Free The Deadly Nightshade by Justine Ashford Page A

your head off, I swear. Do you understand?”
    He stares at me with his mouth agape, as if about to say something but debating whether or not he should. Figuring he has gotten the hint, I turn and begin on my way again. I have taken three steps when I hear him speak.
    “I can’t just stop following you. I’ll die if I do. You know it and I know it. I’m defenseless, Nightshade—I don’t even own a knife, or a gun, or anything. All I’ve got is you. You can try to get rid of me all you want, but I’ll never stop following you. You’ll have to kill me, and I know you won’t do that, so face it—you’re stuck with me.”
    “That’s what you want, a weapon?” I almost laugh as I sheathe my katanas and remove Angelica’s knife from my belt. I hold it out to him, realizing as I do so that this is probably the unluckiest weapon in the world. Connor studies it with distaste. After a moment, he takes the knife and examines it in his hands.
    “Maybe I should have been clearer. When I said I don’t have a weapon to my name, I also meant I don’t have the skills to use one.”
    “What are you talking about? All you have to do is slash or stab, it’s simple.”
    He sighs. “Look, I watched you effortlessly take down five grown men in a matter of seconds. I couldn’t even do that in my dreams. Chase me away all you want, but I’m not going anywhere.”
    “And what about me? What do I get in return, since you seem completely incapable of doing anything even remotely useful?”
    “My constant company,” he says, grinning wryly.
    “Lucky me.”
    I allow him to stay as long as he promises not to annoy me anymore, which he agrees to. After that has been dealt with, I decide there is still a chance I can catch something in another area as long as Connor doesn’t start a damn earthquake. He somewhat successfully attempts to tread a little lighter, being careful to avoid the twigs and crunchy dead leaves that litter the ground. I find his caution as amusing as it is pathetic, but at least he is trying.
    I have barely had five minutes of silent peace when he starts up again.
    “So what’s your real name?” he asks.
    “You don’t know how not to be annoying, do you?”
    “Come on, I told you mine. It’s only fair.”
    This kid just doesn’t know when to quit. If he keeps talking to me, I am going to lose my goddamn mind. I just want him to shut the hell up for ten minutes, that’s all—ten minutes of no stupid questions, no pointless gabbing, nothing but complete quiet. Oh, what I wouldn’t give for him to stop talking.
    “Alright, you clearly don’t want to tell me. That’s fine. But I think you should at least tell me something about yourself. I mean, if we’re going to be together for a while we should probably get to know each other a little. Here, I’ll go first. I was born in—”
    “Connor, I don’t care. Please shut up. You’re going to scare all the game away. Again. ”
    “I was born in Pennsylvania,” he continues. “Lived there all my life, just my parents, my two brothers, my little sister and me—pre-War, of course. We only lost my sister in the bombings. Disease took one of my brothers and both my parents. After that, it was just my brother Alex and I. He was a few years older than me, so he kind of took it upon himself to be the provider. I mean, it made sense; he had the only gun and knew how to use it better than I did. We spent the past few years raiding shops and eating things we found growing in the woods mostly, but after a while it became a lot harder to find a stocked food store, and a lot more dangerous—you know how it is. We started eating less and less until, basically, we were starving.”
    I keep trying to tune him out, to focus on each step that I take, on avoiding the twigs and crunchy leaves, on the sound of the birds chirping merry tunes and the animals scurrying about in the brush. But his words refuse to be ignored and his voice penetrates my mind, demanding to