Page 161 of Sweet Nightmare

CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE

DESPERATE TIMES CALL

FOR DESPERATE PORTALS

“Hey,” Izzy says as we all migrate unenthusiastically toward the door. The root cellar may be the place to be, but between the hurricane and the monsters, getting there is going to be rough. “Do we really want to go out there?”

“Want? No,” Luis tells her. “Need to? Kind of. Because I’m pretty sure the Prince of Darkness over there isn’t going to be able to do what he needs to in here.”

Izzy flashes her teeth at him in a smile that’s definitely more of a threat than a gesture of goodwill before turning back to Remy. “I think you should try the portal thing one more time.”

He rolls his eyes. “I already told you, I’ve tried like five times. I can’t get us off this damn island.”

“We’re not trying to get off the island anymore. We just need to get to the root cellar. Surely, you can do that much.” She makes it sound like a dare and an insult all rolled into one.

“It’s not about what I can do,” he answers, looking insulted. “It’s about the portal block.”

“Which was lifted to create that shit show of a portal that got us stranded here to begin with. We already decided there’s something weird about this storm, that it’s trying to keep us on the island. So, again, stop being a baby about a little failure and get us into that root cellar.”

“I wouldn’t call it a failure.” Remy lifts a brow. “And what do I get when I actually get us there?”

“Not attacked by monsters?” Jude suggests dryly.

“Pretty much a win-win, in my opinion,” I add.

Remy doesn’t look impressed…at least not until Izzy flashes her fangs at him in a very different look than she gave Luis. “How about I bite you?”

“Not sure how exactly that’s a prize,” Simon murmurs.

“Spoken by someone who’s never been bitten by a vampire,” she counters with a smile that is anything but sweet.

“I’ve never been bitten,” Remy tells her.

Izzy lifts a brow. “Do this for me and we’ll see if we can fix that.”

Thirty seconds later, Remy has us all inside the root cellar in the pitch black. And, can I just say, it was a much smoother ride than that portal Mr. Abdullah and Ms. Picadilly created.

When I say as much to him, Izzy says, “Told you he’s got the portal mojo.” She sounds almost proud, a fact that definitely doesn’t seem to slip by Remy. All of a sudden, a massive crack of thunder booms overhead, and I jump. The storm sounds a million times worse out here, the doors rattling like they’re about to come off their hinges. I remind myself that it’s actually safer for us to be underground right now, but it’s hard to believe it.

I pull one of the emergency flashlights out of my back pocket, but just as I go to turn it on, a ghostly face appears in front of me. It’s the woman from yesterday, the pregnant one in the pink nightgown. But instead of calmly walking with a hand on her pregnant belly the way she was earlier, she looks bedraggled and in pain.

Her hair is sweaty and plastered to her face. Her pink nightgown is wet and bloody, and her face is contorted with fear.

“My baby!” she calls, and her hand is trembling as she reaches for me. “My baby!”

I have one second to register that she must be in labor, but as I do, another ghost appears suddenly right next to her.

It’s the terrifying one from Aunt Claudia’s office. Her eyes are wild, her hair limp, and she’s covered in blood. And when she screams, it’s not to ask for help. Instead, it’s the epitome of agony—low and long and desperate, so desperate. Her eyes are darting all around, just like they were in the infirmary, like she’s seeing past, present, and future all at once and it’s torturing her.

“What the hell!” Luis says, sounding totally freaked out. And that’s when I realize he can hear her, too.

“Who is that?” Mozart asks, sounding desperate. “How can we help her?”

“Hey. It’s okay,” I say soothingly, reaching for the ghosts even knowing it’s going to hurt. But they’re both so terrified, so in pain, that I have to at least try to do something. But before I can figure out what that something is, a third ghost joins them—the brown-haired girl in the Calder uniform and nineties beanie and sunglasses. She doesn’t look as scared as the others, just resigned. And sad. So sad. It’s such a marked contrast to the girl I saw on the center mall that it breaks my heart.

“It’s going to be okay,” I say again as I reach out to them.

“What’s going to be okay?” Ember asks.

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