Page 22 of Midnight Auto Parts

“We’re not going anywhere.” I folded her in a hug that left her wheezing. “Take all the time you need.”

Her eyes were glassy when she withdrew, but she refused to let her tears fall. “Since you’re clearly desperate for my company, I’ll be nice and let you go with me instead of Carter.”

Ankou’s tree aside, I was glad for the excuse to hang out with her. “When?”

“Now is as good a time as any.” She grinned over my shoulder. “Coming, Birdfriend?”

Warmth from Kierce’s nearness caressed my spine as he asked her, “Do you require my assistance?”

“I’m sure Frankie and I can handle it, but it’s not bad.” She rolled her eyes. “Having you around, I mean.”

From Josie that was a gold-star endorsement, and Kierce understood the weight of her approval.

Had I not long suspected she began accepting Kierce to spite Harrow, I would be more impressed with her invitation. As it was, I dared to hope Kierce was carving out his own niche with my siblings. Even this, a simple good faith gesture, was more of a welcome than Josie had ever shown Harrow.

And there I went, thinking about him again.

Harrow.

This whole cutting-people-out-of-your-life thing was harder than I thought it would be.

First Armie. Now Harrow. Small as my social circle was, I couldn’t afford to lose more people from it.

“I would be happy to accompany you.” He inclined his head to her. “I have a vested interest in the tree.”

“We all do.” A cold light entered her eyes. “Anything Armie planted is poison.”

Since he fed me its fruit, and he had made no secret he wanted me dead, her literal interpretation might not be far off base. He must have expected me to rise as a god blood, like him. But thanks to my parents, and Dis Pater being a homicidal glowworm, I woke as a demigoddess instead.

Dis Pater claimed I would have died young, for a necromancer, but that could have meant two hundred or more years. Had Armie’s fruit accelerated my demise? Had my episodes not been escalating with the passage of time but through an increase in my consumption? I didn’t know. I might never know. I wasn’t sure it mattered, in hindsight. He got his wish. I died. Now it was up to us to make sure no one else got a one-way ticket stamped to an eternity of servitude.

“I’ll text Matty,” I volunteered. “Let him know where we’re going.”

A pinch in my chest made it difficult to type the message. I didn’t like leaving him alone.

But if I smothered him, I would be clipping his wings when he deserved to fly for as long as possible.

>We’re off to tree hunt.

>>I hope you lose Josie in the woods.

>That’s not nice.

>>Josie’s not nice.

>She has her moments.

Despite the warning voice telling me not to baby him, I couldn’t help but ask.

>Will you be okay alone?

>>I won’t be alone. I’m going to see Leyna.

>Should I know that name?

>>She’s a friend of a friend who invited me to a party tonight.

Teeth clenched against the urge to drill him for details, I restrained myself.

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