“No, he threw it all out.”
“I need something.” Seth sat at the table and looked out through the window into the deep woods that shadowed Jenny’s house.
Jenny leaned against the wall and folded her arms. “You get what I’m saying, though?”
“Yes,” Seth said. “We’re evil. We’re not normal human souls. We don’t belong here.”
“I mean about us being opposites. Ashleigh must have one somewhere, too. Someone whose touch doesn’t spread love, but the opposite.”
“What’s that?” Seth asked. “Hate?”
“Or what we felt last night,” Jenny said. “Fear.”
“His touch spreads fear.” Seth drummed his fingers on the table and shifted around, looking agitated. “Jesus. Think of what he could do with that.”
“I bet he can control people,” Jenny said. “Like Ashleigh. Just in a different way. They fear him instead of love him, but still.”
“I wonder where he came from,” Seth said. “Why’s he here now? Because Ashleigh’s dead?”
“You’ve never seen him before?” Jenny asked.
“Why ask me?”
“She was your girlfriend for three years? You were up her ass all the time? She made you her slave—”
“Okay, I get your point! No, I’ve never seen him, or heard Ashleigh talk about anyone like that. But she never admitted having a power in the first place. He wasn’t a part of her life, unless she kept it totally secret.”
“Which she was good at,” Jenny said.
“You really think he’s like us?” Seth asked.
“He did something to us,” Jenny said. “Don’t you wish there was some kind of expert on this stuff we could ask? It’s hard figuring it all out by ourselves.”
“There’s not even a name for what we are,” Seth said. “If we were, I don’t know, vampires or werewolves or something, maybe we’d have some clues.”
“Vampires.” Jenny laughed a little, without any pleasure. “I’m worse than that.”
“If that guy comes back, I’ll deal with him,” Seth said.
“I’m pretty sure that’ll be my job.” Jenny looked out the window again. “And if there’s another one of us to deal with—another one like Ashleigh—then this isn’t a good time for me to turn myself in.”
“I totally agree.” Seth grabbed her hand. “But we really should move over to my house. You’ll be safer. There’s a thousand places you can hide.”
“A thousand scary places,” Jenny said.
“They’re not all scary.” Seth stood up and embraced her from behind as she looked out at the woods. He pulled her close to him, and he kissed her neck. “You like the navigator room. The bed hung with old sails…”
She closed her eyes as he turned her and kissed her mouth. His hand slid under the hem of her shirt, to cup her left breast. She tried to catch her breath. He was putting her off guard…but they needed to…
“We need to go!” Jenny pulled away from him. “If I’m hiding and playing dead, we can’t stay here.”
“But I was thinking—”
“I know what you were thinking.” She kissed him, then went to her room and stuffed clothes and a few other things into her school backpack. “Go make sure Rocky has food. You’ll have to come check on him every day until this is over.”
When the dog was fed and Jenny was all packed up, she made a last circuit of the house, checking that the windows and back door were locked tight. They’d done a very careful job of securing the house last night, though, when they’d been scared out of their brains.
They stepped out onto the porch. As Jenny locked the front door, a black-and-white police car pulled into the driveway.
“Shit,” Jenny whispered. “Too late.”
The car parked, blocking them in. It was one of the federal cop cars, Homeland Security.
“What do we do?” Jenny whispered.
“Just smile and nod until they leave,” Seth whispered back.
A guy in a blue uniform stepped out of the driver’s side. The woman who emerged from the passenger side had a short, professional haircut and wore a dark suit. She carried a black doctor’s bag. Some kind of ID badge was clipped to her lapel.
“Hi,” the woman said. “Are you Jenny?”
“Um,” Jenny said.
The woman walked all the way to the porch. Jenny felt pinned. She looked at Seth, but he wouldn’t know what to do, either.
“I’m Dr. Reynard,” the woman said. “Centers for Disease Control. I’m looking for Jenny Morton. It’s urgent.”