The Gathering Dark (30 page)

Keira curled her hands into fists as the Hall came into view. She was right next to one of the pillars that ringed the open floor of the main room, and even though she wasn’t Darkside, she felt more secure—more hidden—with the enormous column at her back. She didn’t see Walker, but she also didn’t see anyone moving toward the spot where she’d last seen him.

Keira dropped her view of Darkside, and hurried toward the Reynoldses’ front path, hoping she looked more pathetic than crazy. The door flew open as she raised her hand to knock. Keira yelped.

“Keira?” Jeremy’s face was pink as an Easter ham and his eyes gleamed with unspent adrenaline. He squinted at her
like he wasn’t sure he was seeing things properly.

“Um. I’m glad you’re home,” Keira said.

“Yeah?” A smile slid across his face. “So, how come you’re not at school?” He leaned against the door frame, confidence replacing his confusion.

“I had a dentist appointment,” Keira lied. “My car broke down back that way”—she waved her hand in the direction of the empty lot—“and my cell phone’s dead. Could I use your phone? Please?” When he went to get his phone, she’d duck into the house and take a quick look around Darkside. She couldn’t see around the walls in the Hall of Records from where she was standing.

Jeremy’s lips twitched. “Sure.” His voice was oily. “I’d let you use my cell, but I’m pretty sure the battery’s dead too. Why don’t you come in? You can use the phone in the kitchen.”

The heat in his eyes made her think twice about being alone in the house with him, but she didn’t really have any choice. She was the only one who could save Walker. She couldn’t leave him to fend for himself. And if Jeremy tried anything funny, she could always cross into Darkside, even if it would mean facing the guards.

Crap. Why did all of the possibilities end up with her risking her own ass?

The longer she paused, the more eager Jeremy looked.

“Okay,” she said, stepping across the threshold. “Thanks.” She struggled to stay calm as the musty, messy house surrounded her.

Leaning against the wall next to the door was the baseball bat. It gleamed dully, radiating danger. Keira swallowed her fear as Jeremy’s dog came bounding into the room, greeting her like a long-lost friend.

Jeremy shoved the dog aside. “Get off her, moron.” He glanced sideways at Keira as he gestured toward the back of the house. “Kitchen’s that way,” he said.

Keira strode into the kitchen, trying to look as competent as she could. Walking the way she imagined someone who’d taken extensive self-defense courses would walk.

“Hey!” Jeremy said. The accusation in his voice stopped Keira midstep. “You’re barefoot,” he observed. As if, just because her feet were bare, the rest of her clothes might slither off her too.

“I, uh . . . yeah.” Keira cleared her throat, flipping through a list of possible excuses. “I like to drive barefoot.”

Jeremy snorted disbelievingly. He looked at her through half-lidded eyes. “I know you wrecked your car, Keira. And I saw it sitting at Brutti’s body shop two days ago, still completely bashed up.” His eyes narrowed. “So. Why are you
really
here?”

Oh, shit. Oh shit oh shit oh
shit.

“I’m driving my dad’s car,” she stammered. “It’s the one that broke down.”

“So why don’t you just walk home?” He smiled like he’d caught her.

“I tried, but I’m locked out,” she lied.

Keira hurried across the kitchen and reached for the phone before he could ask her any more questions. She dialed Susan’s number, hoping for once that she
wouldn’t
pick up. While she listened to it ring, Keira let her gaze soften, searching Darkside to see how far she was from the antechamber. There was no way to tell if Smith had made it back, or whether he was distracting the guards. She could be missing her chance to get Walker out while she dicked around in Jeremy’s kitchen, making sham phone calls.

Fuck.

Darkside ghosted into view, and she could see the archway that led into the anteroom at the edge of the kitchen. Walker lay on the floor, facing her, his arm twisted at an unnatural angle. His head was bleeding, but it wasn’t like anything Keira had ever seen. It pooled beneath his nose, black as oil, and moved like liquid mercury, tiny droplets breaking off and skittering across the floor as the puddle grew.

The sound of Susan’s voice mail message broke her concentration, and Keira realized that Jeremy was watching her intently.

“Hey,” she said, instinctively acting like someone had actually picked up the phone. “Yeah, dad’s car broke down and I’m stuck.”

Pause.

“Near Temple and Newbury. Can you call a tow truck and come unlock the house?”

The nasal auto-voice of the voice mail service cut her off and Keira prayed that Jeremy couldn’t hear it.

“Thanks,” she said quickly. “I really appreciate it.”

Keira hung up the phone, her hand trembling. Walker was only a few feet away, injured and unconscious in Darkside, but Jeremy’s stare was boring holes into her back in the normal world. She was going to have to go back into Darkside and get Walker out somehow, without both of them reappearing in the Reynoldses’ kitchen. Or getting caught by the Darkside guards before they made it back.

Great.

“Well, I guess I’ll be going,” Keira said. “Thanks for letting me use the phone.” She turned around. Jeremy was standing a lot closer to her than he had been before.

“You might as well wait here. You can have a soda. Or something. We’ll talk.” He took another step closer to her, and Keira edged toward the back door.

“Um, about what?”

“About Walker. His name’s Walker, right?”

Keira nodded.

“He’s an asshole. You and I make so much more sense, Keira.” His eyes glittered. “If you’d think about it, I’m sure you’d see what I see. We’d be good.
Really
good.”

“You and . . . you and
me
? Jeremy, that’s . . . I’m . . . very flattered but . . . ” The words barely made it past her stammering lips. Keira shook herself. “Listen, I should probably get back to
my car. My mom’s on her way home from work and it won’t take her that long to get here. I have to go.”

Anger flashed across Jeremy’s face, sudden and hot as a grease fire. “You haven’t even given me a chance to finish. We
do
make sense. I can prove it to you.” Jeremy reached out and caught hold of her sleeve.

Every alarm bell inside Keira went off at once. The only thing she could think of was getting out of the house. She yanked her arm away, but instead of letting go, Jeremy’s grip tightened and the shoulder seam of her shirt ripped.

Jeremy didn’t seem to hear the threads tear. Still holding her by her mangled shirt, he pulled her close and kissed her, forcing his tongue into her mouth. Keira turned her head to get away from his kiss. He ended up licking her cheek.

Trying not to gag, Keira wrenched herself out of his grip and ran toward the back door.

“Wait!” Behind her, Jeremy stepped forward, but the dog darted between the two of them, barking excitedly. Jeremy tripped over the dog and cursed. In the spare second the dog had given her, Keira flipped the lock and yanked open the door, careening out into the backyard.

“Hey!” Jeremy shouted after her, as she raced around the corner of the house. Vaguely, she heard the phone in his house ringing, followed by a string of curses.

She might have gotten away for the moment, but she wasn’t at all sure Jeremy was going to let her go for good.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

P
ROTECTED FROM VIEW BY
the wall of Jeremy’s house, Keira crouched down on the scruffy grass and reached for Darkside with everything she had. She crossed over so quickly that it hurt. It was like she’d been shoved through a meat slicer, chopping off her connection with one reality and dropping her into another.

She found herself pressed up against the exterior wall of the Hall of Records, the stone stealing her body heat with shocking speed. A scream of frustration rose in her throat and Keira gritted her teeth against it. There was no way into the Hall from this side. It was windowless. Doorless. Impenetrable. And there
was no way she was going in through the Hall of Record’s main door. She couldn’t risk that.

She’d just have to go back to her world and try again. Squeezing her eyes shut, she felt for the grass beneath her bare feet. When she could feel dirt beneath her fingertips, she opened her eyes.

Home.

There was no time to be relieved, not with Walker bleeding and Jeremy convinced that he just needed to keep kissing her until she realized that she wanted him too. Keira crawled up to the house, pushing against it until the cheap siding pressed painfully against her back. She had to be close enough now. If she wasn’t, she and Walker were both screwed. Briefly, she wondered if it were possible for her to materialize halfway through the stone wall of the Hall of Records. The thought made her shudder. Right then, though, she didn’t have time to worry about it. She had to try, no matter what might happen.

One more time,
she told herself, reaching for another reality. Sweat sprang up on her scalp from the effort of going Darkside again, and the chill that came over her when she passed through turned her damp skin to ice.

But she was
through.
That was all that mattered.

Keira found herself at the very back of the listening room.

The door was open and she could see Walker’s feet just beyond it. In the main room, shouts echoed. She peered around the doorway in time to see Smith dart out through the main doors, followed by a swarm of guards.

Keira scrabbled across the floor, keeping herself as low as possible. Grabbing Walker’s ankles, she dragged him into the room, grateful for the glass-smooth floor. His right arm flopped as though his hand wasn’t attached to his elbow. Keira’s stomach rolled. She shook his good shoulder.

“Walker. Walker, wake up!” His head lolled. The blood from his nose had dried into dark, shimmering flecks.

“Walker!” She pinched him, hard, but his face remained blank. In the main room of the Hall, Keira could hear the rustle of activity. She couldn’t wait for Walker to regain consciousness. There wasn’t time.

She pushed him across the floor so that he was flush against the wall. She had to get Walker out of here, and if he were any farther inside the listening room, they’d end up in the Reynoldses’ spare room when they crossed over.

Keira crawled halfway on top of him, buried her face in his shirt, and wrapped her shaking arms around him. She closed her eyes, blocking out everything about the Hall of Records. She concentrated on the scraggly grass and the cold, gray siding of Jeremy’s house. The rusted, chain-link fence around the yard. The blue sky and the sun glowing overhead, radiating outward, the way light was
supposed
to.

Something unpleasantly wet swept along her bared arm, and Keira opened her eyes, ready to scream. Ready to fight.

The golden retriever looked at her quizzically, like he couldn’t understand why she kept disappearing just when he
was ready to play. Beneath her, Walker stirred.

“Oh, holy discord, are we back in Sherwin?” He sat up and Keira blinked, staring at him. The blood was gone from his face, and he leaned back on his arms. His arms, which were obviously not broken. She had a million questions, but none of them burned as brightly as her desire to get the hell away from the Reynoldses’ backyard.

“Yes,” she whispered, climbing off him and grabbing his hand. The dog danced in front of Walker, whining to be petted. “We have to get out of here.
Now.
”

“Keira, the guards can’t get us here.”

“No,” she breathed, yanking Walker to his feet, “but
he
can.” Walker paled at the sound of heavy footsteps against the Reynoldses’ concrete patio. The two of them sprinted toward the fence. Walker grabbed Keira, lifting her over it like she was as light as a leaf, then vaulted it easily himself.

They ran back toward the car, ducking beneath trees and behind parked cars until they had put enough distance between them and Jeremy’s house that they couldn’t be seen.

Walker tugged her behind a fir tree, his hands reaching up to stroke her face. His thumbs skimmed over her eyebrows and across her cheekbones. They hovered over her lips like a placeholder for an impossible kiss.

“You’re okay?” he asked. “No one hurt you?”

The memory of Jeremy’s unwanted kiss, of the guard reaching for her shoulder, made her want to crawl right out of her
skin. There had been nothing but near misses that morning, but in the end, she’d managed to slip away each time.

“
I’m
fine,” Keira panted, out of breath from all the running. Hours and hours at the piano didn’t exactly count as cardio.

“Where’s Smith? What the hell happened?” he asked.

“I hauled your unconscious ass out of the Hall of Records, that’s what,” Keira said, her adrenaline-fueled fear exploding into anger. “Smith ran out the front door with a bunch of guards behind him. I don’t know where he is now.”

“Smith can take care of himself,” Walker reassured her.

“I hope you’re right, because one of those guards broke your arm and kicked you in the head. Once you were unconscious, he left you bleeding on the floor. At least, I think it was blood.”

Walker rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably. “Yeah. It was probably blood. The dark matter particles that get mixed in make it look different. I remember one of the guards smashing into me . . . he broke my
arm
?”

“It was flopping like a fish,” Keira said.

Walker dropped his hand from his neck and held out his hands, twisting them from side to side, showing her that he was fine.

“How is that possible?” she asked with a croak of surprise.

“It’s the crossing,” Walker said. “In the same way it messes with your metabolism—the molecules in your body shift as you go through the barrier—it sort of resets them. You go back to the way your genes say you are supposed to be. I’m
surprised you didn’t notice that the other night with your shoulder.”