Free My Soul To Take by Madeline Sheehan

back to the park when I realized I did not have my gun. It was ironic really, that the same gun Xan had given me the last time I’d seen him, I’d lost the day I found out he no longer loved me.

CHAPTER TEN
    Xan looked across the truck cab at Nico. Frate was being unusually quiet.
    They'd split up from Marko and Tobar halfway through whatever the hell town in Pennsylvania they'd happened upon and were on their way back to the rendezvous point with bags of clothing and canned goods piled high in the truck bed.
    “What's up with you?”
    “Hmm?” Nico took his eyes off the deserted road to glance at him. “What?”
    “You. What’s wrong with you?”
    “Gimme a smoke, will you?”
    He fumbled in his pockets for his pack, pulled two, lit them, and handed one over.
    Nico took several drags before speaking. “It’s Nicu. He’s…I don’t know. Something’s wrong with him.”
    He hadn't heard anything about Nicu, other than the comments Fifi had made.
    “What’s he done?”
    “It’s not what he’s done; it’s the way he looks at people, the things he says. He’s so angry.”
    “Frate, in a short period of time we went from being a wealthy clan, full of happy, healthy people to whatever the fuck we are now. Everyone has lost family members, lost hope, lost their damn minds.”
    “I know…” He cleared his throat, signaling the end of the conversation. They drove another few miles in silence.
    “So…do you think Becki’s recovered from losing Hockey?”
    He gave him a curious glance. “It’s only been a couple of months. Why do you ask?”
    Nico shrugged. “I don’t know… I mean, she’s hot, right?”
    His eyebrows shot to his hairline. “Uh, sure. If you’re into pregnant fete.”
    “I’m not talking about her expanding belly,” Nico snapped. “I’m talking about her!”
    “Whoa frate, calm down,” he said. “You want to know what I think, here it is. Becki is not hot –”
    Nico glared at him and he rolled his eyes.
    “As I was saying, Becki’s not hot; she’s too sweet looking to be considered hot. Surioară is beautiful. Especially naked.”
    Nico had begun to smile but now he was scowling. Damn. Frate really did have a thing for Becki. He supposed weirder things have happened…you know, like people eating people.
    He had not lied about Becki being beautiful. She really was. All smooth, brown skin and dark oval eyes. Her hair was a curly mess, but on Becki, the mess looked good. And if she kept those pregnancy tits…
    “Holy fucking shit,” Nico breathed, taking a left into…what used to be a hospital.
    “Is this the same hospital we were at this morning?” he asked, sitting up straighter. It looked as if an earthquake had singled out this one area, then a twister had come barreling through, picked everything up, circled around, and dumped it all back in the same place.
    Nico pointed to the Emergency Room Entrance indicator, the one thing that had remained standing. “Yep, same hospital.”
    “Do you smell that?” he asked, nostrils flaring.
    “Yup. Magic. It’s fucking powerful…probably Tobar.”
    “No… There’s something different about it. I’ve never smelled it before. Take a breath and try to ignore the floral scents and go deeper. It smells almost like…sour sulfur?”
    Nico did as he asked and his eyes went saucer-wide. “Ohhh, shit.”
    “What?”
    “I've smelled it before. Only once.”
    They both looked at each other.
    Before Nico could say anything, he jumped out of the moving truck and ran at full speed, not wanting to waste anymore time talking. If Gerik was here, if Tobar or Marko had seen him, then maybe…
    He slowed. Then maybe what? Gerik would just hand her over to him? Yeah, right. And what if she didn’t want to be handed over? What if she took one look at him and saw what he had been so afraid of her seeing before. That he had never been good enough for her, that he was a bastard with a chip on his shoulder and he destroyed everything he