Free Death Becomes Me (Call Me Grim Book 2) by Elizabeth Holloway

highway. He gently places my feet on the ground, keeping his arm behind me, like he’s afraid I might topple over.
    I take a tentative step into the field and the tight, burned skin of my ankle pulls. Fire shoots up my leg as the raw skin there splits. Warmth seeps from the new wound, down my heel and into my tennis shoe.
    I bite my lip against the pain. It’s not so bad. I might need a new pair of socks, but it’s bearable. Not nearly as bad as when it happened, at least. I smile up at him despite the agony. “See? Fit as a fiddle.”
    “You’re sure?”
    “Yes.” I smile again. “Totally sure.” No way he’s carrying me ten more feet. His face is so red he could be a stop sign.
    “Okay. Let’s go.” He takes off running and I run beside him, matching his stride. We take flight when the grass gives way to asphalt and soar over the highway, barely missing a few cars. Moments later, the landscape blurs with pure speed. I pump my legs to keep up. Luckily, running on thin air is much kinder to my sore foot than running in the field.
    “I’ve never seen anything like it before,” Aaron says after a half hour of silence. The bright red color has drained from his cheeks, leaving him pale. I guess he looks better. At least he doesn’t look like he’s about to have as stroke or something. “I mean, he was wearing her body like a suit.”
    I tremble. The sight of the little zombie girl’s long, twitching shadow and blacked-out eyes leap into my head. And that voice, so deep, demonic, unnatural. So wrong.
    We make another sharp turn and he looks down at my clawed fingers sunk deep into his bicep. “Can you let up a bit? You’re about to draw blood.”
    “Sorry.” I force myself to loosen my grip, though it’s hard to do.
    Bobby called Annalise a Shadow. He said Abaddon was holding his great-grandniece as a Shadow because of him. Because of things he had done.
    “I think it’s a punishment,” I say softly, because if I don’t say something I’m going to scream.
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean hurting Bobby wasn’t enough to keep Bobby in line, so Abaddon took his niece. He knows Bobby cares about her and he’s using her body to punish him for breaking the rules.”
    Aaron keeps his eyes focused on the horizon. After a few seconds, he nods.
    “I don’t think anyone has broken Abaddon’s rules as badly as we have.” The muscles in my hand ache. I’ve clamped down on Aaron’s forearm again.
    His answer is a slow shake of his head.
    By leaving Carroll Falls, Aaron and I have taken Abaddon’s precious rules and trampled them with stilettos. If Abaddon would take Bobby’s niece as a Shadow because he missed a death to celebrate his one-hundredth birthday, what will he do to us if he finds us? No. When he finds us.
    In my mind, Max’s face replaces Annalise’s waxy gray features. His green eyes stare out from under limp copper bangs. Black fluid fills his eyes, blotting out the green irises as well as the white. His hair flickers like a torch in the breeze.
    No, it’s not his hair. His head is on fire. His body jerks and his face twists in agony. The memory of the scent of rotting, burning meat rolls over me again and I gag. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to push the hellacious image out of my mind, but it won’t leave. As much as I want it to, the vision doesn’t feel like my artist’s imagination working overtime. It feels like a premonition.
    My skin prickles.
    “He’s going to take someone we love and use them as a Shadow against us.” My head throbs, but I ignore it. “He’s going to take Max. Or maybe Sara.”
    Aaron finally speaks after a moment of thought. “I don’t think so. Max and Sara aren’t dead. He has no control over the living. That’s why he needs Reapers to do his dirty work. We’re the go-between.”
    “I don’t know, Aaron. Who knows what he can do,” I say, but Aaron keeps talking like he didn’t hear me. Maybe he just didn’t want to.
    “Even if he could,