Page 53 of Uncontrolled

“What would that be?” she asks in a voice fighting to sound nonchalant.

“Go take the fastest shower of your life,” I say. She pauses for a second before a startled laugh breaks from her and I grin. “Because I’m next in line and if I don’t get these moldy ass clothes off me in the next ten minutes, I might suffer permanent damage.”

She fakes a wince. “I didn’t want to ruin our romantic scene or anything, but you do kind of stink.”

“Speak for yourself, Prom Scene Carrie,” I shoot back and this time her throaty chuckle sends a tingle through me.

She kisses the tip of my nose and then mock jogs to her room, emerging a moment later clutching an armful of clean clothes. Lifting them in a salute, she heads into the bathroom and closes the door. The shower starts.

I toe off my sneakers, checking them for blood. Unsurprisingly, there’s a streak of maroon going brown on the side. They’re only days old and already I’ve messed them up.

“I need something bigger,” I mumble to the empty room. In order to find that, I’m going to need more time, which means I have to give Nico what she wants. A body.

Thinking of Corbin dead makes me think of Jason Jourdain, the real owner of that cabin. Quinn had said the resurrectionist being alive was one of the terms of selling him to their buyer.

I straighten. Does that mean there’s a chance he’s still alive? I can find him, get him back safely. After that, Allie’s people will have to believe I’m not a threat.

It might be the move I need.

Allie

“Yeah, it’s all been a little much the past couple weeks. Still getting the hang of things, which is why it took me a bit to reach out,” I say into the phone.

I mark a line through Tennisen’s name on the scrap piece of paper in front of me on the counter. Tennisen is the leader of the cluster in Callatan, Montana and at only twenty-one years old, if anyone understands what I’m going through, it’s him. He’s also my final call.

“I can imagine,“ he says in a voice that lacks any trace of accent. I expected him to sound like a cowboy or a Canadian. “You weren’t exactly eased into things.”

My laugh is uncomfortable enough that I regret the attempt as it leaves my mouth. I’m not privy to why Tennisen assumed control over his cluster so early, but he definitely didn’t have someone running it for him the first two weeks like I had Talia. Yesterday’s resurrection of the bank robber wasn’t the tame job I expected. Christopher and I had watched the news last night, hoping for an update. After a high-speed chase, our Bonnie and Clyde had disappeared. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t been rooting for them.

“Take things slow as much as you can,” Tennisen says, dragging my brain to the present. “It’ll come more naturally, I promise. If you need to vent or ask advice, I get we don’t know each other well, but I’m a phone call away.”

The gratitude in my voice is genuine. “I appreciate that.”

“Things safe again down your way?” He means the hunters anyone else would have made an immediate priority.

“They’re… I’m… For now,” I settle on. “How’s it going where you are?”

I glance up as Christopher comes into the kitchen. On the phone, Tennisen’s rambling about splitting the scant resurrectionist payments combined with what he has to do in a day to run his ranch.

As I watch, Christopher lowers his shoes into the empty sink. Maroonish brown smudges one side and more stains the soles of both, souvenirs from the job I took him on yesterday. He reaches for the hot water knob. I flail my hand to stop him.

“Uh huh,” I say into the phone, distracted now. “I can imagine!”

While Tennisen babbles, I go into the bathroom to gather a wholesale-sized bottle of hydrogen peroxide and bring it into the kitchen. I swirl the cap and tip to pour the liquid onto the blood. As the chemical reaction bubbles and seethes, pink foam sloughs in a slow slide toward the drain.

“So when are we going to make you official?” Tennisen asks.

Everyone seemed sympathetic that after the massacre and mess here, I needed some time for mourning. Officially handing me the reins means the leaders of each cluster coming here, a traditional meet and greet and a rare excuse to mingle. It also means a spotlight on Fissure’s Whipp, on me, on Christopher. It’s exactly what I don’t want. Still, it needs done. “I imagine soon,” I tell Tennisen.

“All right,” Tennisen says. “Hang in there, and I suppose I’ll see you sooner rather than later.”

“Sure thing.”

“Allie, before I go,?” he says. “Real sorry about your aunt. Sarah was a damn force of nature.”

My throat goes thick and there’s an awkward pause. Everyone thought the world of Sarah. How am I supposed to fill her shoes? I stare at Christopher's sneakers in the basin, bloodied and dripping.

“Thanks. I appreciate that,” I manage and then I hang up.

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