Page 57 of Welcome to Blackbird Hollow
“Yeah?” I say, unsure.
“Thanks for caring this fucking much,” she says, her tone choked. Maybe it’s just the dim lighting of the bar, but I’m pretty sure that her eyes are shining with tears. “We have a great community here, we really do. We take good care of each other. But sometimes—well, I’m kind of difficult.”
“I hadn’t noticed,” I say with an arched brow.
She snorts, rolling her eyes. “Sometimes it sort of feels like people tolerate me because of what I can do. Because I can handle Them. And sometimes I wonder if they’d kick me to the curb if I weren’t useful.”
I sit back with surprise, examining her. “Fallon, I think people here love you more than you understand,” I say, meaning every single word. “Look, I haven’t been here very long. But folks admire the shit out of you. Maybe not all of them. I’m sure you’ve been given plenty of reasons to feel the way you do. But I don’t think the people who are afraid of getting cut on your sharp edges deserve to feel the warmth of your company.”
Thanks to all that hedgerider training, Fallon moves so fast that I barely register when she throws her arms around me. But I hug her back fiercely, burying my face into her leather jacket. Then we’re both crying, cradling each other in Lucky’s battered pleather booth, bathed in the skittering purple lights.
“Right on schedule,” I say, making Fallon laugh. We pull apart, smiling shyly at each other, before Fallon recovers herself and sits back in the booth, one arm thrown over the back, looking like a queen surveying her kingdom.
“I want you to understand how frequently Sector is here,” she says suddenly. “For every agent you see, there’s at least one more that even I can’t clock.” I lean forward on the table, watching as Fallon gestures around the room, identifying agents.
“Obvious,” she scoffs at a white man in his thirties wearing a dress shirt and tie, clutching a beer bottle. “Not so obvious,” shecontinues, this time gesturing to someone wholookslike they belong—worn-in clothing, no fancy haircut—but who isn’t really engaging with anyone. Just watching. Finally, Fallon lifts her chin in the direction of a femme-presenting person in a vintage dress spinning around on the tiny dance floor, holding court with three or four people vying for her attention.
“No way,” I exclaim.
“Yes way,” Fallon says with a nod. “See what I mean? There werealwaysa ton of Sector agents here. You just didn’t notice them before.” With that, she stands, sliding out from the booth. “Alright, ponder your lesson. I gotta piss.”
I laugh at her abruptness and take another sip of my beer. I’m exhausted and wrung out, but I feel like I can breathe again. Nervousness and excitement flutter in my belly as I think about seeing Wyatt soon. I glance down at my outfit, hoping he’ll like it. Fallon dug out a black tube top from her closet, insisting it would look cute with my loose, mid-rise jeans. And Idolook cute, especially with the subtly shimmery body lotion she dabbed on my collarbones and shoulders.
Movement in my peripheral vision makes me look up; it’s only been a few moments since Fallon left. Instead of the tall, lanky hedgerider, there’s a woman in her early sixties with silvery-blonde hair sliding into the booth next to me. I startle, leaning away. She’s dressed in nondescript, tailored trousers and a nice blouse.
Which means she’s absolutely not from Blackbird Hollow, and I swear she wasn’t in this bar just a few minutes ago.
“This seat’s taken,” I tell her. In the large, shadowy room, she looks a lot like my grandma—the same round face and warm eyes, a similar shade of blonde shot through with silver.
“It’s nice to meet you,” the woman says, ignoring my words. I look at her, bewildered, my heart climbing my throat.
“Are you Sector?” I ask, narrowing my eyes at her. “Because you sure as shit look like Sector. And if you are, you should get the fuck out of here.”
“Oh, Alice,” the woman says, reaching across the table to pat my hand before I can yank it away. “Your friend’s coming back from the bathroom, so I’ll have to tell you more later.”
“Later?” I spit at her, adrenaline coursing through my veins, all the fear and dread from earlier surging back in as though it had never really left.
She stands then, brushing imaginary lint from her pants with one hand. “I thought you’d be more excited to meet me. After all, we’ve talked for years,” the woman says with a smile as I stare her down. “Alice, I’m Cookie.”
Chapter 26
Wyatt
I’m early to pick the girls up from the bar. I check my watch. Got about an hour ’til I can safely go in for a beer and check on things. Fallon’s a stickler about her own timetables, everyone else’s be damned, but she’ll throw a shit fit if I head in there early and spoil her night out with Alice. Fern was deep in a nap at home, so I haven’t even got my dog to talk to.
I dig around under my front seat. There’s a Sweet Valley Twins book in here somewhere. Fallon picked up a plastic bin of them from an old barn a few years ago, and Caden and I have been making our way through them. My fingers wrap aroundIf I Die Before I Wake, and I grin at the haunted house on the cover. Looks kinda like our house, now that I think about it. The twins are trapped in a dream with a half-monster named Eva, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
As I kick my feet up on the dash, a prissily dressed white woman in her sixties comes out of the bar. She gives me a Sector kind of feeling, which isn’t particularly odd. But the way she stands in the golden pool of light under the bar’s striped awning, scanning the parking lot, catches my eye. What’s she looking for?
I follow her gaze until it reaches my truck. When she sees it, her looking around pauses, and her eyes slide straight to mine. At first, she frowns for half a second, and then the slipperiest, most conniving smile I’ve seen in a long-ass while spreads over her face. On the surface, she looks like someone’s granny, but that smile. That’s something else entirely.
And not a supernatural something else. A completely human, downright evil sort of expression. I toss the twins aside, and I’m out of the truck before I can think a second thought. Before I can get across the parking lot, an old silver station wagon pulls up, a white man who looks like the perfect pair to the woman standing under the awning at the wheel.
As she gets into the car, she grins at me, her pale gums showing, eyes practically maniacal with some kind of secret joy. I break into a sprint, but can’t make it in time. The car pulls away, speeding out of the lot before I even have a chance to stop them.
Fuck Fallon’s timetable. Girls’ night is over. I push the wooden door to Lucky’s open. Joan Jett & the Blackhearts are playing on the jukebox, and I find Alice staring blankly at the wall as Joan wails about love hurting. Fallon’s headed back from the bathroom, and when she sees me, I can tell she’s about to yell.
I point at her and shake my head. “Don’t start. We’re going. Now.” I turn to Lenny at the bar and point at them next. “You put whatever they had on my tab, and I’ll be by after the first to clear the grindylow infestation from your end of the lake.”
