The Tenants of 7C by Alice Degan Read Free Book Online

him with a pillow. Nick was probably, Clare thought, one of the bravest people she had ever met. And she had tried to lead him to his death, for sport—no, for profit, so that she could profit from someone else’s sport, so that she could impress her colleagues and get ahead. And the monster, the real one, had accepted her explanation of his motives—had recognized that she understood him, and left her alive.
    In a panic to do something, it didn’t matter what, to escape from her thoughts, she reached for her purse on the chair beside her. She remembered the box of buns inside. They would be stale by now. They wouldn’t taste the way she remembered that gingerbread, anyway; there was no reason why they should.
    She pulled out the box. It was squashed and greasy. Maybe she should eat one, she thought. It would taste like ashes, and that would prove something. She picked out the most squashed, stale-looking bun and bit into it. It was delicious.

    •   •   •

    It took her two weeks to work up the courage to make the call, and as soon as she hung up she was sure it had been a mistake. She almost called back immediately to cancel the order, afraid that this was the successful Clare somehow getting the upper hand again. She spent the evening pacing her apartment, waiting for the doorbell to ring. Finally it did, and acting according to the plan that she had worked out beforehand, she ducked into the kitchen and called out, “Come in!”
    She heard the front door open.
    “Hello?”
    She came out of the kitchen, pretty sure from the voice that it was Nick.
    It was him, the box of buns she had ordered in his right hand. His left hand was still bandaged where the crossbow arrow had gone through the wolf’s paw. He stood frozen inside the door, wide-eyed and white-faced as he realized what he had just walked into.
    She held out her hands so that he could see that they were empty, and said quickly, “I want to talk to you. This was the best way I could think of. I had the box with the bakery’s number on it.”
    “Smart,” he admitted. He let the door close behind him, wary but not, she realized, actually terrified.
    “I wanted to talk to you,” she said again. “But you go first.”
    His chin went up defiantly, and she reminded herself that he was brave, that it was taking bravery for him to face her just then. “I don’t have anything to say to you.”
    “No?” She tried not to sound defiant herself. She wanted to confess, to explain things—but she realized that could easily come out sounding self-indulgent. She wanted him to ask first.
    “Well … ” His eyes flicked tensely around her living room, then came back to rest on her. “I guess maybe I do. How did you find Heaven and Earth? That’s what we haven’t been able to figure out. You didn’t just come in by accident, did you?”
    “No. We’ve got—Stake has got an iPhone app. I don’t know who designed it for them, but I know it wasn’t done in-house.”
    He goggled at her. “An iPhone app ? That does what?”
    “Maps out locations in the city where … uh … I don’t know, magic? Where there’s a high concentration of magic, or something. I mean paranormal, um … ” she trailed off, embarrassed.
    “Yeah, I get it.”
    “I don’t have the phone here—it’s a company phone, so … ”
    “You don’t work for them any more?” He sounded hopeful.
    She gave a noncommittal wiggle of her head, neither yes nor no . She wanted to be quite honest with him. “I’m on a leave of absence. It’s their policy when a hunt goes bad.”
    “Uh huh. I heard they were basically shutting down.”
    “No. They’re scaling back, but they’re not shutting down—they won’t be stopping the hunts. But that’s not necessarily anything for you to worry about. They’re not likely to come after you again, not after the disaster that … Most of them—you’ve got to understand, most of the hunts are fake. Actors and fake blood, and nobody