Inbetween

Chapter 24

Finn Maeve. I may not have been able to see her, but I could feel the wintry chill trickling down my spine.

The whisper of nearness that another soul left across my skin. I made my way through the menagerie of cars, letting the soft pull in my veins guide me. To my right, I heard a shrill peal of laughter echo across the lot. I catapulted over a car, heading in the direction of the sound, then stopped. The chill faded and the pull tugged me in the opposite direction. I spun around, shaking my head, trying to clear it. To get some focus.

“Maeve!” I rounded another car and started across the lot. “I know you’re out there.” But the pull faded again, and then pulsed with life, tugging me in the opposite direction. What the hell? I rolled my shoulders and gritted my teeth. Get it together, Finn. I stopped, looking for anything—the hint of a red shimmer, a spark of silver—anything to tell me which way to turn. There were too many people here.

Too many ways for her to bait me. Realization hit me.

She’s trying to bait me.

I spun around, slid over the hood of a yellow Volkswagen. I had to get back to Emma-“Looking for someone?”

I froze at the sound of Maeve’s voice. She stood on the roof of an old pickup that once upon a time had probably been red. Now it was mottled with rust and made creaking sounds every time the kids inside moved.

“There are so many options here. So many ways to die, don’t you think?” She tapped her finger on her chin, calling attention to the black veins standing out on her throat. A dull silver color was strangling the lively red from her hair one strand at a time.

“Don’t do something stupid just to prove a point,” I said.

Maeve glared at me. Her black pupils ate up the green that had once been around them. “And what point is that? That I have wasted the past seventeen years of my existence for something that should have been mine in the first place? Well, no more waiting, Finn. I’m taking what’s mine tonight.”

What? Her words tumbled around inside my head before clicking into place. She didn’t want just anyone’s body, she wanted…Emma’s?

She twitched as the right side of her face morphed into a screaming shadow before returning to pale-colored skin again. She grabbed the sides of her face and an agonized scream exploded from her throat. She was about to turn. I slipped my scythe out of its holster and climbed onto the hood.

“You’re not taking anything.”

Maeve straightened her back and laughed, the shadow flickering over her features. Before I could blink, she leapt over me, what was left of her red shimmer blurring across the dead black sky. I spun around, looking up, down, left, right, until the stars in the sky blurred together. Where could she have gone? What was she-An ice-cold hand wrapped around my ankle and jerked me off the hood of the pickup. I landed on my back. Swirled into nothing resembling a man. I focused on pulling myself back together, and when I did, Maeve was standing over me, red hair blowing around her pale freckled face. Rage had consumed her to the point she was shaking. I glanced at her hand. It was wrapped around a blade. My blade. My scythe. It looked so awkward in her white fist. Mine felt so incredibly empty without it.

“Maeve…” I held my hand up and tried to ease up. “Don’t do—” She swung out. The blade sliced through my thigh, and all that existed was pain. I clutched at my thigh and groaned. Black oozed from between my fingers, glittering like stars in the night.

“Oh, does that hurt? Poor little reaper. Maybe you should have picked someone else’s life to ruin. I could be happy right now! I could be alive. I could be in love. I didn’t get the chance to have any of that my first life. And you made sure I’d never have it again. You call me a bad person, Finn? What about you? You walk around like there’s a halo on your goddamned head, but you’re just as bad as me and we both know it.”

“Her time was up!” I shouted, panic and anger fighting for a place in my chest. I clutched my head to stop everything from spinning. “You could have had another chance!”

“Once my name was called, it was over for me, too. There was no second chance for me. There never is, but you didn’t stop to find that out before you ruined my life, did you? But now…now, I’m taking my chance. If I can get into her body, there is no way in hell I’ll let you take it from me again.”

I opened my mouth, but stopped, processing her words. Take it from her? Scout said a possession would only last a few hours. This didn’t make sense…unless she’d found a way to make it permanent.

No. She couldn’t have. I had to believe that. “That’s not even possible. Just…think about this. Think about—”

“I’m done thinking about it!” A shadow slithered over her face and she sobbed. The black veins in her neck pulsed with darkness. “Look what you did to me!”

She swung my scythe again and I grabbed her wrist. Twisted her until she landed on top of me. The blade clattered to the ground. She screamed and turned to a vapor in my grasp.

“Maeve!” I shouted, grabbing my scythe and shoving it into my holster. I vaulted to my feet, and my vision blurred out of focus. The anger was burning me up. Turning my insides to ash. “You want the truth?” I spun around and stumbled. “I don’t regret it. I’m not sorry. You didn’t deserve that body.

And there is no way in Hell I’d let you have it now!”

An engine started behind me and roared to life. I turned on my heel and squinted into the headlights that engulfed me. There wasn’t anyone inside. How…

The car leaped into action, accelerating, and I stumbled back. I barely had time to think. I focused on making myself solid, lunging for the young blond girl carrying a box of popcorn in the car’s path, but spilled right through her. I flexed my fingers and they scattered like stars. I couldn’t keep it together. Couldn’t touch her…

I took a deep breath and shouted, “Move!” She spun around in time to see the car and horror registered across her face. She stumbled back out of the way, falling into the gravel.

Across the lot another engine roared to life. I staggered through the cars. The groaning sounds of the undead on the screen filled my ears. The thought of Emma being in this parking lot while Maeve was going on a rampage made my head spin and my legs pump a little faster. The car revved, churning a cloud of dust into the air, and rolled forward. I ground to a halt in front of the car, expected it to fly through me like everything else, but it stopped, the bumper an inch from touching my chest.

I bent over and grabbed my knees, dizzy. The hole in my thigh oozed and ran down my leg. I couldn’t stay like this. I felt… I closed my eyes and focused, but no matter how hard I tried I could feel myself losing it. Energy was leaking out of me, leaving me wispy and weak. I’d never been this drained. I limped over to Cash’s Bronco, slid through the metal and into the seat. “Get Cash to take—” My lips froze around the words. Emma was gone.

I grabbed the door handle, hoping to catch Cash’s attention, but my fingers slid right through it.

Trembling, I reached out and tried to knock the bag out of his hands. Nothing. She’d drained me.

Something hot swept through my chest. Panic. Terror. She’d planned this. Set me up to fail so she could get to Emma. I slid back through the door of the Bronco and looked across the crowded lot.

Maeve was out there. So was Emma. And there was nothing I could do about it.