“Which is?”
“A McGriddle and an Egg McMuffin,” Jackie volunteered, seemingly disinterested. “Cooper is right. Tyler might be a glutton for processed breakfast sandwiches, but he’s hardly a new glutton.”
“I heard that.” Tyler jabbed a finger in her direction. “My breakfast is too yummy to care, though.”
Jackie smirked. “Good to know.” She turned serious as she pinched off a corner off her hash browns and turned her full attention to Hannah. “Did you really kill a fury?”
Hannah hesitated and then nodded. “I think so. I mean ... he seemed dead.”
“She fried him,” Cooper acknowledged. “By the time he hit the ground, he was nothing but dust.”
“Maybe that means he poofed like the other guy,” Hannah countered, her mind busy. “I mean ... he could’ve realized he was in trouble and ran.”
“Except he still had an army of hungry zombies at his disposal,” Cooper pointed out. “Technically, he still had the upper hand. When you hit him with your magic, he looked surprised. The spell was broken by the time he turned to dust. That seems to indicate to me that you killed him.”
“I would agree,” Jackie said. “We can’t be a hundred percent certain at this point, but I’m as close as I can get to that number. That means we have six left.”
“Had we known what we were dealing with, Hannah could’ve taken out the other one before that poor man was killed,” Danielle noted. “It’s too bad we’re so far behind.”
Hannah’s heart heaved. “Yeah. It’s too bad we didn’t know.”
“Stop that,” Cooper admonished, his mouth full of food. He didn’t care that his fingers were greasy when he moved them to the back of Hannah’s neck to rub at the tension pooling there. “You did the absolute best you possibly could,” he reassured her. “There was no way for you to know. It’s not as if you could hurl magic at that guy without a reasonable assumption that he was a monster.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Danielle offered quickly. “I didn’t mean to insinuate that you did anything wrong. Of course you did absolutely everything you could.”
Hannah nodded numbly. “I know. I just ... it’s a sad thing.” She flashed a smile that she didn’t really feel. “It’s okay. I know I couldn’t have done anything.”
“Basically, we called you here because we need to figure out a plan of attack,” Cooper noted, changing the subject. “We have six furies out there and I’m guessing they’re going to be out for blood now that we’ve killed one of them. They won’t want to risk losing another member of their team so ... we need to figure things out.”
“It’s not going to be as easy as you would like,” Jackie noted. “You and Hannah are the only ones to have seen these creatures so far. Until we witness them in action ... .” She trailed off.
“We still need a general plan.” Cooper was firm. “We can’t simply sit back and wait for them to attack us. That’s not the way to win this.”
“Are we to assume that they’ll come at us individually?” Danielle queried. “I mean ... wouldn’t it make more sense for them to attack as a group? They’re stronger that way.”
“Yes, but they seem to use different methods of attack,” Hannah pointed out. “The guy who was here in town wanted to influence the men to attack one another. He didn’t actually get his hands dirty.”
“And the guy who was trying to get everyone to eat themselves to death was in the thick of things, shoveling food into his mouth as if it was about to be outlawed, but he didn’t particularly look keen at the notion of having a showdown with Hannah,” Cooper added. “In fact, the more I think about it, the more I think he looked annoyed.”
“I think he expected us to start eating before we noticed anything strange was going on,” Hannah admitted. “He would’ve preferred having us fall victim to him like everybody else. When that didn’t happen, it was as if taking us on magically was an afterthought ... and he didn’t like it.”
“So, maybe the ritual is more important than the outcome,” Jackie mused. “That is ... interesting.”
“Can we use it to our advantage?” Cooper countered. “That’s what I want to know.”
“I think it’s possible.”
They lapsed into comfortable silence as Jackie and Danielle read up on the section of book provided by Abigail. They appeared lost in thought, which gave Hannah a chance to survey the room.
“Where is Becky?” she asked finally. She’d just noticed the woman wasn’t part of the group and she found it strange.
“We called her,” Jackie replied, not looking up from the book. “She declined to be involved.”
“She declined?” Cooper was incredulous. “Are you serious? This is a dangerous situation.”
“And she’s still getting over the last dangerous situation,” Danielle pointed out. “I’m not sure she’ll ever truly get over that, if you want to know the truth. I don’t think she’s up for a big fight right now.”
“I’m not sure she’ll ever be up for a big fight again,” Jackie admitted. “She seems disinterested in life right now. She’s especially disinterested in anything that’s happening out here. I think there’s still a chance she could snap out of it, but I wouldn’t expect miracles this go-around.”
“Well, that’s just great.” Cooper made a face. “I’m glad to know we can rely on her in times of peril.”
Hannah pressed her lips together and raised her eyebrows, earning a sidelong look from her boyfriend.
“What?” he asked, defensive.
“That was a little dramatic,” Hannah noted. “Like Lindsey dramatic. Times of peril? Since when do you say things like that?”
“Since ... now.” Cooper rolled his neck, his breakfast sandwich abandoned on the table. “I’m just saying that I expected more from her.”
Hannah frowned as she stared at the sandwich, waiting for Cooper to remember he was famished. When he didn’t, she slowly got to her feet. Her inner danger alarm was pinging
