Dying Breath Page 10

  “She’s protecting him from you,” Georgia insists and she looks irritated that I’m questioning her. If her jaw works any harder, some of her teeth are going to crack.

  “Test your connection.”

  “Excuse me?”

  There’s an opportunity here. It’s a gamble, but it might throw Georgia off balance, but it also puts Maisie at risk. The payoff would be worth it though, if I get Georgia to lead me to Caldwell’s body.

  She’s not in danger. Yet, Gabriel assures me as I frantically search the emotional connection for a sign of Maisie’s wellbeing. I don’t sense any fear or pain, two things I’d felt when Rachel had her face blown off.

  “Test your connection,” I say again, reassuring myself this gamble is worth it as long as Maisie isn’t at risk. I visually measure the distance between the cluster of cops and me and Georgia. They’re getting closer. I lower my voice. “If you’re connected to her emotionally, you’ll feel her. She’s on the move.”

  Georgia looks ready to spit in my face. But then her gaze slides down, and to the right. Seconds later, her brow creases. Then her eyes spring open, and her lips part.

  “She—” Her gaze flicks up to mine, her cheeks going red.

  “Yep,” I say with my best told-you-so grin. “She totally ditched him.”

  “Freeze!”

  My shield, which I’d kept at a polite smallness while talking down the hell bitch, flares to life. I whirl to find cops with their guns raised. Damn.

  “Settle down, boys,” I begin. They can’t shoot me no matter how many clips they empty. They can only draw a bunch of attention and make a big freaking mess.

  I place my hands up in front of the group creeping forward. They get close enough I can see the eyes of their guns, the black chambers where bullets would eject straight into my head if given the chance.

  It’s too close for comfort. And apparently, Georgia agrees.

  Black ribbons snap past me and strike the officers. They all collapse on contact, eyes rolling up into their heads. Their necks roll and knees give. All five hit the grass like cotton dolls tossed aside.

  “Freeze!” Someone screams. “Hands in the air!”

  Really? You’re going to keep saying that? Because it was so effective the first time.

  I whirl on Georgia. “You sure know how to keep it low-key, don’t you?”

  Only I’m not bitching at Georgia. I’m bitching at thin air.

  Georgia’s gone.

  I take off down the only narrow path between the two houses. I burst through the gate at the end of the passage and spot her. Or I spot the back of her blond hair whipping behind her as she vaults over a fence. She’s heading west, the opposite direction of Maisie.

  Bam!

  Now we’re talking. Her reaction tells me everything I need to know.

  He’s still dead.

  Her reinforcements aren’t here yet.

  Most importantly—I still have time.

  If Caldwell is surrounded by a guard, Georgia would’ve stayed and finished me. Or at the very least, she would keep me busy so Caldwell has time to wake up. If she’s running back to him, it’s because she thinks he’s vulnerable.

  Time to chase her. Time to find Caldwell. Time to take out the sadist trying to destroy the world and everyone I love in it.

  I sprint after Georgia.

  Chapter 15

  Maisie

  I can’t keep up with Sam. It’s harder than it sounds. My ankle feels a million times better now that it’s wrapped tight, but it’s still sore. And Sam’s got ridiculously long legs. I can see why this boy wants to play basketball. His body moves in a way that’s more animal than person. Very fluid. I shamble after him. It’s like I’ve suddenly got six clumsy legs all vying for the same space.

  If my inadequate body wasn’t bad enough, he’s got us going through playgrounds and back alleys.

  “They called a curfew,” Sam explains as I struggle to get my second leg over a hip-high wooden fence. He reaches back and grabs me by said hips.

  A boy’s hand on my hips nearly kills me.

  Okay, not kills me. But if I wasn’t motivated to keep my girl parts from getting impaled on a wooden fence, I’m sure I would have melted to a sack of jelly when his thumb brushes that sweet spot just below my hipbone.

  One day, I whisper to myself as he lifts me like a box of feathers and sets me down on my feet like a baby kitten. One day these hormones will pull themselves together, and I won’t be such a nonsensical loon. The internet says the teenage brain isn’t fully formed. Lucky me. How can I be expected to live like this?

  Assuming I live at all.

  My shirt slides up, and his warm palm brushes my bare stomach, which would be much sexier if I wasn’t sweating like a pig.

  “If we get caught outside our houses, we’ll be arrested. I had permission to get my stuff while they waited with my dad. The paramedics.”

  He seems totally unaware of the effect his touch has on me. Or his dimples. “Are you going to tell them who I am?”

  “I’ll say you’re...” He stops walking. “Maybe they won’t recognize you. I didn’t with all the blood.”

  “Yeah, blood. It’ll stump you every time.” But I’ve showered since then. Is he trying to politely tell me I still look like hell? Uh, thanks?

  “The Maisie Caldwell. Wow.”

  “I told you who my parents were. You saw them on the news. Don’t act surprised.”

  After a pause, I add, “You didn’t even guess it was me?”

  He shakes his head. “I don’t like to assume. You know what they say about assuming.”

  “No. What?”

  He picks me up and puts me on the other side of the next fence like nothing. Seriously? How tall is this kid?

  “It makes an a—”

  He freezes.

  “What? It makes what?”

  “It makes, uh, something.”

  “Sam.” I offer my upturned hand so he can balance himself as he lifts his own long legs over the fence. “Can I tell you something?”

  His hand stiffens in mine. “Okay.”

  “You know, I have heard curse words before.”

  He grins. A sheepish, part shy, part embarrassed grin. “My dad says it’s rude to curse in front of a lady.”

  A lady? Am I a lady? Despite the offensive image of myself in a Victorian skirt and parasol, my heart swells.

  “Well, let me tell you. My sister has a very extensive vocabulary. There’s nothing you can say that I haven’t heard before.”

  Sam’s grin tucks into the corner of his mouth again, but he never finishes telling me what assuming makes a person. I’ve heard the joke before though. And it’s a good thing, or my curiosity would be killing me right now.

  Sam’s hand seizes mine. His fingers close and I’m totally prepared to swoon.

  Okay, yeah, I’ve had a lot of time to imagine my first real kiss. I’ve kissed. But a casual snogging and a real kiss aren’t the same thing. Everybody knows that.

  I wish I was a little less sweaty, but I could be dead by tomorrow the way my day is going. So I’ll take whatever I can get.

  I come up on my toes, trying to help close the distance between our mouths. You’re supposed to keep your eyes closed when kissing, but I peek mine open to make sure our mouths are lined up.

  Sam isn’t looking at me.

  I sag.

  “If you can’t…” he begins. He looks at me and the corner of his lips tug into a deeper frown. “If you can’t bring him back, it’s okay. I don’t expect…I…”

  I turn to see what he’s looking at. His eyes are fixed on the ambulance parked on the adjacent street. The back doors are open and inside the ambulance, a gurney sits. The distinct shape of a body rests under the sheet as a paramedic sits perched on the step, smoking. Vapor rises around his head, mingling with the heat.

  Smoking? A paramedic!

  Aren’t medical professionals supposed to know better?

  “This will
work.” I squeeze his hands. Please Azrael, let that be true.

  Sam squeezes my hand again. “There they are. But I’m not sure how to get you over there without you being seen. The second they see you, they’re going to bring the police down on us.”

  He falls back against the building, shielding us from view. The smell of campfire lingers in the air. I turn peer around the corner and see a forest of charred buildings.

  It’s practically a big Jesse was here sign.

  It looks like most of the emergency crews have managed to stop the blaze. A few buildings are smoking, but the flames have gone out.

  Why did Jesse have to blow up the town? I thought she was going to be more careful with her fire stuff. She’d promised Ally. I can’t believe she’d break a promise to Ally without a really, really good reason. So, what happened? Was she trying to reach me? Surely it was for her own protection. She can’t possibly believe I’m important enough to burn a town down for.

  I tell myself not to be stupid. I’m not that important to anyone. Yet I can’t help but feel a flutter in my chest. I replay Jesse reaching out to me, begging me to jump out of the speeding truck.

  She made me feel important then.

  Maisie.

  Jesse calls out to me. I want to go to her. I do. But there’s something I must do first. Sam needs his dad.

  Azrael’s power flares. It’s the smell of metal. The smell of blood and cinnamon.

  I turn to Sam, expectant, knowing whatever he says next will be her influence talking.

  “I’ve got it!” His eyes brighten. “I know how to distract them, and draw them away from the ambulance. Once the coast is clear, go in and do your thing.”

  Do my thing. Wow. My superpower sounded much cooler the way he put it. It’s like I have a highly specialized technical skill, one honed after years of hard work and craftsmanship. In reality, I blow into someone’s nose. That’s it. It doesn’t require a medical degree.

  “Ready?” Sam asks.

  I squeeze his hand back. I’m getting used to the fact that he’s a hand squeezer. Every time he pumps my hand with his, it doesn’t mean he’s about to French me. Sad face. “What if they arrest you or something?”

  Sam shrugs. “I’m not going to break any laws. And I’m fast.”

  Not what I want to hear. “Don’t run. Only guilty people run.”

  “Can you do it or not?”

  “Yes,” I say, feeling defensive.

  “How much time do you need?”

  “A minute tops.” With the whole conjuring the power part, it doesn’t take long to huff into a couple of nostrils. Sam’s dad should start breathing right away, and breathing is what Sam needs to see. When Ally died, it’s what Jesse needed too…and probably anyone who has ever lost a person they loved. If they can see the person breathing again, that’s when they start to believe everything is going to be okay.

  “Here we go.” Sam steps out from our hiding place between the buildings and approaches the ambulance.

  His head is down, and shoulders slumped. He slips his hands into his pockets and kicks a rock in the road. The smiley, hopeful boy holding my hand is transformed.

  The smoking paramedic sees him first and straightens, flicking his cigarette away.

  Sam stops short of him and gestures into the back of the truck. I’m waiting to see what he might say. What crazy line he might use to get the paramedic to leave his post and give me access to the body…to Sam’s dad.

  Sam’s shoulders suddenly hitch, and he begins to cry. I can see the tears glittering on his cheeks from here. He’s pointing at something down the alley adjacent to ours. He’s touching his chest and flailing his arms. The paramedic’s mouth parts in surprise, his lower lip going soft.

  Wow. Either Sam’s drawing on his honest to goodness sadness, or he’s a great actor. Hey, if this whole ball player thing doesn’t work out, then maybe he can take up acting.

  The paramedic and Sam start hurrying toward the alley—if that’s what you want to call the narrow passage between a row of charred buildings. I can’t help but think of alleys in Chicago, which are three or four times larger than these little pathways.

  I wait, breathing heavy in the mounting heat as I watch them hurry away. The ambulance sits there, completely unguarded. I can see straight into the back of the vehicle, and the lumpy form under the white sheet.

  Sam’s eyes flick to mine before he turns down the alley, and he flashes me a wicked grin.

  Naughty boy.

  The second the paramedic and Sam step out of view, I move. I give the area one good look, searching for anyone who might stop me. Seeing no one, I dash toward the open door. I’m like one of those power-walking grannies as I hustle to the back of the ambulance and heft myself inside.

  I have to lift my leg pretty high to clear the first step and then hold onto a silver handle by the door to pull myself up all the way. Grit from my sneakers grates audibly against the platform.

  No one stands in the sandy street. No cops or bystanders are rushing to yank me out of ambulance. If anyone saw me, they don’t care enough to stop me. I quickly reach for the door handle and pull it shut. I don’t want anyone to look inside and see me molesting a man’s corpse. I duck down and keep my head below the window. I don’t want anyone to see me through the back window of the ambulance either.

  With the door shut, the heat doubles immediately. And with it, the rate of decomposition. If I don’t hurry, Sam’s dad is going to stink.

  A little creeped out to be shut into the back of the ambulance with a dead body, I keep breathing, trying to calm down. But the air is stagnant and thick, giving me the feeling I can’t quite draw a full breath. Or it’s the anxiety of, you know, hanging out with a dead guy.

  “This is fine, totally fine,” I say as I kneel beside the sheet. “It’s not like he’s going to pop up and eat you. This isn’t Dawn of the Dead.”

  The body twitches, and I scream. I clamp a hand over my mouth and leap back, slamming my head on the edge of a cabinet. White hot shock and pain spiderwebs through my skull. I swear again, placing a hand over the burning wound.

  Every swear word I can think of pours out of me as I stumble around, eyes pinched shut, viciously rubbing the new hole in my head.

  “Christ on a cracker! It was a twitch!” I scold myself. Dead bodies twitch. Dead bodies move. Dead bodies fart. Quit acting like a wimp and do this!

  I’m not sure if my pep talk is working because while I do manage to open my eyes and stop rubbing my head, I am not able to approach the lumpy dead guy right away.

  I lean forward and yank the sheet off his face in a single swipe.

  I exhale. Whew. That’s better. No ghastly wounds. No horrific gobs of blood or brain to contend with. Just a man, lying there, looking like he’s enjoying his afternoon nap.

  “Hey,” I say, because it’s only polite to say hi. I’m kind of interrupting. “I’m Maisie.”

  He doesn’t say anything. I’m not sure if I need someone’s informed consent to bring them back from the dead, and it feels a little weird to be thinking about it now.

  I lean in and peer into his face.

  He’s older than I expected him to be. I’m not sure if it’s because I compare all parents to my parents, and my parents look young. It’s the NRD and dying. We age differently. When we die and come back to life, our cells remake themselves, all brand new. It’s like the perfect anti-aging spa treatment. If you can get over the whole pooping on yourself when you die thing, it’s the best anti-aging option on the market.

  Even though they don’t look alike, our parents are probably the same age. Sam’s dad has bushy gray eyebrows and wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. The stubble on his jaw and upper lip is gray too, with lots of little lines around his mouth. Dad’s barely got some crow’s feet.

  I run a fingertip across one of the lines.

  Is this what Mom would look like now? If things were different? Would she have gray in her hair? Lines by her mouth?
>
  I can’t help but wonder if I’m screwing with fate by bringing a person back. What if someone as old as Sam’s dad is supposed to be dead and I bring him back? Am I threatening the very fabric of existence? What if Sam’s dad wakes up, and it causes an earthquake to rock the other side of the world and kill a hundred people?

  I wonder if I’m naturally paranoid, or if I’m so used to crazy things happening that my anxiety is conditioned.

  But if I’m not supposed to use this gift, then why do I have it? Why give me the ability to feel someone die, and the power to reverse it, unless I’m supposed to help people? I’m not the one who broke the rules. Someone else did when they gave me this power in the first place.

  I lean over his bristled face. “Hope you don’t regret this. Mr…” I fail to recall his name. “Mr. Sam’s Dad.”

  I close my eyes and reach down inside of me. There’s a cold stone in there. It sits near my belly button. It’s always there, waiting, but when I concentrate on it, it grows hot in my belly. I inhale and the stone glows like an ember. The power emitting from it swells with the oxygen I pull inside myself. Air slides over these coals, catches fire, and burns. As I exhale the air into the man’s nose, it’s not my air. By passing the air over the warm coals in my guts, the air is changed. It becomes infused with magic and life somehow.

  I inhale again and the ember brightens. My chest and throat grow hot with it as I expel a second breath. By the third inhalation, my insides feel alive, like a fire eater who’s stuck a flaming stick down her throat. But I breathe anyway and release it into his nose.

  I feel the spark.

  The stone in Sam’s dad reignites with my borrowed sparks and begins to burn again, he’s alive. This life swells, the ember glows with flame. The flame swelling to something substantial enough to burn on its own.

  I lean back, a little light-headed. I always lose my breath during this.

  I sit for a second, waiting for the dream-like quality of the ambulance to refocus into something resembling real-time reality.

  Then the idea of time hits me. I’ve been in this ambulance way too long. Holding onto the handle of the cabinet door, I pull myself up. The cabinet door swings open under the strain of my weight, and I glimpse bandages and breathing equipment wrapped in plastic.