The Reaping (The Fahllen #1)(45)
Author: M. Leighton

“What are you looking at?” The child’s question startled me. When I dropped my eyes to her, she was looking toward the woman blankly. Then she raised her confused blue eyes to me.

She wasn’t the only one that was confused. I stood, rooted to my spot, with no idea what to do, looking back and forth between the woman and the girl.

Just then Leah returned with some money. “All I could find was ten bucks,” she said, stepping out onto the stoop in front of the girl. “Are they still five dollars a box?”

“Yes, ma’am,” the girl said with a sweet grin.

Then the woman spoke, “Such a sweet and pretty girl, isn’t she? Leah, I mean.”

Leah and the child exchanged money and information, the little girl writing it on her order sheet. They both acted as if they hadn’t heard the woman speak.

“It would be a shame for her to fall into harm’s way, wouldn’t it?”

My heart lurched. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Huh?” Both Leah and the girl were looking at me in confusion.

“Just that as long as you don’t do anything reckless, Leah will be enjoying her cookies by Christmas,” the woman said, her chilling smile widening to reveal perfectly straight, glaringly white teeth.

Leah was still looking at me strangely. “Carson?”

“Sorry, what?”

“Would you like some cookies, too?”

“I, um,” I said, looking back and forth between Leah and the woman who’d moved to stand right behind Leah. “I, uh, I don’t think so. I- I changed my mind, but thank you.”

“Are you alright?”

“I’m fine. Sorry,” I said, shaking my head, trying to ignore the woman as she raised her hand to pinch one of Leah’s dark curls between her scarlet-tipped fingers. “I was just thinking about something else. I’ll just see you tomorrow, k?”

“Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Yep,” I said as lightly as I could manage. That seemed to have helped. Leah’s wrinkled brow smoothed somewhat at my response.

I turned and made my way down the driveway. As I turned onto the sidewalk, I looked back up at Leah. The woman was gone; only Leah and the little girl remained on the stoop.

Hurrying home, I quelled the urge to run, knowing Leah could see me if she stepped out into her yard. When I reached my mailbox, I got the mail and continued up my driveway as was my habit. The garage door was closed, but I silently prayed that Derek’s bike was hiding behind it.

And it must have been because when I turned the front door knob, it was already unlocked and Derek sat in the living room floor cleaning my father’s Glock. Relief flooded me.

I closed the front door and leaned back against it, closing my eyes.

“What’s wrong?” The question was innocuous enough, but I could hear the sharpness of anxiety in his voice.

“Fahl was at Leah’s.”

Derek was on his feet in an instant. “What? What happened?”

I described the encounter to him, leaving nothing out. The furrow in his brow grew deeper and deeper as I spoke.

“What could that possibly mean?”

His only response was a humph.

“Why am I seeing him? And now in the light?”

“He can travel outside the shadows. He’s dead, but he’s also… something else.”

“What do you think it means? Why is he stalking me?”

Derek watched me carefully, his expression unfathomable. “Your time might be coming.”

“What?” My heart sank. “So soon?”

“It’s impossible to know when, but…”

“How long do I have?”

Derek shrugged in that way that I loved. “Hard to say.”

I fought against that claustrophobic feeling that the world was closing in on me. I reminded myself that I was a survivor and that I wasn’t going down without a fight. My confidence was wavering, though, with the idea that my time might be imminent.

We ate dinner that night in silence, both of us lost in thought. Later, in the wee hours of the morning, I stirred at the sound of my bedside lamp switch clicking off. Fear rose inside me at the darkness that surrounded my bed until I felt Derek’s weight as he sank into the mattress beside me.

Wordlessly, he wrapped his arms around me and I snuggled into his bare chest, reveling in the intoxicating scent of him. And though his presence was comforting, he’d never been in my bed before and I felt the significance of it, like a nail of finality in the coffin of my circumstance.

The days that followed drifted by in a haze of desperation and awareness. There might as well have been a giant clock with glowing red numbers hanging over my head, counting down the days to my summons. Only the invisible clock that ticked away inside me had no numbers, no way of letting me know exactly how long I had left and, crazy as it might sound, that was the most disconcerting thing of all—not knowing.

********

Two weeks later, I sat in front of the Christmas tree, drinking my coffee, staring at the single, cheerfully-wrapped package that lay beneath it. My curiosity was at fever pitch. The gift had arrived last night. I’d noticed it when I’d come into the living room looking for Derek. He was gone when I woke up.

He’d left sometime while I slept, like he was doing more often of late. I never knew where he went, what he was doing or how long he was gone. I just knew that it was making me more and more uncomfortable as the days went by. At this point, I’d shifted from uncomfortable to downright suspicious.

Just then, I heard the roar of Derek’s bike as he zoomed up the driveway. I didn’t move, choosing to wait patiently where I was for him to come inside. And he did.

He came through the front door, carrying a bag with golden arches on the side. He smiled when he saw me sitting in front of the Christmas tree. “You’re up early. Aren’t you supposed to sleep in when school’s out?”

I smiled a sleepy smile in response.

Dropping a quick kiss on my lips as he passed, Derek took the bag into the kitchen. “Want some breakfast?”

“I’m not very hungry,” I said flatly.

I heard Derek’s boots clacking on the linoleum as he crossed the kitchen back toward the living room. “Is something wrong?” He asked, poking his head around the corner to look at me.

I said nothing at first, knowing that I wouldn’t get a straight answer if I asked the question that was always hovering at the back of my mind. Instead, I said, “Where’d this package come from?”