Pitch

CHAPTER NINETEEN

The lights were on inside the school. The hallways, the cafeteria, every classroom – even the bathrooms were all illuminated with a searing glow that hurt my eyes. I had grown accustomed to the darkness so quickly I had forgotten how weak human’s eyes must be that we required every little nook and cranny to be lit up like it was high noon.

Side by side Maximus and I strolled down the middle of the main hallway. I peeked sideways at him under my lashes. As always he looked calm. Confident. Cocky, even, if I judged him by the slight swagger of his hips. I wished I felt the same.

Instead my palms were sweating so much it was hard to keep a good grip on the gun Maximus had returned to me and my heart was thumping so loudly it was a wonder Angelique didn’t hear us coming a mile away. Or maybe she did. She struck me as a cat and mouse kind of predator. One who watched her prey walk by, let them start to feel safe, and then WHAM shredded them to pieces with her claws.

We passed by my old locker. I couldn’t help but slow down in front of it and let my fingertips slide across the cool metal. So many lockers. So many students. So many classmates and friends and teachers. Had any of them survived?

The sound of a door slamming ricocheted down the hall, piercing the eerie silence.

I couldn’t help it. I screamed. The same thing happened when I saw a snake slithering through the grass. Someone could tell me it was there, but one glimpse of its wiggling body and I would scream anyways.

Maximus reacted with a bit more maturity. Wrapping his arm around my waist he pushed me behind him, shielding me with his body. “Stay back,” he said tersely, as if I was thinking about running off down the hall by myself.

Tense silence, and then…

Laughter.

It rang through the hall, gleeful and menacing all at the same time. Vomit rose in the back of my throat and I swallowed it reflexively, trying not to gag on the taste. Angelique. I would recognize that laugh anywhere. After all, it in my dreams every night.

Someone whimpered. It wasn’t until Maximus looked over his shoulder that I realized it had been me. Eyes dark with concern, he traced his fingertips under my jaw, lifting my chin until our eyes met, mine wide and terrified, his dark and solemn.

“You’re going to be fine Lola,” he vowed. “I would never let anything happen to you.”

Panic rolled over me like a black thundercloud, extinguishing the light that had shimmered briefly in the form of courage. Courage I didn’t have. Courage I had never had. “I can’t do this,” I gasped, shaking my head from side to side. “I can’t. I can’t. I’m too scared.”

Maximus simply folded me in his arms and cradled my head against his chest like I was a child. His hands skimmed across my back, running up and down in a gesture meant to comfort and soothe. “You’re the bravest one of them all,” he whispered against my ear. “You always have been.”

“Isn’t this so sweet. It brings tears to my eyes” a voice drawled, thick as honey. Angelique. She was here. She had found us.

I jerked free from Maximus’s embrace. He ducked and spun, a natural fighter, a practiced killer. Unfortunately I wasn’t quite as graceful under pressure.

The gun in my hand bucked as it discharged. I shrieked and flung it away from me. The bullet I had shot wildly into the air zinged past Angelique’s head by mere inches before plowing into the wall at the end of the hallway.

“Bitch!” she cried, her ice blue eyes flaring. “You could have shot me!”

“That would be the general idea,” I said shakily.

Angelique’s hands flicked down the sides of her skin tight red sequined gown, her nails glittering black under the fluorescent lights. She had certainly dressed up for the occasion, I thought as I studied her. Floor length dress, glossy brown hair curled into ringlets, cherry red lips. If I didn’t know any better I would assume she was going to the prom.

Catching me staring, Angelique’s mouth curled in a sneer, revealing the silver fangs that marked her as a monster. “I don’t recall writing two invitations,” she said, glancing over at Maximus who stood beside me, every muscle in his body tensed and ready to spring.

“I’m crashing the party,” he said.

“That’s not very nice,” Angelique pouted. She stepped forward. Maximus did the same. I stood rooted to the spot, unable to move as they began to circle each other, their eyes locked with the deadly intensity of two wolves squaring off for the kill.

Shoot her, I begged Maximus silently. Just kill her and get it over with. But when I glanced down at his hands I saw they were empty of any weapon and my gun, the one I had foolishly tossed away from me like an idiot, was on the other side of Angelique, well out of reach. I still had the smaller one, but I didn’t want to play all my cards. Not yet. Not until I knew where Travis was.

“You marked her,” Maximus said to Angelique, so softly I could barely hear.

“I should have killed her like I did the rest.” Angelique’s shoulders jerked in a little shrug. “But she was so delightfully willful. It would have been a shame not to play with her first.”

Maximus made a low growling noise in his throat. “She is not a toy.”

A smile spread slowly across Angelique’s face and in that moment, even though she was everything evil and ugly and wrong, she was beautiful too. “Ah, but she is Maximus.”

Maximus? How did she know his name?

“There is no reason for you to get involved,” Angelique continued. “The girl is here. Obviously she has agreed to my terms. Herself for the weakling. What else is there to discuss?”

“Where is Travis?” I said loudly. “Is he here? Is he okay? What have you done to him?”

In unison they stopped and spun to face me. Maximus looked furious. Angelique simply laughed and brought her hands together.

“See?” she beamed over her fingertips. “So deliciously unafraid. I haven’t had a pet like that in ages, Maximus. And to find one in the first town… Why, that’s unprecedented!”

Find one in the first town? What did that mean? “Maximus?” I said uncertainly. “What is she talking about?”

“Oooo,” Angelique cooed breathlessly. “You haven’t told her? Naughty, naughty boy.”

Maximus jerked his head to the side, but not before I saw the flicker of guilt pass over his face. “Nothing,” he said. “It’s not important. It doesn’t matter now.”

“Tell me,” I insisted. “What did she mean, first town?”

“She meant,” Angelique purred when Maximus remained silent, “that your little pathetic town is the Origin, darling. The first. A beta test, if you will. To see if we could do it. To see how fast ten thousand people could be slaughtered.” Her head tipped to the side and she frowned. “Much faster than we ever anticipated. Not much fun at all, actually. You didn’t exactly put up a fight.”

My head spun. “You mean – the rest of the world – they aren’t – you didn’t…”

“Slice them open, drink their blood, and destroy their homes? No,” she said sweetly. “I’m afraid not. Oh, don’t look so crestfallen, darling. We will do it. Tonight, in fact. If ten of us can do this in one night, just imagine what ten million can do in a week.”

Ten? All those people dead, an entire town wiped out, and there had only been ten of them? I staggered back, floundering under the weight of all of this new knowledge. Everywhere else… the rest of the world… Safe. Not destroyed, not dead, not yet, at least. Just one town. My town.

My mom. My sister. Still alive. Relief flowed through me, followed immediately by an anger so powerful I trembled.

“You knew,” I accused Maximus, stabbing my finger at him. “You knew it was just happening here. We could have… we could have gotten away! We could have escaped but you told us to stay.” I spat out the words like poisoned darts. Maximus flinched and stepped towards me, one armed stretched out.

“Lola, you don’t understand, it would not have made a -”

“No. NO! I’m getting Travis and we’re leaving. We’re going to go tell everyone what happened here and you,” I spat, cutting my eyes to Angelique, “are going to pay for what you’ve done.”

She ran a fingernail across her lower lip, drawing it down as she considered my words. “Is that so?” she said thoughtfully.

“That is exactly so,” I said.

“Oh, little pet.” She clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and shook her head. “I am so terribly sorry, but I simply cannot let you do that. Warning the rest of the world would be bad for business, you see. Ruin the element of surprise and all that. And we’ve been working so hard on this surprise.”

I ripped out the gun from my back pocket and pointed it right at the middle of her forehead. “The way I see it, you don’t have much of a choice. Now put your hands behind your head and stand against the lockers or I’ll shoot you dead, I swear I will.” Please don’t let her see my hands are shaking.

“I am not very fond of threats,” she said before she lunged for my throat.