Pitch

understanding.

“To fall asleep,” Maximus repeated.

“Hey, if it’s really the end of the world a guy is entitled to a few beers, right? I might even have one or two myself.” Two complete lies in one sentence. Dad would have the case finished by morning and I would never drink beer again after I had stolen a sip from a lukewarm can he had left lying around one afternoon. My gag reflex kicked in just thinking about it.

Maximus cupped the back of his neck and looked heavenward to where the last traces of daylight were fading away. “We should go. Give me the beer. I’ll carry it.” He held out his hands and I passed the case over, grateful that I wouldn’t have to lug it all the way back to the hotel.

“So I guess this means you’re coming with me?” I asked. It was a rhetorical question as we had already started walking. Maximus ignored it.

As with most things, the way back seemed faster. We reached the cornfield without coming across any more of the Drinkers, although I could hear them, slithering in the shadows like snakes. Every so often a shrill scream tore through the air, sending a shiver down my spine. I glanced sideways at Maximus when I heard the screams, searching for some sort of reaction, but his grim, tight lipped expression never faltered. Only when the high pitched squeal of a child reached us did he curse under his breath and falter.

“Are you okay?” I said hesitantly when he stopped and looked back towards the town. His chest rose and fell with every sharp intake of breath. Without thinking about what I was doing I wrapped my fingers around his arm. It was like holding granite.

Maximus jolted at my touch and looked down to where my fingers were splayed across the sleeve of his leather jacket. Neither of us moved. The cornstalks rustled quietly as they closed in around us, cutting away the outside world. Our eyes met, dark gray against deep, stormy blue. For one crazy, mind numbing moment I thought he was going to lean forward and kiss me and I imagined the way my eyes would close and how my arms would curl around his shoulders as if they had always belonged there and my fingers would bury themselves in his hair.

He licked his lips.

My eyes began to drift closed…

“Stop lagging behind,” he growled. “We don’t want to be caught out in the open.”

My eyes popped open. It felt like someone had just dumped a bucket of freezing water over my head. Maximus ripped his arm free and stalked off into the corn, leaving me standing by myself like an idiot. Muttering my own curse under my breath, I hurried after him. Maximus might have been an asshole, but he was an asshole with a gun.

He didn’t look at me when I pulled up alongside him and we continued on towards the hotel in stony silence, neither one of us willing to give an inch. The sun was dipping below the mountain range to the west when we reached the parking lot. Or at least, what remained of the parking lot. Time had not treated the Renner Hotel and her grounds very kindly.

The hotel sat before us, an old, neglected building that sagged slightly to the right. Four large columns, the marble chipped and cracked, guarded the entrance. The front door was one of those old fashioned spinning doors where only one person could go in at a time. I was surprised – and relieved – to see all of the glass was still intact. I gave the door an experimental push. Without electricity to help swing it around, the door didn’t so much as slide an inch.

“Get out of the way,” Maximus said.

Tight lipped and glaring, I stepped to the side.

Leading with his shoulder, he threw his weight into the door and moved it easily. I darted in behind him and narrowly avoided tripping over my own feet as the door spun around with a high pitched whine.

The inside of the hotel was no better than the outside, with the exception of it being darker, so the neglect and decay weren’t as visible. The scent of mold and dust hung heavy in the air, although I would take grandma’s closet over blood and burnt flesh any day of the week.

Our footsteps echoed over the hardwood floor as we walked across the lobby. It was empty; the various tables and chairs that had once filled the space stripped away long ago. Narrow slivers of moonlight passed through the windows and illuminated everything in a soft, silvery glow. It didn’t escape my notice that Maximus stayed mostly in the shadows.

“Where are your father and friend?” he asked.

I bit down on my lip as I struggled to recall what room Dad had said he would be in. “Umm… Two fifteen or sixteen, I think.”

“We’ll have to go higher than that.”

“Higher?”

The whites of Maximus’s eyes flashed as he rolled them. “Drinkers are leery of heights. They’ll go up if they have to, but they prefer to stay close to the ground.”

So much for believing everything I saw in the movies. “How do you know so much about them?” I asked as we headed for the stairs. Maximus held the door open behind him – barely – and he answered when it clicked shut behind me, plunging the stairwell into darkness.

“Learn to know your enemy, Lola. You’ll live a lot longer if you do.”

Clinging to the smooth metal railing, I made a face at his back. Or at least where I thought his back was. It was too dark to tell for sure. “What does that even mean? It’s a simple question. How do you know so much about them? Have you seen them before? Are you part of some secret government – AHH!” My shriek of alarm echoed as my right foot slipped out from under me and I went flying forwards. I threw my arms out, bracing for the fall, but it never came. Instead two strong, capable hands caught my shoulders and pushed me upright. Gasping, I collapsed against the wall. It felt cool beneath my back and I pressed the side of my face against the painted brick while I waited for my heart rate to return to normal.

“Are you always this clumsy, or is it just in life or death situations?” Maximus asked dryly.

“Shut. Up.”

From somewhere above us came the sound of a door slamming and the clatter of footsteps. I drew in a sharp breath and instinctively moved towards Maximus, who wrapped one arm around my waist and jerked me hard against him.

“Go back down and wait by the door,” he hissed in my ear.

“What about you?” I heard a quiet click and then felt a cool brush of metal against my arm. “Oh yeah,” I said, feeling foolish. “You have a gun.”

“Go down and wait by the door,” he repeated. “Now, Lola.”

“But -”

The arm around my waist gave a threatening squeeze.

“Okay, okay,” I grumbled. “Just don’t… die or anything, k?”

“Are you worried about me?” Maximus sounded amused.

I could feel my cheeks turning bright red and was suddenly thankful it was so dark in the stairwell. “No. I’m worried about what would happen to me if something happened to you.”

His low chuckle sent my heart pounding again, this time in a not so entirely unpleasant way. “Don’t trip on your way down.”

I made another face.

“I saw that.”

My eyes widened. “But it’s so dark. How can you -”

“I have excellent night vision.”

I raised my hand with one finger in particular pointing high above the others. “Can you see that?”

“Lola…”

“I’m going, I’m going,” I grumbled. Carefully turning around I made my way back