Lukas relaxed his grip and Jared scrambled away from him, coughing. “Don’t worry, Luk. You made your point.”
Lukas stood up and wiped the blood off his face with his sleeve before he walked away.
I knelt down next to Jared, and he dropped his head. “He’s right.”
“About what?”
“How close I came to getting us killed.”
I didn’t want to think about what it felt like inside that wall. “We’re both fine.”
Jared looked at everything but me. “Because Lukas saved us.”
“He had help.”
“Lukas would’ve found you somehow. He protects people,” Jared said, falling silent for a moment. “I get them killed.”
“Don’t do this to yourself. It was an accident.”
He raised his head, eyes dark and shining.
“Five people are dead, and there was nothing accidental about it. I knew there was a risk, and I kept looking anyway. I led Andras right to them.” Jared leaned his head against the wall. “I don’t want you caught in the cross fire the next time I screw up.”
It felt like my heart stopped beating.
“What are you saying?” But even as I asked, I knew the answer.
He studied the weeds and dead grass at his feet. “I care about you—”
“Just not enough to stick around,” I said.
“You don’t understand.”
My hands curled into fists at my sides. “Three hours.”
“What?” he asked.
“That’s how long it took for you to walk away.”
Whenever I cared about someone, I imagined them leaving—the words they’d say, the way it would feel when they left. I thought if I prepared myself, it would be easier when it finally happened. I was wrong.
“Kennedy—”
I held up a hand to silence him. “Now let’s see how long it takes you to forget me.”
CHAPTER 29
Sons of Disobedience
I stared out the window as the winding back roads led us closer to the coordinates etched in the sledgehammer. I tried to lose myself in drawing, anything to forget Jared’s arms around me inside the wall, or how easily he had given me up outside it. We hadn’t spoken a word to each other since I left him standing in front of Hearts of Mercy.
There wasn’t anything else to say.
I sketched the woods along the Maryland state border, where towering oaks guarded the remnants of charred brick buildings. According to ghost stories, the houses belonged to witches, until they were burned to the ground with the women trapped inside them. Now people believed the scorched remains were haunted.
It was hard to imagine we were going somewhere with a history more disturbing.
Lukas had spent most of the ride searching websites on his cell phone, so he didn’t have to talk to his brother. When he finally lost the signal, he went back to studying the map.
He drew a line connecting the red circles, while Jared scanned through the static on the radio.
“There’s probably no reception out here.” Priest looked up from his own sketch, some kind of tube loaded with canisters.
“That’s because this is the edge of the world, and we’re about to fall off,” Alara said.
Jared turned the dial again and this time a voice cut through the static. “The shooting occurred at eleven fifteen this morning at the Walmart in Moundsville. Three people were killed and two others injured before the gunman exited the store, turning his weapon on police. The gunman was killed in the standoff, and no officers were injured.”
“We must be getting close,” Priest said.
“I found something else.” Lukas held up the map. He had added blue Xs inside the boundary line.
Alara frowned. “You’ll have to elaborate.”
“The circles represent the places that had major surges in the last month, the cities and towns where we ended up looking for Kennedy.” He traced the line with his finger. “The Xs are the locations where we found pieces of the Shift.”
Priest froze. “They’re all inside that red line.”
“So what does that mean?” Alara asked.
“I think the Marrow is in there, too,” Lukas said. “And if I’m right, Andras is closer than we thought.”
Alara nodded. “Then we need to find the last piece.”
Another newscaster’s voice replaced the first. “Eastern West Virginia is still under tornado watch. Two tornadoes touched down in Morgantown yesterday, destroying three homes and a community center. The National Weather Service is working to determine the cause—”
“It’s like we’re headed into it,” Priest said.
Alara stared at the black clouds looming in the distance. “Or we’re already there.”
MOUNDSVILLE, WEST VIRGINIA
POPULATION 9,835
Jared glanced at the sign as we passed. “Only a few more miles.” They were the first words he’d spoken since we left Hearts of Mercy.
The road curved and the sky turned black, but this time it had nothing to do with the clouds.
Alara leaned over the front seat to get a better look. “Please tell me I’m seeing things.”