by Jenna Black
Dr. Gilliam’s brows drew together with concern. “He hasn’t come after Piper. Her parents hired a private security firm to help keep her safe, but so far they haven’t had any trouble.”
“I’m different,” I insisted. “Did Luke tell you about the Night Maker?”
I could tell by her puzzled expression that she had no idea what I was talking about. Luke must have been upset when he found out I was behind what had happened to Rittenhouse Square, and yet he apparently hadn’t told his mother about it. Either he just flat-out hadn’t wanted to talk about it, or he’d been protecting me in his own way, trying to hide the full extent of what I’d become from someone whose good opinion he knew mattered to me.
But there was no time for that now. My rendezvous with Luke had been at two, and I had no idea how much time had passed since then. I’d been too dazed to pay attention, but I was sure it had been at least an hour, probably more, and sunset would be on its way soon.
I hurriedly explained the Night Makers and my role in creating the gate to Dr. Gilliam.
“So you see,” I concluded, “Aleric needs me. And that means he’s not going to let me go without a fight. He can come here with an army of Nightstruck and constructs, and they can get in with no trouble. We can’t be here.”
Being an emergency room doctor, Dr. Gilliam was used to thinking on her feet and not panicking. I could see the worry in her eyes, but her voice came out smooth and level as she glanced at her watch. I saw that as I had feared, it was nearing four o’clock.
“I’ll book us a hotel room,” she said. “We’ll have to come up with something more permanent and secure, but it’ll do for now. Pack a bag, and we’ll be out of here in fifteen minutes.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
I didn’t really have any packing to do. Piper and her Nightstruck friends had destroyed just about everything I owned. I had a single change of clothes, a few assorted toiletries—and a gun. I’d had two of them, but I had no idea what had happened to the one I shot Piper with. My dad’s backup gun should have been packed in my pathetically empty duffel bag, but it wasn’t there. Not surprisingly, considering Luke had shot at me with it on my second visit to his house. Dr. Gilliam probably wouldn’t have left me alone in that room if there were a gun handy. If I were her, I wouldn’t trust me as far as I could throw me.
I heard a door open down the hall, then heard the heavy thump of paws on the floor. I turned around just in time to see Bob come bursting through the door. He bounded toward me like he was on springs, his tail wagging wildly, his eyes bright with joy. My dad had long ago trained him not to jump on people, but when he came to a halt at my feet, his paws kept dancing, proving how badly he wanted to jump on me.
I fell to my knees and put my arms around my dog, hugging him tightly and almost bursting into tears. His fur felt softer than the mink coat, and I didn’t even mind the sloppy dog kisses. I looked up to see Dr. Gilliam smiling in the doorway.
“Don’t worry,” she said, “he’s coming with us. I’ll find a hotel that will take him.”
I worried that might be hard, seeing as even the most pet-friendly hotels usually only take small dogs. But there was no way I was leaving Bob here alone.
I would have loved to have taken a long hot shower and then buried myself under the covers where no one could see me, but that was not among my options. My mind was slowly but surely becoming more my own, my mental processes emerging from the fog of shock. I wished I hadn’t told Dr. Gilliam I had slept with Aleric. I should have just lied, even though she wouldn’t have believed me. I trusted her not to tell Luke, but I still hated the fact that she knew. Never mind how much I hated the fact that I had actually done it.
If I let myself think about it too much, I started feeling like there were worms writhing in my belly, so I tried really really hard not to think about it. Which was easier than it sounds, seeing as I had so many other horrors filling my head.
There were still a good thirty minutes left before sunset when Luke and Bob and I piled into Dr. Gilliam’s car. I felt even more shy and tongue-tied around Luke now than I had in the days when I’d been crushing on him from afar. I found the idea of making conversation downright impossible, actually, so I mostly just huddled in the backseat with my head down and my mouth shut. Either Luke was being considerate of my mental state, or he didn’t have any more idea what to say than I did, because he didn’t try to talk to me during the short drive.
When the city was first put into quarantine, I thought most of the hotels would have to shut down. After all, it wasn’t like we had visitors coming in for the night, except for those unlucky people who’d happened to be traveling here when the quarantine hit. I suspect some of the smaller hotels did close, sending any guests to one of the bigger ones that remained open.
Thanks to the depredations of the Nightstruck, the hotels weren’t as empty as I would have expected. Property damage was one of the Nightstruck’s favorite party games, so every day there were more people needing alternative lodgings for the night. That being said, the hotels weren’t so booked up that it was hard to get a room. Dr. Gilliam seemed to have no trouble getting us a two-bedroom suite on about thirty minutes’ notice. And, as it turned out, a lot of hotels had also relaxed their pet policies out of compassion, so Bob was actually welcome.
I had naively thought that one room was for the Gilliams and one room was for me, but it turned out Dr. Gilliam and I would be roommates. It sort of made sense for the two women to share a room and let the lone guy have a room to himself, but I knew at once that wasn’t the reason. Dr. Gilliam didn’t want me to have a room to myself because she was afraid I might sneak out in the night so I could be out at dawn and be Nightstruck again. Just because I told her that wasn’t what I wanted didn’t mean she believed me.
“Are you working tonight?” I asked her. It used to be she worked practically every night, because the emergency room was always flooded thanks to Nightstruck attacks.
She gave me a knowing smile, telling me without words that she knew exactly why I was asking. If I’d come right out and asked if we were sharing a room specifically because she wanted to keep an eye on me, she’d probably have given me a straight answer. But I wasn’t sure I wanted a straight answer.
“We couldn’t go on having the same people work every night shift,” Dr. Gilliam said. “It was doable for a few weeks, but since the crisis doesn’t seem like it’s going to end anytime soon, we had to start thinking about long-term solutions. We take turns working the night now, and this week it’s not my turn.”
I hadn’t exactly put a lot of thought into things since I’d been Nightstruck, and I certainly hadn’t considered how the city was responding to the way our world had changed. Partially because I hadn’t acknowledged, even to myself, just how long I’d been gone. Hell, I didn’t know how long I’d been gone. It wasn’t like I’d kept a diary or jotted appointments in my calendar or anything.
“What’s the date?” I asked, fearing I was about to lose what little grasp on reality I’d managed to get. I’d snuck out on my mission to kill Piper shortly after Thanksgiving. I’d been gone a couple of weeks, at least, but that was about as close a guess as I could imagine. Everything that had happened while I was Nightstruck kind of blurred together, some of it feeling like it must have happened just yesterday, some of it feeling like it had to be a month ago.
“It’s December twenty-seventh,” Dr. Gilliam told me.
I gasped and had to close my eyes to fight off a bout of tears. All the terrible things that had happened, all the terrible things I had done … And yet somehow finding out I’d missed Christmas entirely was almost enough to send me into another tailspin of despair.
Not that I’d been looking forward to Christmas this year. The idea of having to spend it without my dad, of knowing I would never again spend a Christmas day with my dad, had filled me with dread. Thanksgiving had been bad enough, even though the Gilliams had been kind enough to include me in their family celebratio
n. So it wasn’t missing the actual celebration of Christmas that hit me so hard. It was more the passing of a milestone—and the thought of what my mother and my sister, both of whom lived in Boston and couldn’t get through the quarantine, must have suffered. They’d both been in pain from having lost my dad, but they must have felt like they’d lost me, too.
“You should call your mother,” Dr. Gilliam said gently. “Give her the best belated Christmas present she’s ever gotten.”
“You told her … what happened to me?”
Dr. Gilliam nodded. “The basics of it, at least.” We were both sitting on one of the beds, and she reached over and put her hand on top of mine. “I didn’t send her the letter you wrote. I hope you’ll forgive me.”
I grimaced. When I’d gone out to kill Piper, I’d been pretty convinced I wouldn’t be coming back. I didn’t want to disappear without a trace, so I’d written good-bye letters to my mom, my sister, Dr. Gilliam, and Luke. Actually physically written them by hand, so that just in case I made it back alive I could destroy them without a trace.
“Why not?” I asked. I hadn’t died as I’d expected, but being Nightstruck was the next worst thing. I’d have thought it a good occasion for a good-bye letter.
Dr. Gilliam’s hand tightened over mine. “Luke and I are the only ones who know it was you who shot Piper.”
I’d had enough shocks throughout the day that I couldn’t muster one more gasp, but Dr. Gilliam had no trouble reading my surprise.
“When Piper woke up after surgery, she claimed she was shot by one of the Nightstruck.”
“Why would she do that?”
Dr. Gilliam raised an eyebrow. “So that you wouldn’t be wanted for attempted murder.”
Attempted murder. That was exactly what I’d done, and I’d been fully aware of its moral implications. I had never for a moment considered the legal ones. Unless things had changed recently, the law still considered the Nightstruck human beings with rights. I doubted there was much push to prosecute anyone who killed one of the Nightstruck, but it made sense that once Piper came back to herself, the police—and certainly her wealthy parents—would want to prosecute the person who had shot her.
“I think it’s very important we keep that a secret,” Dr. Gilliam continued. “With neither you nor Piper being Nightstruck anymore, if anyone finds out you shot her…”
I totally understood where she was going with that. If there was evidence that I’d shot and almost killed Piper—especially in an obviously premeditated attempt and while I was still of sound mind—I would be arrested and could even go to jail.
It was … humbling to realize that Piper had protected me even after I shot and almost killed her. It was also hard to reconcile the Piper who would protect me with the one who’d murdered my father right in front of me. I would always consider my dad’s death Piper’s responsibility, even though it had been Billy the goat who’d done the actually killing and no doubt it had been Aleric who’d ordered it.
“She’s been seeing a therapist ever since she came to in the hospital,” Dr. Gilliam said. “I think maybe you should consider talking to someone yourself. I can—”
I held up my hand to stop her. “I don’t want to talk to anyone about what happened. I just want to … forget all about it.”
“We both know that’s not going to happen.”
I winced, not sure if I was grateful for or resentful of her refusal to sugarcoat things. It was nice not to feel condescended to, but some realities are awfully hard to face. Like the fact that I would never be able to scrub my mind clean of what I’d done while I was Nightstruck. Or the fact that despite all my denials, there was a small part of myself that longed to be Nightstruck again. That wouldn’t make the memories go away, but it would make them stop hurting.
“I can’t imagine what it must have been like, what you must have gone through,” Dr. Gilliam said, “but holding it all in and keeping it to yourself is just going to make things worse. I hope you know there’s no shame in seeing a therapist. It doesn’t mean—”
“I know,” I cut her off. No one would fault me for seeing a therapist after everything I’d gone through. In all probability, it was the smart thing to do, the healthy thing to do. “There’s just no way I’m going to talk about everything that’s happened with some stranger.” I shook my head firmly. “Can’t do it.”
Piper’s folks could force her to see a shrink, but Dr. Gilliam didn’t have that kind of power over me. Besides, a shrink probably wasn’t optional for Piper. She’d done far worse than I when she was Nightstruck, plus she’d been shot by her best friend. She had to have some kind of PTSD or something. I was a mess myself, but not that much of a mess. At least that’s what I told myself.
“I understand,” Dr. Gilliam said. “All I’d ask is that you don’t close your mind to it entirely. And remember, I’m always here for you if you need to talk but can’t face a stranger. I can’t help you in the way a therapist could, but I can be a friend. A shoulder to cry on. And I promise, I will never judge you.”
“What about Piper?” I asked out of genuine curiosity. “Do you judge Piper?”
She smiled ruefully. “I’m afraid Piper was never my favorite person in the first place, so it’s a little harder not to be judgy about her.”
I’d always thought of Piper as a person who everyone—except my dad—liked. She’d been outgoing and bubbly, beautiful and friendly—all things I wasn’t. Even so, I realized I wasn’t entirely surprised to find the mother of the guy she’d been dating wasn’t any fonder of her than my dad had been. I wondered if Luke’s dad felt the same way. Mr. Gilliam traveled constantly for work, so I didn’t know him very well. He’d been on one of those business trips when the quarantine hit, and like my mom, he was unable to get into the city. I assumed the separation was hard on both Dr. Gilliam and Luke, especially as the quarantine dragged on and on.
“Now,” Dr. Gilliam said. “Why don’t you give your mom a call and let her know you’re back. She’ll be so relieved. She’s been frantic ever since you were taken. She’s been working hard to find a way to get permission to come into the city, but so far it’s been like banging her head against a brick wall.”
I had some serious mixed feelings about the idea of my mom making it through the quarantine. On the one hand, she was the only parent I had left, and though she wasn’t the most nurturing mother in the universe, I would love to collapse into her arms and cry my eyes out. I would also love to let someone else be in charge for a while, to not feel like I had to make all the difficult decisions myself—even if I might not agree with a lot of the decisions she’d make.
On the other hand, she would be one more person Aleric could potentially use against me. He already knew that the best way to get me to do what he wanted was to threaten or hurt or kill people I cared about. My mom would have a humongous bull’s-eye on her the moment she entered the city. Instead of her protecting me, I would be the one protecting her, or at least trying to, and that was not something I needed right now.
I didn’t feel like explaining any of that to Dr. Gilliam at the moment, so I kept all those feelings to myself, shoving them down into my center with everything else that was roiling and squirming there. I reached for the phone, but my hand stalled halfway there.
My mom deserved to know immediately that I was safe and whole and back in my right mind. She’d been suffering for about four weeks, and I could end that for her simply by picking up the phone and giving her a call. If that were all there were to it, I wouldn’t have hesitated. But she was going to want to know all about what I’d done and where I’d been during the time I’d been missing. She had a lawyer’s knack for asking just the questions you don’t want to answer and then persisting until you blurted out everything you were trying to hide. I’d had a hard enough day already, and I just couldn’t face the Inquisition that was to come.
“If it’s all right with you,” I said to Dr. Gilliam, letting my hand fall back to my lap, “I’
d rather call her tomorrow.” I let my eyes get all teary, not because I felt the desperate need to cry at the moment—I was more tired than sad—but because I wanted to look as pitiful as possible. “I can’t … handle it right now.”
Dr. Gilliam bit her lip indecisively. I was acting like I was still Nightstruck, selfishly putting my own wants and needs before those of others. I knew that, and knew it wasn’t like me. I just couldn’t find the courage to make that call.
“Maybe you can call her for me,” I suggested. “Tell her I’ll talk to her tomorrow. Maybe you can tell her you gave me a sedative, and I’m sleeping.”
Dr. Gilliam’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not lying for you, Becket. And your mother already hates me because she thinks it’s my fault you ran off. If I call her and won’t let her talk to you, she’s probably going to call the police and claim I’ve kidnapped you.”
“It is so not your fault!” I cried indignantly. My mom had always been a champ at assigning blame—she’d done it constantly with my dad—but to think that she was blaming the woman who’d taken me in when I had nowhere to go, who’d been unfailingly kind, who was even now risking—
“That doesn’t really matter, sweetheart,” Dr. Gilliam said. “I promised her I’d take care of you, and I failed. I’d feel the same way if our roles were reversed and Luke went missing on her watch. It may not be entirely rational, but it’s human.”
I stared at the phone balefully and tried to summon the strength to make the phone call I needed to make. But in the end, I just couldn’t do it.
“Give me one more day to get my head back together,” I begged. “I promise I’ll call her tomorrow.”
I caught Dr. Gilliam’s disapproving frown out of the corner of my eye, but I was relieved that she let it go.
* * *
I was used to catching what little sleep I could during the day, so I knew I wasn’t going to have a whole lot of luck sleeping at night even though I was exhausted body and soul. Dr. Gilliam offered to give me something to help me sleep, but I wasn’t really that eager to fall asleep. I could almost feel the nightmares gathering inside me, elbowing each other aside as they jockeyed for the chance to get to me first. Dr. Gilliam seemed to understand, and when she went to bed, she handed me her laptop and a pair of headphones.