Page 27 of The Fire Went Wild

“But there was a friend.”

I nod, even though I’m crossing into dangerous territory. There’s a reason Edie didn’t contact Charlotte to tell her she’s alive and safe. Probably to keep Charlotte out of this world. My world. The world of the Hunters.

And yet Charlotte came stumbling into it anyway. She’s right in the middle of it, sitting on my sofa, with her tousled cherry hair and wine-stained lips.

“You want some weed?” I ask her.

“Tell me who the friend was.”

I shake my head. Scoot a little closer to her. When she doesn’t pull away, I keep going, moving across the cushions until my knees knock into hers. She looks down at them. Up at me.

I suck down a deep lungful of weed smoke.

Then I lean forward, press my lips against hers, and exhale.

It’s not a kiss, but Charlotte reacts like it’s one—and one shewants. Because she doesn’t push me away. Doesn’t shriek and call me a disgusting weirdo freak.

Instead, she parts her lips and accepts the white cloud of smoke as it passes from my lungs into hers.

I sit back, trying to mask the trembling in my hands. I can’t believe I did that, although I can feel the Unnamed circling nearby, and I suspect that’s where the bravery came from.

Charlotte breathes, the smoke curling out of her lips and nostrils and forming a halo over her head for just a second before dissipating into the lazy circulation of the ceiling fan.

“What the fuck?” she says.

I want to do it again, desperately. Her lips are so astonishinglywarm. But this is a game, and there are rules.

“Ask another question,” I say roughly. “The right one.”

It doesn’t matter what she says. I’m going to do it.

Charlotte’s lips part. Her fingers tug down on her dress hem. Her eyes bore into mine.

“Have you spoken to Edie?”

The question brings me up short. Edie is the last thing I’m thinking about. But at least I can answer truthfully.

“Yes,” I say. “Once.” She had been in the room when I called Sawyer not long after he faked her death. He introduced us. I remember her voice, small and a little scared. The shy, whispered,Hello. Nothing like Charlotte, who puts on her mask, trying to hide that she’s afraid of me. Edie didn’t care that I knew.

And why should she? She knows I won’t do anything to her. Not as long as she’s Sawyer’s girl.

Charlotte falters. Her eyes seem big and damp. “And she’s okay?”

I suck down another lungful of weed smoke and lean forward. Charlotte doesn’t lean forward to meet me, the way I want her to, but she doesn’t pull away, either. Nor does she protest when I press my mouth to hers and exhale.

In fact, this time, she tilts her head, sealing our mouths together, her hot living breath mingling with mine as she draws the smoke away.

She exhales, her eyes never leaving mine. Waiting.

“Yes,” I say. “Edie’s okay. You really don’t need to worry about her.”

Something slumps in her shoulders. “I just have to worry about myself,” she mutters. There’s a slight slur to her words, from the wine and the weed. A faint lack of focus in her gaze.

I don’t respond except to suck down the last of the weed to the joint’s cardboard filter, lean forward, and shotgun her again.

She lets me. Parts her lips. Tilts her head. I press a little harder against her strangely hot mouth, trying to make it more of a kiss, and she lets me do that, too.

At least for a few seconds. Then she jerks back, exhaling the smoke between us. Through the pale haze, her eyes are wide with confusion.

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