line snaps harshly, and wood splinters while Zeds groan louder now, hungry and much too close.
I hit the stairs hard and fast, adrenaline pumping through me now that the threat has broken into the place I was hoping would shelter me for the night. Halfway up, my knee twinges painfully from the playground fall, and I catch the railing with a hiss through gritted teeth.
Kaito’s hand lifts behind me as though he has the intention to steady me, and I whip around with my knife raised at the ready. He freezes instantly, hand open in a show that he means no harm. The expression on his face weirdly isn’t one of irritation, but more one of apology.
“Don’t,” I bite out.
He lowers his hand and nods in understanding. “Understood.”
And then a Zed reaches the bottom of the stairs, my eyes catching its cloudy ones over Kaito’s shoulder. It defuses any argument that might have come from the strange moment, keeping it gloriously brief before we fucking bolt up the stairs like our asses are on fire.