Wildblood

Chapter 20

20

The wail of a distant siren cut through the night like a ghost’s keen, and fog gathered over glistening asphalt after an unexpected downpour. It’d hit while Kai was in the warehouse, sparing him the additional inconvenience of lugging a sodden, zombified teenager home.

Caelan was walking on her own now, albeit unsteadily. Kai had released her elbow, giving her the space to feel out her own body. She must’ve been in that room a long time. There were no windows, her senses deprived of the stimuli required to keep her body functioning normally. Now that they were clear of the warehouse, there was no rush, but Kai found himself on edge. The girl either drew trouble or was trouble. He hadn’t yet decided which was the case. Then again, it could’ve been both.

“You managing?” he asked as she hobbled next to him.

Caelan nodded. “I’m just weak.” After a respectable pause, she risked a gander at her rescuer. “Who are you?”

“Kai,” he grunted, unaccustomed to speaking with a teenager. He remembered being one, but he hadn’t been a shining example. For six years, Alice raised him in a dilapidated bungalow next to a Mormon church in Granite Falls, Washington. There was no sidewalk, and he had to leap over a ditch just to get to the road. Every Sunday, this girl from the church would try to lure him to service, selling him on some bullshit about inner peace and community. She could tell he was messed up—he’d give her that—but nothing she had to offer would’ve unfucked him. He wasn’t sure anything could.

He glanced down at Caelan. She hadn’t badgered him to take her to her family. “Don’t you want to go home?”

She shook her head. “I don’t have a home.”

“Your parents?—”

“They’re not really my parents,” she interjected. “I don’t belong with them. I don’t really belong anywhere.”

He had no idea what she was on about, but the words got stuck between his ribs. Granite Falls had supposedly been home, but it may as well have been an alien planet. His peers treated him like a freak, and it wasn’t because of how he looked; it was how he acted. He was erratic, unfocused, always itching to get up and pace around while everyone took diligent notes about Hemingway’s angst. The guidance counselor encouraged him to try out for sports teams, but he couldn’t remember the rules—hated having to follow them—and it often ended with the coach breaking up fights. Kai rarely started them, but people took his conduct for belligerence. They thought he was trying to be a dick. In truth, he just didn’t get whatever rulebook they were playing by. Life hadn’t sent him a copy.

“We can talk about it later.” He didn’t care to push the matter. The kid needed food, a shower, and some sleep.

As they rounded the corner, Caelan sucked in a sharp breath and glued herself to Kai’s arm. He stopped in his tracks, his spine going rigid as an electric current surged through him. This girl—she wasn’t right. Her scent had all the inflections of a human’s, but something else lingered under the earthy tones of flesh and blood—a sickly sweetness that clung to the contours of her human-like shape. It was jarring, unfamiliar, and when she touched him, he felt her foreignness claw through his skin.

Pay attention , the wolf warned. This one’s not part of the flock.

Yet she seemed so fragile. So easily frightened. A pair of flashing headlights were the cause of her sudden start. The car responsible rolled down the empty street, but she skulked into Kai as though she could meld with his shadow and become a part of it.

As the vehicle got closer, Kai let out a defeated groan. It was an unmarked police car, the lettering scrubbed from the sides, but the make and interior partition were unmistakable. As if on cue, the cruiser squealed to a halt.

“Excuse me, sir.” The cop circled his showboat after stepping out. “I’d like to see some identification.”

Kai sometimes forgot he was as undocumented as Mothman. “Don’t need to give you shit. I’m not driving a car.” One reason he liked Massachusetts: he legally didn’t have to talk to the police unless he was behind the wheel.

Flustered, the cop quickly switched gears and turned his attention to Caelan. “You all right, miss?”

The girl was a block of ice at Kai’s side. She didn’t move, didn’t speak, but he could feel her trembling.

“Miss, please step forward,” the officer ordered, alarm shading his voice.

Kai knew how it looked—a scraggly teen in flip flops out with a grown man in the middle of the night. She had nothing on her but pajamas and an oversized hoodie, her face a textbook exhibit of a shell-shocked war survivor.

“She’s my kid sister,” Kai lied. “Doesn’t like strangers.”

“I didn’t ask you, sir .” The asshole took an aggressive step toward them, then gestured at Caelan. “I asked the girl to come forward. Release her, now.”

Kai hadn’t laid a finger on the kid; she’d glommed on to him. She shrank back, her chin wobbling as the officer menaced closer. “She doesn’t want to talk to you,” he growled, “and she doesn’t have to.”

“I told you to shut up!” The officer shoved passed Kai and seized Caelan by the arm. A shriek tore from her lungs, and she folded like paper, writhing to get free.

A firestorm snaked through the pit of Kai’s stomach, and he grabbed the cop by the throat. It’d been a very, very rough night, and he still had a bullet in his abdomen. Fingers digging into soft flesh, he slammed the officer into the hood of the cruiser. Kai’s lips peeled back, teeth bared in a feral snarl. “And I told you, she doesn’t want to talk to a pig.” He leaned in close as the meat sack kicked uselessly. “You see my face, you look the other way, understand?”

Kai’s grip was like a steel vise, and his blood-tinged eyes promised carnage. The cop strained to speak, mustering only a pathetic gag as his chin jerked down. A nod. Knocking him against the hood one last time, Kai released him when his face began to blanche. The officer rolled to his side, wheezing for air.

Kai pivoted and took Caelan’s hand. She was shaky but eager to leave.

“I-I guess you’re not a fan of the police…” she ventured.

“Never met a law I got along with,” Kai muttered as they hurried away. He slipped into a side street to avoid patrol cars. If he was hassled again, Sergei would have to pay off the entire pig pen.

Rummaging racoons and pissing drunks were the only racket in back lanes—innocuous and easy to ignore. Suddenly, Caelan planted her feet and tugged Kai to a halt. Her gaze flew to an adjacent alleyway, the sound of a ricocheting can followed by throaty yowls and feline screeches.

“It’s just a cat fight.” Kai squeezed her hand and tugged.

“Stop!” She yanked at him again, refusing to budge.

Kai kissed his teeth and rotated to peer into the alley. “They’ll sort it out?—”

“One of them will get hurt!” Frantic, she pitched toward the darkness, and as she did, the darkness reached back. Shadows that belonged in the slim corridor between buildings swelled into the street, and the lamplight above flickered from the encroaching murk. It was the same ethereal pall from the warehouse, orbiting Caelan like a deathly ring.

It was enough to crush Kai’s stubbornness. Cursing under his breath, he dropped Caelan’s hand and stalked into the alley. Two grubby furballs tussled between the garbage dumpster and the back door of a fried chicken joint. No wonder it was a match to the fucking death.

One of the cats was definitely going to kick it. Small, orange, and plagued with stubby legs and a long coat, the runt was clearly outmatched but too stupid to back down. Guessing that this was the cat whose demise Caelan so brilliantly foretold, Kai bent down and snatched the Cheeto-colored munchkin by the scruff. The cat flailed wildly, hissing in protest as Kai carried him away. Luckily, his legs were too short for him to do any real damage.

“Happy?” Kai sneered, and Caelan nodded, satisfied that he’d prevented a slaughter.

“You can’t drop him,” she urged. “If you do, he’ll just run back and get himself killed.”

“What the fuck do you want me to do then?”

“You have your own place, right?” She stared at him expectantly, her suggestion louder than the cat’s screeching.

“Fuck tha—” He stopped himself. It was a cat. Cats ate vermin. Their apartment had cockroaches, and Miya was getting fed up. She’d asked to move several times, but the rent was cheap, and their landlord didn’t ask questions. He’d been debating gifting her a cat as a compromise, and this one already had a killer instinct. Kai swallowed his objection. “Fine.”

With Caelan appeased, the shadows receded. Then, she reached for his hand.

Weird kid , Kai thought as he reluctantly allowed her to curl her fingers around his. The orange tabby continued his futile revolt, but Kai ignored it, holding the cat at arm’s length.

Apparently, he’d be bringing home two strays tonight.