his fault than hers. He was so lost in the wonderful moment of contact that he’d forgotten, just for a second, what was happening around them. Kirsty wasn’t inviting him to her bed. She was afraid of being alone.
“Let me see what David says,” Jonathan told her. He finished his coffee with one last gulp and put his mug on the cocktail table. He stood up, already feeling the loss of Kirsty’s body next to his. “We might want to go to a hotel or something. Someplace with a lot of people around. We can figure it out when I get back, but I better head over there.”
Kirsty stood up too. She wrapped her arms around Jonathan and pulled him close. She kissed him lightly on the mouth, sending sparks of excitement through his body.
“For luck,” she told him.
Jonathan smiled and held her hand. Together they walked across the living room and into the foyer. At the front door, he let go of her palm and said, “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“Be careful,” Kirsty said. “You don’t know what he might do.”
Jonathan nodded. He opened the door.
Next to him Kirsty gasped.
David stood on the sidewalk only fifty feet away. Shock and anger covered his face like a terrible mask.
High above his head, three Reapers soared in gentle circles, barely visible against the night sky.
15
“I knew it,” David said.
The heavy kid stomped toward them, but Jonathan was already stepping back, slamming the front door. Kirsty lunged forward and turned the locks. Her trembling fingers fumbled with the chain. Twice, she failed to fit the metal knob into the clasp. Finally Jonathan moved her aside and quickly slid the chain into place.
David pounded on the door. “Kirsty!” he shouted.
“David,” Jonathan said. “You have to stop this.”
“Shut your damn mouth, you back-stabbing dickhead. I want to talk to Kirsty.”
“Go away, David,” Kirsty said, her voice cracking with fear.
“Just let me talk to you,” David pleaded through the door.
“Come on, man,” Jonathan said. “Just stop. You’re acting crazy. You can’t keep doing this.”
“Shut up!” David roared. “She was my girlfriend. Mine. You had no right to do this. Christ, after all I’ve done for you, you pull something like this? It’s SAW, man. Totally SAW. How could you? How could you do that to a friend?
Jonathan looked at Kirsty. A flash of hurt played over her frightened expression. She lowered her head.
“Kirsty,” Jonathan whispered.
“It’s okay,” she said, not looking at him. “I already knew that.”
“Kirsty! Open the door. Come on. I just want to talk.”
Jonathan turned to Kirsty and grasped her shoulders. “You have to call the police,” he said. “Just tell them someone is trying to break in, okay?”
Kirsty nodded her head slowly and eased out of his grasp. Jonathan returned his attention to the door. “David,” he said, “we’re calling the police. You “I’m not going anywhere.”
Jonathan didn’t know what else to say. He leaned against the door, feeling miserable. He was jacked up on adrenaline, but he also felt bitter sadness. His best friend was a killer, a murderer with dark powers. No matter what else happened, his best friend was gone. The realization hurt worse than anything he could remember.
A touch at his shoulder startled him, and he spun to find Kirsty.
“He did something to the phones,” she said. “There’s no dial tone. Just static.”
“You’re going to be sorry,” David said through the door.
Kirsty ran into the living room. Concerned, Jonathan followed and found her standing at the window, holding an edge of the curtain back.
“He’s leaving,” she said.
“What about those things?”
“They’re still out there.”
“Okay,” Jonathan said. “Grab the emergency kit. We’d better get ready for a fight.”
Jonathan pulled a fireplace poker from its rack. He tested the weight in his hand and slashed it through the air once, like a swordsman preparing to duel. Kirsty grabbed the bag from the floor and checked through its contents.
“Do we have the duct tape?” Jonathan asked.
“Yeah. It’s here on top.”
“Okay, do you guys have a basement? Someplace without windows?”
“The basement has windows on two sides. A lot of them, but they’re small.”
That wouldn’t work, Jonathan thought. Likely, these things could creep through just about any space they wanted. They had no bones or muscle to give them bulk.
“What about a closet?” Kirsty asked.
“Too small,” Jonathan said. “We might be trapped in there for a long time. What about your room?”
Kirsty’s eyes lit up. “No. My mom’s room. It has a window, but we can block it. If they manage to get into the bedroom, we can still hide in the bathroom. We might need water or something anyhow.”
A window shattered at the back of the house. Jonathan’s heart leaped into his throat.
“That’s the kitchen,” Kirsty whispered. “God, they’re in the house.”
“Come on,” Jonathan said. He put his hand on her lower back and pushed her toward the stairs.
They ran, Jonathan one step behind Kirsty. At the bottom of the stairs, movement caught Jonathan’s eye. He turned to look down the hallway. Two of the Reapers glided into the hall from the kitchen. They rippled and spun as if caught in a violent ocean tide. But they continued forward, jostling for space in the narrow hall.
“Run!” Jonathan yelled.
They pounded up the stairs. On the landing Jonathan turned with the poker raised above his head, ready to bring it down on the attacking phantoms, but he didn’t see them. He scanned the foyer with his eyes and tried to hear the rippling of their bodies through the thundering pulse in his ears.
Jonathan noticed a broad stain beside the front door. It looked like someone had splashed a bucket of water on the wall. Except the stain moved. It pulsed and shimmied, moving slowly upward. Jonathan stepped back.
Another Reaper peeled away from the wall above the staircase only three feet from him. Jonathan stumbled back as a grin spread over the creature’s transparent face. Jonathan spun quickly, using the momentum of his misstep to drive him down the hall. At the end of the hall, Kirsty stood in an open doorway. She called his name, waved for him to hurry.
Not looking back, Jonathan sprinted toward her. Something cold and moist ran over his neck, and Jonathan raced even faster, driven forward by revulsion and fear. As he neared the threshold, he lunged forward. He tossed the poker ahead of him and dove into the room. Behind him, he heard the thwack of the door being slammed.
He hit the floor hard. Pain flared from his hip to his ankle and back again. But he had no time to entertain minor injuries. Jonathan rolled over and got to his knees. He turned and crawled toward the bag sitting on the floor next to Kirsty. He pulled out the duct tape and tore a long strip free. Above him Kirsty was talking, babbling about something, but he was too panicked to listen. He fixed the strip of tape over the gap between the door and the wooden floor. Then he dug in the bag for one of the bath towels. He rolled it up and slid it tight to the door. With more tape he secured the towel.
“Here,” he said, handing the roll of tape to Kirsty. “Seal up the edges of the door. I’m going to find something to wedge against that towel.”
The frantic girl did as she was told, but Kirsty’s fear was so great and her hands so affected by that fear, she kept sticking the tape to itself. She muttered and swore at her own clumsiness. Across the room Jonathan found a wooden dressing bench. It was barely more than a frame with a cushion but the wood was solid and heavy. He tossed the cushion on the floor and carried the bench across the room. He set the top of the bench on the floor and slid it tight against the towel.
Two minutes later, the door was sealed with ragged strips of duct tape, running around the edges and framing the door in gray. Jonathan checked the seal at the bottom—tape, towel, tape, bench. It should hold, but he
