Page 6 of Shadow of Death

“Nope,” I said. I was more put out by the patch of poison ivy I was climbing through.

“You’re getting kind of, like…badass.”

I wasn’t sure if that was the most accurate word, but if it made them feel better… It was hard to have nerves when you couldn’t die.

Which reminded me: “Make sure you stay behind me, okay? You’re more for visual effect.” I couldn’t get Rastin and Buddie killed. They were like uncles to Charlie. It would be very bad form.

“We’re what?” Buddie asked, as if his ears were clogged.

Rastin’s face screwed up and he turned to Buddie. “Is she saying we’re, like—trophy wivesor some shit?”

Clearly these two weren’t comfortable in the arm candy column. I was going to need to be more careful with my wording going forward. “I didn’t mean it like that. All I’m saying is it might be easier for me to take the lead.”

They both stared at me like I’d dumped a bucket of freezing water on their heads.

“Holy shit. We’re her bitches,” Rastin said.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” I said, trying to think up a way to soften the blow. “If I walked over and said,Hey, my bitches,you wouldn’t think twice, would you?”

Rastin said, “We’re herbitches?”

Buddie laid a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “It’s okay. So she’s scarier than us now? Did you really want to be able to compete with her kind of freak show anyway?”

Rastin shrugged out of his grasp. “She is not scarier than me. Take that back.”

Buddie shook his head. “She is. I’m sorry, but it’s true. She’s scarier than all of us, and we’ll have to come to terms with it.”

“I’m not coming to terms with shit. If I walked around in my beast form, we’d see who was scarier,” Rastin said.

“Yeah, until she walks up all cute and innocent and people start dropping like flies. I’d put my money on her ‘cause that’s some real creepy shit,” Buddie shot back.

I stepped in between them. “Can you please shut up? We have other things to deal with right now.” Once they seemed to agree, I began walking again.

“Her heartbeat is barely pulsing over a dead person’s,” Buddie whispered. “We’re about to confront a group that wants to kill us, probably rape her before they do, and she can’t even get her heart rate up. She’s scarier, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

I shot them a look over my shoulder. “Shut up. We’re almost on them.”

I scanned the area and spotted an arm here and a foot there, all tucked behind shrubs.

“I don’t want to have to kill you,” I said, my voice raised so they could easily hear me. “Leave now, and we won’t.”

A man stepped forward. His hair was overgrown and greasy, but he looked fit enough. He might’ve been in his forties, or thirties and just not aging well. The look in his eyes made me wonder what his life had been before Death Day, and I had a feeling he’d risen in standing with the demise of our laws. Another man followed him out, looking a little less hardened, a little smaller, a little less of pretty much everything across the board. The only thing he wasn’t second at was sticking out his chest.

I could spot more of them in the trees around us. As long as they didn’t have silver bullets, it wouldn’t be that much of a problem for Buddie and Rastin. Death wouldn’t let a bullet of any kind get near me. She’d burn this forest to the ground first.

“You three are going to kill us?” the leader scoffed, and then spat at the ground.

I hated when people spat. It was a personal pet peeve. I smiled anyway. “Yes. Well, technically,Iwill, but I like to give them some of the credit for coming along.”

“Is this shit for real?” Rastin mumbled.

“I’msorry,” I said. “That was just for effect. If you’d like to shift and show them how scary you are, go ahead. I’m not trying to steal the spotlight. I was just trying to finish this up quickly so we could have a peaceful lunch.” If this got ugly, I’d have to let Rastin kill at least one. He was really getting very sensitive about this.

“Rastin,” Buddie said, “Evangeline’s got her chili cooking. Can you let her do this quickly if she can? I’m hungry.”

“Oh shit. Forgot about the chili.” Rastin looked back to me. “Go ahead. Do whatever.” He waved a hand at the men.

Those men were now staring at us with more weariness than when I’d been threatening them. They might’ve been getting the picture that they really weren’t an issue to us.

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