I slip into the hall behind her.
“I can help you,” says Wes, but I can tell from the tension around his eyes that he’s not used to this level of disorientation. Not used to using words instead of force. “Calm down,” he says finally. “Just calm down.”
“What’s wrong with her?” The question doesn’t come from Wesley or me, but from a boy behind Wes at the end of the hall, several years younger than either of us.
Wes glances his way for a blink, long enough for Dina Blunt to lunge forward. As she grabs for his arm, I reach for hers. Her balance is off from panic and forward momentum, and I use her strength instead of mine to swing her back, get my hands against her face, and twist it sharply.
The snap of her neck is audible, followed by the thud of her body collapsing to the Narrows floor.
The boy makes a sound between a gasp and a cry. His eyes go wide as he turns and sprints away, skidding around the nearest corner. Wesley doesn’t chase him, doesn’t even move. He’s staring down at Dina Blunt’s motionless form. And then up at me.
I can’t decide whether the look is solely dumbfounded or admiring as well.
“What happened to the humanitarian approach?”
I shrug. “Sometimes it’s not enough.”
“You are crazy,” he says. “You are a crazy, amazing girl. And you scare the hell out of me.”
I smile.
“How did you do that?” asks Wes.
“New trick.”
“Where did you learn it?”
“By accident.” It’s not a total lie. I never meant for Owen to show me.
The History’s body shudders on the floor. “It won’t last long,” I say, taking her arms. Wes takes her legs.
“So this is what the adults are like?” he asks as we carry her to the nearest Returns door. Her eyelids flutter. We walk faster.
“Oh, no,” I say when we reach the door. “They get much worse.” I turn the key and flood the hall with light.
Wes smiles grimly. “Wonderful.”
Dina Blunt begins to whimper as we push her through.
“So,” Wesley says as I tug the door shut and the woman’s voice dies on the air, “who’s next?”
Two hours later, the list is miraculously clear, and I’ve managed to go, well, one hour and fifty-nine minutes without thinking about Ben’s shelf vanishing into the stacks. One hour and fifty-nine minutes without thinking about the rogue Librarian. Or about the string of deaths. The hunting quiets everything, but the moment we stop, the noise comes back.
“All done?” asks Wes, resting against the wall.
I look over the blank slip of paper and fold the list before another name can add itself. “Seems so. Still wish you had my territory?”
He smiles. “Maybe not by myself, but if you came with it? Yeah.”
I kick his shoe with mine, and apparently two boots make enough of a buffer that almost none of Wesley’s noise gets through. A little flare of feedback—but it’s growing on me, as far as sound goes.
We trace our way back through the halls.
“I could seriously go for some Bishop’s baked goods right now,” he adds. “Think Mrs. Bishop might have something?”
We reach the numbered doors, and I slide the key into I—the one that leads to the third-floor hall—even though it’s lazy and potentially public, because I really, really, really need a shower. I turn the key.
“Will oatmeal raisin do?” I ask, opening the door.
“Delightful,” he says, holding it open for me. “After you.”
It happens so fast.
The History comes out of nowhere.
Blink-and-you-miss-it quick, the way moments play rewinding memory. But this isn’t memory, this is now, and there’s not enough time. The body is a blur, a flash of reddish-brown hair and a green sweatshirt and lanky teenage limbs, all of which I distinctly remember returning. But that doesn’t stop sixteen-year-old Jackson Lerner from slamming into Wesley, sending him back hard. I go to shut the door, but Jackson’s foot sails through the air and catches me in the chest. Pain explodes across my ribs, and I’m on the ground, gasping for air, as Jackson’s fingers catch the door just before it shuts.
And then he’s gone.
Through.
Out.
Into the Coronado.
TWENTY-FIVE
FOR ONE TERRIBLE, terrifying moment, I don’t know what to do.
A History is out, and all I can think about is forcing air back into my lungs. And then the moment ends, and the next one starts, and Wes and I are somehow on our feet again, rushing through the Narrows door and onto the third floor of the Coronado. The hall is empty.
Wes asks me if I’m okay, and I take a breath and nod, pain rippling through my ribs.
My ring is still off, but I don’t need to read the walls to find Jackson, because his green sweatshirt is vanishing through the north stairwell door near my apartment. I sprint after him, and Wes turns and launches down the hall toward the south set of stairs beyond the elevators. Steps echo in the stairwell below, and I plunge down to the second floor as the door swings shut. I’m out in time to see Jackson skid to a stop halfway down the hall, Wesley rushing forward to block the landing to the grand stairs and the lobby and the way out.
The History is trapped.
“Jackson, stop,” I gasp.
“You lied,” he growls. “There is no home.” His eyes are wide and going black with panic, and for a moment it’s as if I’m back in front of Ben, terrified, and my feet are glued to the ground as Jackson turns and kicks in the nearest apartment door, smashing the wood and charging through.
Wes dashes forward, shocking me into motion, and I run as Jackson vanishes into the apartment.
Beyond the broken door of 2C, the apartment is modern, spare, but very clearly occupied. Jackson is halfway to the window when Wes darts forward and over a low couch. He catches Jackson’s arm and spins him back toward the room. Jackson dodges his grasp and cuts to the side down a hall, but I catch up and slam him into the wall, upsetting a large framed poster.
The shower in the bathroom at the end of the hall is going, and someone is singing off-key but loudly as Jackson shoves me away and rears back to kick. I spin as the rubber heel of his shoe lodges in the drywall, and grab his wrist while he’s off balance, pulling him toward me, my forearm slamming into his chest and sending him to the floor. When I try to pin him, he catches me with a glancing kick, and pain blossoms across my chest, forcing me to let go.
Wesley is there as Jackson scrambles to his feet and into the living room. Wes swings his arm around Jackson’s throat and pulls hard, but Jackson fights like mad and forces him several steps back. A glass coffee table catches Wesley behind the knees, and he loses his balance. The two go down together. The shower cuts off as they crash in a wave of shattered glass. Jackson is up first, a shard jutting from his arm, and he’s out the door before I can stop him.
Wesley is on his feet, his cheek and hand bleeding, but we tear into the second-floor hall. Jackson, in his panic, has stormed past the entrance to the landing and toward the elevator. We close in as he rips the glass from his arm with a hiss and forces the grille open. The dial above the cage door says the elevator is sitting on the sixth floor. The lobby is two stories tall. Which means two stories down.