Vampire Uprising

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The three Nymar were feeling cocky when a redhead in high heels and a nightie led them to the club’s back rooms. More than likely it was a combination of the human dancer’s charms and the high that all Chicago Nymar were running on that night. No matter how confident they felt, the vampires didn’t have a prayer when they stepped into the utility room. One of them was still wearing the self-satisfied look on his face when Cole’s spear pierced his heart. Rico kept the second one quiet by knocking him down and stepping on his mouth.

When the third one started hissing in a threatening manner, Cole flipped his spear around so the Nymar’s chin was wedged in the forked end. He was a greasy looking idiot with a gold T hanging from a chain around his neck that must have been forged somewhere in the darkest fashion days of the eighties. “What’s your name?” Cole asked.

“M-My name?”

Rather than repeat himself, Cole tightened his grip on the weapon so the thorns sank deeper into his palms. It took only a thought for him to cause the forked ends to extend, curl slightly around the Nymar’s throat and tighten.

As soon as he felt the pressure, the Nymar sputtered, “Dave … David! It’s David, okay? My name’s David!”

Tightening the wooden snare a bit more, Cole twisted the spear to angle the Nymar’s face toward the floor. “Take a look at your friends there, David. What do you think they’d tell you if you asked how patient we are tonight?”

“How’d you know where to find us, Dave?” Rico asked. When he didn’t respond, Rico flipped out the blade he’d sunk into the eye socket of the Nymar at the tunnels. “I already tortured one of you today,” he said while holding the knife close enough to Dave’s face for him to smell the oily blood that remained on the sharpened steel. “One more’d just be a bonus.”

“Steph and Ace’ve been recruiting for weeks. She kept most of the newbies around the Blood Parlor and they were all out looking for you. One of them saw you drive away from the parlor, and another saw that same car driving here. Hope wanted us to make sure the seeding took root. Then we’d get our Shadow Spore.” His eyes darted toward Cole and his nostrils flared with a quick inhalation. “What happened with that, anyway?”

“Still want to file your report?” Cole asked as he angled the spear so the forked end grew sharper than a pair of scissors and fit snugly under Dave’s chin. “What about now?”

“So Steph knew we were coming?” Rico asked.

Dave nodded as best he could. “We didn’t know the exact time, but Steph knew you’d show up at the parlor eventually. So did Hope. She said she knew Paige real well.”

“What about those cops? Were they on Steph’s payroll?”

“They were just cops.” Dave squirmed and made the mistake of moving his hands more than an inch. He paid for it by getting Rico’s fist buried in his gut. “Some of us approached them as informants,” the Nymar wheezed. “I got a card in my pocket.”

Rico flipped Dave’s jacket open and dug around in the pockets. He came up empty, but found something when he patted down the heavy cotton shirt the Nymar wore over a dark red T-shirt. After nearly ripping the pocket off completely, Rico was satisfied that the card was the only thing in there. Only then did he finally take a look at what was printed on the muted white paper. He showed it to Cole, then tucked it away inside his own shirt pocket. “That’s from one of the cops at the parlor tonight?” he asked.

“That’s the one who sent the cops,” Dave replied. “Some lieutenant or captain, I don’t know. Whoever Ace and Steph were talking to.”

“Sounds like this has been in the works for a while,” Cole pointed out.

“Maybe a month or two,” Dave said.

“But it’s only been a little while since Lancroft’s place in Philly was raided. There’s no way you could get all of this and the cops on board in that amount of time.”

Dave was getting nervous. The sweat trickling from his brow was tainted by the same oily substance found in their blood. It allowed him to maneuver within the spear’s grip, but it also caused a reaction with the weapon’s varnish that made the forked end twitch against his jugular. “We’ve been stringing the cops along for months. Some of them got hooked on the girls. Some stayed out in their cars or tried to act casual in Astin’s bar. Others just swung by to give Steph and Ace some shit. All we had to do was keep them interested so when the time came it was easy to convince him to send some badges down to wait for you guys. When they started to lose interest, all we needed to do was feed them bits and pieces here and there. Drop a few anonymous tips. Let a few of the scared customers go instead of reining them in. It ain’t hard to keep cops looking at you.”

“And when the shooting started, you camouflaged them using that striped shit?” Rico asked.

For a second the Nymar seemed confused. “You mean the Shadow Spore. Yeah. We only just got that. We were all supposed to get altered, but there wasn’t enough time for everyone to get a taste. With everything that’s been happening between us and you Skinners, Hope and Cobb decided to use the Shadow Spore to put everything into motion.”

“Who’s Cobb?” Rico asked. The Nymar that had been under his foot was coming around and glaring up at the Skinners. Rico wiped the snarl off the vampire’s face by stomping his head against the floor hard enough to put his lights out for a good long while. From there, he clamped a hand against Dave’s face and slammed him against the closest wall.

“I don’t mind doing the legwork for an important job, but I’m getting bored with slapping you fuckholes around,” he said. “It’s been a long night, so tell me the rest before I decide to spice this up by carving my name into your face. How are the Nymar coordinating these attacks?”

“There’sh a webshite,” Dave said, his lips crushed and pursed together by Rico’s hand. “It’sh run by Cov Thirtyeigsh.”

“What was that?” Cole asked. “Did you say a website?”

Once Rico gave his mouth a chance to move, Dave said, “Y-Yes. It’s a message board run by a guy named Cobb. Cobb38. That’s his screen name.”

“Who the fuck is that?” Rico snarled.

“I don’t know. All I know is a screen name.” Dave brightened as if he’d found his lifeline. “I can show you how to get to him. Just take me to—”

“You’re not going anywhere,” Rico snapped.

Cole dug the phone from his pocket and pulled up the Web browser. Between the hell his body had been through and the sense of panic that came from being wanted for killing several police officers, it was a true struggle to keep his hands steady. “Don’t give me any shit about needing to be on a certain computer. Just tell me how to find Cobb.”

“If I tell you … you’ll let me go?”

Rico raised his knife and showed the blade to Dave. “How about for every bit of good info you give us, I cut off one less piece from your bloodsucking carcass?”

Dave talked.

Maybe he thought he could walk away from Pinups.

Maybe he already knew he was never going to leave that utility room. The stench of dead Nymar was thick enough to clog Cole’s senses, and he was still nauseous from the stink of oily tendrils reaching up through his sinuses while hugging him from the inside out.

When Dave was finished talking about Cobb’s website, Rico held him in place and asked, “You got any more antidote, Cole?”

“No. Most of it’s in me.”

“Then finish him off the hard way.”

Cole knew it was useless to tell the big man to do the deed himself, and there was no reason to ask why the job had been given to him. Skinners did what needed to be done, no matter how dirty the job was. When he picked up his spear and drove it through Dave’s chest, he figured he was being taught that Paige had simply been doing her duty as well.

“Damn,” Rico said as Cole wiped off his spearhead on the clothes wrapped around Dave’s lifeless body. “That was cold.”

“Sorry. Did you intend on bringing him along so he could screw with us, or let him go so he could warn the others and tell Cobb to change everything on his entire network?”

“I just thought you’d need a little more convincing. Give Paige a call and see where she’s at with her cop buddy.”

Cole wasn’t certain that Rico even had a phone. They were pretty much standard issue for anyone in the modern world, but Rico wasn’t always modern. Rather than question the big man on his views of technology, he took out his own cell phone, hit Paige’s speed dial number, and tossed it to him while it rang.

Poking his nose into the hall, Cole found Tristan standing watch just outside the door. Several dancers hurried back and forth between the stage entrance and dressing rooms, but deferred to the Dryad’s Queen Bee status with a quick nod as they passed her by.

“Any more assholes out there?” he asked.

Without batting a perfectly formed eyelash, Tristan replied, “Just the regular ones. Are you boys through yet?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you leave a mess?”

“Nothing a broom, dustpan, and some trash bags can’t handle. We’ll take the unconscious one with us and dump him somewhere far from here. That is, unless you want us to make sure he doesn’t come back?”

Tristan considered the Skinner’s offer for all of two seconds before shaking her head. “No. They didn’t see me or my sisters here. No need for any more death tonight.”

“Whatever. Think we could get a ride to Denver?”

“I can arrange that.” Tristan moved even closer to Cole and placed a hand on his forearm. Since he was a human male and she was a member of a species that served as the template for the ultimate ethereal female, that simple touch was enough to separate him from the world as well as his reality. “Please tell me you’re done with this kind of bloodshed.”

“We’ve got what we need from the ones we already questioned. I don’t think any of us are in the mood to talk to another one.”

“Good. I need you to tell me one thing, Cole.”

“Name it,” he replied before he could think any better of the decision.

She smiled, deflecting the knee-jerk appeasement with grace. “I need you to tell me you’re innocent of what they’re accusing you of on TV.”

Even though Tristan didn’t make a threat or even hint at anything along those lines, Cole somehow felt that a lie would be detected instantly by those softly contoured ears or those deep, colorful eyes. Before his baser instincts dragged him any further down into that sweetly scented trap, he told her, “It was a setup. Those cops were set up as targets and we were set up to knock them down. If we didn’t do it, I’m guessing the Nymar would have made it look like we did and then fed the same shit to the press.”

After taking a moment to size him up the old-fashioned way, the Dryad nodded and said, “I believe you. What I said before about not using our bridges still goes. Until this legal mess gets straightened out, we’ll only be able to transport Skinners when it’s absolutely necessary. You and Paige are different, though. I owe you two more than I can repay, which means you can come and go through our temples as often as I can.”

“What about Prophet?”

Tristan smiled with so much warmth that it cheapened her previous attempts. “He’s a cutie,” she said. “He had plenty of chances to make things tough for me, but worked to smooth them out instead. He’s got a free pass too.” Placing her hand on Cole’s arm, she quickly added, “But don’t tell him I said that. Just tell him he can come and check with us if he needs to.”

“I’ll do that.”

“Should I get things set up for Denver? I’ll need to make a few calls but should be able to get you there.”

“Yeah, do that. I really appreciate it, Tristan.”

“I know you do. That’s why you still get the VIP treatment, and the rest of those cocky, stick-wielding jerks have to go to the back of the line.”

Watching a Dryad walk away was an event unto itself. No matter what was going on with the rest of the world, Cole felt his muscles loosen as his eyes followed the mesmerizing sway of her hips. Well, some of his muscles loosened. It was definitely easy to see how a shipload of sailors from centuries past could be drawn off course by catching sight of similar creatures frolicking topless in the waves.

“Paige already talked to Stanze,” Rico announced as he stomped down the hall from the opposite direction. “She’s meeting up with him now.” He slapped the phone against Cole’s chest and said, “Here. You call Prophet and I’ll tidy up the back room. I’ll convince that other one what a bad idea it would be to bring any of his buddies back here. There’s an art to these things,” he declared with a grin.

No matter how badly Rico obviously wanted to discuss his art, Cole wasn’t in the mood. He let the big man go and then dialed Prophet’s number. The bounty hunter answered on the third ring.

Completely stepping past any hellos or how-are-yous, Prophet said, “Tell me you guys ain’t involved with this cop shooting business.”

“I could tell you that, but …”

“Aww, Jesus Christ. How bad is it?”

“It’s a setup. I can tell you the rest later. How about we meet in Denver?”

“Only if we go after those Nymar that Stanley’s been on my ass about.”

“You talked me into it,” Cole said. “What can you tell us about those guys?”

“I’ve got a whole damn file. They’re more of a gang than anything else. Maybe even like a crime family. No, that’s giving them too much credit. I’ll go with gang. Not just some street gang, but more like—”

“It’s so much easier when you just have some crazy dream and give us a warning,” Cole grumbled. “Remember that? I miss those days.”

Prophet’s tone shifted into something that allowed him to scowl across a digital phone line. “Funny thing about those dreams. I need to sleep in order for them to hit. Ever since you asked me to watch your back in some creepy-as-hell basement in Philadelphia so we could steal a prized possession from a bunch of armed and dangerous, lunatic monster hunters, my sleep schedule ain’t been too great. Oh, and finding out that the possession we were taking was the mutilated chunks of a werewolf, any dreams I might have had after that ain’t exactly the ones I want either.”

“Point taken. What did you mean before when you said ‘wait for us to get there’?”

After a short pause, Prophet continued without the gruff tone in his voice. “Me and the Amriany.”

“You’re still following them?”

“Actually, they’re following me. From a real close distance.”

“They caught you, didn’t they?”

“Caught sounds so sinister. They’re after the same thing you are, anyway.”

“Really? What might that be?”

“They want to recover some of that Lancroft crap, but they also caught wind of some Nymar taking their business overseas. One of them named Hope is traveling with a group that’s been putting together some sort of organization. They already got their communications set up. They’ve been collecting weapons. They got plenty of intelligence on Skinners and now they’re looking to take you out.”

“So if they’re getting so comfortable here, why would they want to leave the U.S.?” Cole asked.

“That’s what these Amriany want to find out. Drina, she’s the blonde, she thinks one of the Nymar groups that are definitely involved in this uprising will have a computer with some good intel on it or numbers on their phones they can use. I’ve been trying to steer them to Denver, but they got a line on a group down in Texas.”

“San Antonio?”

“Yeah,” Prophet said in a voice that made it easy for Cole to picture the surprised look on his face. “How’d you know about that?”

“Never mind. How’d the Amriany get out of Philly?”

“Drove, then flew. They got a real nice setup, Cole. Kind of puts you guys to shame. Not that it’s too hard to put a shit-box Chevy to shame, but I’m talking charter planes and the works. These Gypsies have some serious funding.”

“You might not want to let them hear you call them that. They’re a bit sensitive about the G word.”

“Believe me, I understand that kind of aggravation. I still need to check the African-American box on more official forms than I can count. My dad’s Jamaican and Mom’s from Cuba. How the hell does that make me African American? You’re rolling your eyes now, right?”

“Yeah, Prophet. Big-time.”

“I’ll see about getting us to Denver.”

“Tell them we’re planning on hitting them hard. The last thing those Nymar will be expecting is another team sneaking in while the fireworks are going. Even below that on the list would be a team of Amriany. As long as your new buddies are willing to cooperate and share what they find, we don’t have any problem with letting them in on this.”

“You’ve got the pull to guarantee that?” Prophet asked cautiously.

“There’s just me and Rico here, so yeah. I’ve got the pull.”

“What about Paige?”

“I’m sure she’ll find a way to get there.”

“You don’t sound thrilled about that.”

“Can you get to Denver or not?” Cole quickly asked. “Considering everything they’ve been saying about you guys, that shouldn’t be too difficult.”

“What have they been saying?”

“‘Bye.”

Cole looked at the phone as if Prophet might somehow be looking back at him. All he saw was a reflection of his face and a red message telling him his call had come to an end.

“You done out here?” Rico asked as he stepped into the hall.

The latest round of dance mixes had come to an end, which meant the dancers were starting to hustle backstage again. A few of the Dryads were among them. They stood out like finely cut crystal goblets scattered among a collection of free cups collected from fast-food movie tie-ins. Considering how attractive Pinups’ human dancers were, that was saying a lot. Elle whispered something to the ladies in her group, which kept the whole procession moving right past the Skinners.

“Yeah,” Cole said as he tucked his phone away. “I’m done.”

They tagged along with the trio of girls heading for the main stages, savoring the mixed scents of body sprays and female skin. All three were human, and drinking them in was like a welcome bit of familiar cooking. Hooray for the home team.

The procession stopped at a door that would have blended in perfectly with the black wall if not for the handle outlined in white tape. The girls opened it without having to look at what they were doing, and Cole stopped in his tracks when he saw Tristan in the main room. She leaned against a table in a pose that wasn’t quite the same as the one she struck when prowling for lap dances. Shifting her eyes toward the door at the back of the room, she looked straight past the three dancers and locked eyes with Cole.

Something was wrong.

His fingers curled in to brush against his palms. Whoever those guys at Tristan’s table were, they weren’t Nymar or shapeshifters. They sat away from the glare of lights without being coated in black stripes, so they weren’t carrying a Shadow Spore. Both of the men were dressed in simple, inexpensive clothes resembling the ensembles of every other paying customer in the place. One of them was in his late twenties or early thirties. He angrily said something to make Tristan look at him, while the older man followed her previous line of sight to the stage door. Even though Cole had pulled back enough to hide within the shadows filling the doorway, he knew he might have already been spotted.

Heavy steps sounded behind him, but Cole didn’t need to turn around. The rustle of Rico’s leather jacket was more than enough to give him away. Thanks to the cold weather, the leather had hardened into something closer to a shell than the smoother material of the Full Blood coat.

“Never thought I’d get sick of hangin’ out in strip bars,” Rico muttered. “Tristan out there?”

“She’s talking to someone. Doesn’t look like it’s for official dancer business either.”

Placing a hand on Cole’s shoulder to keep him in place, Rico leaned forward to get a look for himself. He almost immediately leaned back again and snarled, “Shit. Cops.”

“How can you tell?”

“Well, they ain’t Nymar. There’s two of them, and they ain’t buddies out to see some bare ass, because they ain’t grinnin’ from ear to ear with Tristan being so close. Look at the way they’re talkin’ to her. One’s asking questions and the other’s scanning the room. Keeps looking over here. Did you poke your nose out too far?”

“Maybe a little.”

“They’re cops. I’ve had enough of them sniffing around after me that I can damn near smell the doughnut frosting on their fingers.”

Cole shook his head and eased the door shut. There was a narrow slot filled with tinted plastic just wide enough for a dancer to get a look out to see if an unwanted admirer was waiting for her next set. Although he couldn’t see as much as before, Cole could make out the shapes at Tristan’s table if he squinted just right.

“Come with me.”

Those three words drifted through the air without the slightest bit of warning. Both Skinners wheeled around with their hands headed for their weapons before they caught sight of Elle standing behind them.

“You’d better go now,” she said. “Those policemen were asking about you, and it’s not like we can refuse if they insist on searching.”

“Sure you can,” Rico chided.

If Elle had been even slightly intimidated by the Skinners, she didn’t show it as she grabbed hold of Rico’s jacket and dragged him away from the stage door.

Allowing himself to be pulled down the hall, he looked over his shoulder and said, “See? Told you they were cops.”

She led them all the way around the back of the club to the room that had been made into the Dryad temple. The first time Cole had seen the flowing script covering the smooth walls of a similar temple, he was fascinated. Now, it hit him on the same nerve as watching his bus pull up to the curb.

“Will this take us to Denver?” he asked.

Another Dryad was near the edge of the curtain, swaying slowly and humming in time to the thumping beat that filled the club. “No,” Elle said. “It’s to a club in Boulder, but it’s the best we could do. There seems to be some trouble at the Denver clubs.”

“Nymar?”

“No. More police. All of our sisters are staying out of sight in case more Nymar are following all the Skinners going back and forth. I don’t need to tell you what sort of trouble it would be if they found us.”

After having that thing inside him, Cole could still feel a pang of hunger at the very notion of opening one of those beautiful women’s veins and drawing their precious fluid into his stomach. He was still fuzzy on the difference between a Dryad and a nymph, other than a Dryad was supposedly much older and more experienced. Sort of the supernatural equivalent of a MILF. All he knew was that the longer he stood among them, the harder it was to resist. Before his resolve was tested further, he was shoved through the beaded curtain and sent toppling through the breezy in-between that smelled of freshly cut timber and felt like an autumn breeze.

Something was different this time. The trips had always seemed instantaneous before, but this was a bizarre nightmare where the room around him melted away, leaving only phantom glimpses of things he could hold on to. His stomach dropped. Voices screamed in his mind. Music raked against his inner ear. Heartbeats pounded against him like invisible fists, and when he tried to fight them off, his fingers became entangled in what felt like a blanket of cobwebs so thick he could hear it tearing.

Upon reaching the other side of the bridge, Cole flopped onto his side and hit a floor identical to the one he’d left behind. The music was different, however, as was the scent of the body spray worn by the dancer who helped him up.

“Oh my God,” she said. “Are you all right?”

When Cole grabbed onto the hand being offered to him, he nearly pulled the slender dancer down on top of him. She had the ethereal beauty of a nymph and smelled like heaven drizzled in vanilla. As he struggled to get his bearings, he spotted another woman standing with her back pressed against the wall. Her arms were crossed and she glared at him in a way that said she either didn’t like ferrying Skinners through the club or just didn’t like him messing up her floor. Then the beads rattled again and a large boot thumped solidly against his back.

“What the hell?” Rico grunted.

“He tripped when he came out,” the dancer against the wall explained. The imperfections around her eyes were subtle, but marked her as human. “Was he drinking?”

The big man pulled Cole to his feet and shoved him toward the door. “You got a car we can use?”

“Wha …?”

“Not you, Cole.”

Cole’s feet were moving but the voices and queasiness still filled his head.

The human woman fell into step behind them, keeping her arms crossed and her eyes locked on the Skinners. “There’s a blue Civic parked out back. Here are the keys. Just because I was told to let you borrow it doesn’t mean you get to trash it. Bring it back by tomorrow, or else.”

Rico took the keys and rattled them as if purposely trying to jangle whatever was left of Cole’s brains. “We’re taking it to Denver and may need it for a few days. That okay?”

“Sure,” the nymph replied. Seeing the increased unhappi-ness on the other one’s face, she added, “There’s a few out there given to us by the same customer. He’s a real nice guy. Very generous.”

“Generous to you, maybe,” the stern woman scoffed. “The rest of us gotta earn the hard way.”

“Gary paid two months of your rent over the summer. What are you complaining about?”

The banter between the dancers went on for the duration of the walk through the back rooms of the club. It was decidedly smaller and quieter than Pinups, but Cole’s head was pounding and he still felt as if he’d been dragged a noisy mile before he could walk on his own.

“Blue Civic. Gotchya.” Judging by the sharp tone in Rico’s voice, he wasn’t enjoying the chatter either.

“So you guys are friends of Tristan’s?” the nymph asked. She slipped a key into the alarm bar of a steel exit door and turned it so she could push it open. “What are your names?”

“Never mind that,” the other dancer snapped while propping open the door with the side of her foot. “The car’s right there. You guys need anything else before you go? Some water? Something to eat? Tristan told us to ask.”

“No thanks, girls,” Rico said. “You’ve been perfect hostesses. We’ll be on our way.”

The moment the Skinners were outside, the door was pulled shut, a key was turned, and that was that.

Rico unlocked the Civic and dropped himself onto the seat behind the wheel. After unlocking the passenger door, he started the engine and waited for Cole to lower himself in. “I don’t think she liked you.”

“She gave me a new car,” Cole said. “That puts her one up on my dad.”

“I don’t think I ever heard about your dad. Wanna regale me with stories of Young Cole Warnecki during the drive into Denver?”

“No.”

The little car’s engine revved a few times. When it started whining, Rico pulled away from the club. “You know where we’re going?”

Cole checked the GPS he’d recently added to his phone’s laundry list of services, but wasn’t able to get his results before Rico stumbled upon a sign pointing him toward southbound Highway 36.

After Cole stuffed his phone back into his pocket and started fighting with the lever for his seat’s backrest, Rico asked, “So what’s the deal with you and Paige?”

“I thought you already had that figured out.”

“And I thought you weren’t such a prissy little bitch.”

Cole rolled down the window and closed his eyes to feign complete relaxation as the cold air tore into his cheeks. “If this is building into another ‘she did what she had to do’ speeches, you can save it.”

“Well,” Rico grumbled. “She did.”

“Maybe.”

“But?”

“But she didn’t have to make it seem so easy,” Cole replied.

“Easy? Are you fucking blind?”

Cole shook his head. “I’m not talking about what was going through her head or whatever was on her face. I’m talking about the weapon in her hands being stuck in my chest. I felt her trying to push it in, and wouldn’t have been able to stop her if it wasn’t for that … that thing giving me the strength. Spare me all the talk about duty or mercy or whatever else you were going to use to justify it. She was going to kill me and I couldn’t have done that to her. Even if it was the right thing to do, it would have been nice if she’d taken a moment before letting me go to …”

The highway was covered with a layer of snow that crunched under the Civic’s tires, and the wind coming in through the window smelled clean. It was late enough for there to be relatively few other cars on the road with them, but even if they were in the middle of a traffic jam with police helicopters closing in from all sides, Cole would have felt like a solitary figure in the middle of a frozen field.

“To what?” Rico asked.

In the time it took Cole to blink, he thought back to the first time he’d been dropped off in front of Raza Hill. The sting of Gerald and Brad’s deaths was still as fresh as the injuries he’d sustained after getting knocked around by a Full Blood. The Blood Blade was just a weird knife tucked away in his luggage, and vampires were just sexy fairy tales. When Paige walked out to meet him that first time, his entire world had kicked into overdrive. When she told him about Skinners, Nymar, and Full Bloods, he believed her. When she asked him to come along with her to help with the Blood Blade, he followed. When she told him about a warrior’s spirit and offered to train him, he accepted. At the time, no matter how much of it he might or might not have truly understood, he still would have gone along with her. There just wasn’t any other place for him to be.

“To what?” Rico asked again. “Say a proper goodbye?”

There was a reason Cole hadn’t wanted to say that part out loud. Even hearing it from someone else hurt worse than the lingering pains and incessant tightening within his chest.

“She didn’t get a chance to tell you the rest of what happened back in Urbana,” Rico explained.

“I heard enough. Her friend Tara was seeded and killed a bunch of doctors and nurses. Ned found her before, so he probably found them again. Paige probably did what she needed to do and now she’s a Skinner. Can we just flip on the radio and drive?”

“You don’t wanna hear the rest?”

“You’re telling me you memorized those Shampoo Banana journals?” Cole scoffed. “I know she’s your friend and everything, but that’s a little stalkeresque, don’t you think?”

“You want to hear what happened or not?”

“Do I have a choice?” Cole grunted.

“Sure. You could listen or you could plug your ears like a little—”

“Don’t call me that.”

When Rico spoke again, the edge was gone from his voice. “You need to hear this, Cole.”