Page 90 of Never Say Die
Someone else.
Footsteps banged on the porch. He heard Kelly saywait, but the door flew open, and Shay barreled inside. His chest lifted on big, heavy breaths, dressed in one of Aiden’s shirts and wrinkled jeans. He glanced from Aiden to the half-plucked bird on the table, then to the knife. Lifted his chin and sniffed.
“You’re bleeding,” he blurted, and shook his head, as if he’d said the wrong thing. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Shay,” Aiden said, swallowing hard.
“Shoes!” Maeve hollered. She pointed at Shay’s boots and leaned over the back of the couch, wrapping a beige compression bandage around Aiden’s sore wrist.
Kelly, swathed in a pink pajama set, hair tied into a slouchy bun, side-stepped Shay and adjusted the dog stuffed under herarm. “You almost gave him a heart attack, which almost gavemea heart attack,” she spat, glaring at Aiden. Disheveled, and beautiful regardless.
“Give the boy a break. He’s not very charming, but he’s got courage,” Maeve said.
Aiden jerked his head, offended.
“Can someone, maybe, like, explain what the hell is going on? What. . .” Shay gestured loosely to the feathers, the knife, the teacup. “What’s happening?” he asked, softly, and met Aiden’s eyes. “Why didn’t you answer your phone? Why’d you take off like that? What’re we doing here?”
Aiden gripped the bandage, holding his wrist tightly. “I couldn’t tell you?—”
“I was fucking scared, Aiden!” Shay’s teethclicked. His lips thinned, and a hush fell over the house. Like this, with his defenses shattered, Shay was so much himself, so much the boy Aiden had grown up and into. Defiant and human and selfish and good. “There’s a psycho-demon-bitch stalking you and?—”
“She’s on her way here,” Aiden said. Unearned regret needled his esophagus.
Shay blinked. His lips closed, parted, closed again. Aiden watched the pieces come together. Watched his mouth quiver and his throat flex. Pain cracked through the rage and worry on his face, and Aiden reminded himself to breathe.
Maeve curled her fingers, calling Kelly into the kitchen.
“I need you to listen to me,” Aiden said, as gently as he could. “Laura saw Cami, okay? She saw my sister, and if she can’t have me, she’ll go after her. She’ll find Ramírez blood,myblood, somewhere else.”
“You don’t know that,” Shay said, anger flaring again.
“I do.”
“How?”
“Because it’s what I would do,” Aiden said, and it was the truth.
Shay shook his head. “Blood isn’t exchangeable.”
“No, it isn’t. But Camila grew in the same belly I did. She shares my history, my family. Everything. I saw Laura look at her, and shesawher, Shay. If she can’t have me, she’ll try the next best thing. I can’t. . . I can’t let that happen. I can’t put my sister in danger over?—”
“You put a goddamn knife in me and kicked me off a cliff, Aiden. Please, don’t bother trying to fool me with your righteous, bullshit savior act,” Shay snapped.
Kelly clucked her tongue and poured herself a cup of tea. “Goddess, have mercy.”
Aiden almost said, you’re not my fucking sister, but he clenched his jaw and turned toward the window, staring into the restless bayou. “I’m performing another ritual. If I brought you back, you can bring me back?—”
“Absolutely the fuck not,” Shay said. Anger gave way to something else. Something splintered and broken.
“Maeve has the ritual items, she knows the steps, she’ll walk you through everything?—”
“No.”
“What, then? You kill Laura, I die. Laura kills me, I die. Laura kills Camila, I kill Laura and Istilldie,” Aiden said, and lifted Shay’s journal. “If we do the ritual, at least there’s a chance I’ll come back. Yeah, I put a goddamn knife in you,” he said, chewing on the words. “I kicked you off a cliff. You think that shit doesn’t have consequences? You think what we did in the desert didn’t come with a price-tag? A prophecy? Nothing’s free, cariño. Nothing.”
Shay shifted his jaw back and forth. His cheeks flushed, knuckles popping against his palm. He searched the floor, theceiling, then jutted his chin toward Maeve and Kelly. “Tell him this is bullshit.”
Maeve listed her head. “You’ve seen this moment since the day you returned. That isn’t a coincidence, Shay.”
