Kelly Meding - Wrong Side of Dead

“I’m so sorry about Ava,” he said.

“Don’t be sorry yet.” A brief flare of annoyance shut out any lingering threads of grief. “I plan on getting her back alive, along with the rest of them.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“I know, Wyatt, but saying you’re sorry feels like a condolence, and I don’t want it.”

He lifted his hand and brushed a damp strand of hair off my forehead. “What do you want, then?”

Boy, that was a loaded question, and it had nothing to do with the missing Therians. For once, I didn’t know what to say because I didn’t have a clue what I wanted from him. We’d been keeping each other at arm’s length for two weeks, getting the space we both needed. I just didn’t know if I was ready for the heart-to-heart that would finally lay it all on the table.

“I want a shower,” I said.

“Well, you are kind of a mess.”

“No kidding.” I had dirt on my arms and legs from both of my tumbles (the roof of the rave and the driveway landing), drying sweat everywhere from my battle with the heavy bag, not to mention tears, snot, and probably a little bit of blood from any number of sources. I couldn’t smell very good, either. “No, I think ‘mess’ is kind. I’m downright disgusting.”

“Come on, then, Stinky.” Wyatt stood up, then offered his hand. I waved my boxing glove at him. He laughed, then grabbed my wrist and helped lever me to my feet. He unstrapped the gloves—for which I was eternally grateful, as my fingers were stiff and refusing to work properly—and tossed them aside.

“Thank you for this,” I said.

“Of course. I’ll do everything I can to help you get the Coni back. You know that.”

“I do.” I flexed my fingers, wincing at the sharp twinges in my joints. The soreness would fade quickly, thanks to my healing ability, so in some bizarre way I wanted to enjoy the pain while it existed.

We headed for the door. I grabbed his arm before we reached it, and he stopped short.

“One favor after my shower?” I asked.

“Depends on the favor.”

Smart man. “I want to speak with Felix.”

“Think you can make him talk?”

“Probably not, but if he isn’t talking, then Astrid won’t keep him alive much longer. I just want a minute before his neck gets snapped.”

“Why?”

“Because he never finished answering a question I asked him on the roof.”

The shower felt wonderful. A little bit of steamy, wet heaven after a nightmarish few hours. I almost felt normal again as I left the bathrooms in fresh jeans, a navy blue tank top, and the latest in heavy-duty sneakers. My hair was left to dry in whichever manner it chose.

Wyatt was lingering outside of the jail. “Astrid said you could have five minutes.”

“Generous of her.”

“Play nice, Evy.”

“With Astrid or Felix?”

“Astrid. She’s taking these disappearances more personally than you are. Clan protection is her job.”

True, and a great point. Except for Phineas (and, to an extent, Kyle), I hadn’t given consideration to the feelings of the Therians we worked with. Before creating the Watch, Astrid had headed up an elite security team for the Assembly of Clan Elders. Losing so many people at once had to hurt.

“Okay,” I said. “Five minutes.”

We went inside. The first room was large, with a center desk and three observation windows, one on each wall. The rooms to the immediate left and center were both specialty jail cells—the walls created with alternating strips of silver bars (anti-Therian) and raw pine (anti-vampire) to keep the majority of potential prisoners from staging a breakout. To the right was the interrogation room, its walls a similar composition. Two different chairs were bolted to the floor at intervals, also of different materials depending on who was being questioned. A rack of tools hung on the back wall of that room next to an industrial sink.

Seth Nevada stood behind the desk, arms crossed over his chest. I didn’t know him well; he’d been a Handler in a different part of the city and had volunteered here as the equivalent of town sheriff. Three others worked under him, and the quartet manned the jail. Humans were chosen because of the wall materials—to prevent accidental injury. Nevada was smart, fair, and fond of snacking on hard-boiled eggs.

“Truman. Stone,” he said.

I gave an impolite half nod in his general direction, too horrified by what I saw in the interrogation room. Felix was slumped over in the wooden chair, bare arms and thighs bearing weeping blisters at every point of contact. Blood oozed from several parts of his body, and he was having trouble breathing. It took me a moment to spot the reason—a small head of garlic was hanging around his neck. Vampires and Halfies are allergic to all plants in the allium family, but garlic and onions had the worst effect.

And we knew all the tricks.

My stomach twisted. He’s not your friend, Felix died, he’s not your friend, Felix is dead . Seeing him like that made it harder to remember.

It also made it impossible to forget Alex Forrester. A kind young man who was once the best friend of Chalice, my new body, he’d volunteered to help me after my resurrection. He lost his life for his generosity, ending up in a position very similar to the one Felix was in now—a half-Blood tied to a wooden chair, tortured for information.

A warm hand squeezed my shoulder. I knew it was Wyatt without looking. “You sure you want to do this?” he whispered.

“Yes.” No. Fuck .

Nevada punched a code into the digital lock, and the interrogation door clicked. I pulled it open, stepped inside, and pulled it shut.

The odors of garlic and blood stung my nose and watered my eyes. Felix didn’t move, head down, arms and ankles shackled to the chair. He seemed to have passed out, but I knew better.

“I hear you haven’t been very cooperative,” I said.

His head snapped up, iridescent eyes blinking through a sheen of tears. “You brought me here and assumed I’d trade info for good-byes,” he said, voice hoarse, bitter.

“Not interested?”

“Anything I agree to ends with me being executed anyway, so what’s the point?”

I lifted one shoulder in a half shrug, struggling to keep an air of nonchalance when all I wanted to do was look away. “One final good deed before you die? For old time’s sake?”

Felix snorted, then winced. “What the hell do I owe the Triads?”

“I don’t know. Most of us were heading toward early death, jail, or a pretty fucked-up adult life before we were recruited. You think you’d have lasted this long without the Triads?”

He looked away, as if actually considering the question. I was barely eighteen and on my way to jail for assault and B&E when the Triads made me an offer. In some ways, Boot Camp was like jail, but I have no doubts that a prison full of women who were a lot tougher than I’d been back then would have killed me. Or at least broken my spirit. Four years as a Triad Hunter had broken a lot of my bones, but so far my spirit was intact and still fighting.

I didn’t know Felix’s story. Hell, I barely knew anyone’s story—even Tybalt’s and Milo’s, who were the closest Hunter friends I had now. Talking about the past wasn’t a particularly favorite subject of conversation for anyone.

“I was a street hustler,” Felix said.

It took me a moment to process that. I was afraid to interrupt or react in any way, just in case I shut him up.

“It was fast money, and it kept me from starving and freezing in the streets. Hated it, though, every fucking second. I guess Gina knew, because our Handlers got all the dirt on us, right? But if so, she never said anything. When the guys found out, no one cared. I hated it so much that I couldn’t believe they didn’t care.” He was babbling a bit, saying whatever his muddled memory pulled out of storage.