Dealing with James will require accessing my soul, and few things have terrified me more.
I look up, into his eyes—
James
Chapter 18
“She just passed out,” I say, throwing up my hands. “I’ve already explained this like fourteen times. I have no idea what happened.”
“And you didn’t do anything to her?”
“No, I didn’t do anything to her!”
“All right, everyone needs to chill,” Kenji says, biting into a carrot stick. He offers me the bag and I reach for a carrot, muttering thanks when he says, “Obviously James didn’t do anything to this girl, because if he had any idea what he was doing he would’ve killed her days ago.”
“Hey—”
“Look,” Kenji says, crunching. “I love you, you know I love you, and props for coming home mostly in one piece, but you literally shaved years off our lives. We thought you were dead.” He chews for another second, then: “Honestly, if we weren’t over the moon to have you home right now, I’d beat the shit out of you.”
“I second that,” says Adam.
Kenji reaches for another carrot, then nods at Adam. “The snack game gets stronger every day, man. A little peanut butter, too? In its own little container?” He takes another bite. “Did you cut these carrots yourself?”
“Yeah, and I’ve got apple slices, too,” says Adam, rifling through the backpack at his feet. “Roman decided he’s only eating apples this week.”
“Wasn’t he only eating bananas last week?” asks Winston, intercepting the bag of apple slices.
“Yeah, but—”
“Hey,” I say, sitting forward. “Why’d you call for a meeting if you’re not even going to talk to me?”
“I didn’t call this meeting,” says Kenji. “Warner did. And we’re ten minutes early, so technically the meeting hasn’t started yet. This is snack time.”
“Yeah,” says Winston around a bite of apple. “This is snack time. We work hard for snack time.”
I sigh. “Do you know where he is?”
“Who? Warner?” Kenji crunches. Shrugs. “Probably thinking up the best way to kill you without J finding out.”
“How’s she doing, by the way?” I sink back in my seat. “I haven’t seen her yet.”
“She’s okay. Slight improvement. She wanted to visit you in recovery, but the doctor says she shouldn’t be exposed to idiots. They think it might be contagious.”
I throw my carrot stick at his head. “Don’t be a dick,” I say. “I’m genuinely worried about her.”
“If you were genuinely worried about her,” says Winston, “you wouldn’t have disappeared like that. We were planning your memorial.”
“How many times do I have to say I’m sorry?I’m sorry.I’m really sorry. I’ve apologized a million times.”
“You weren’t here,” says Kenji. “You don’t know what it was like. Even when we got the call to come get you yesterday, people had a hard time. People were really overwhelmed. People cried.”
“You cried,” says Winston. “I didn’t cry.”
“I saidpeoplecried—”
“Hey, have you seen Warner yet?” Adam asks, turning to face me.
“Yeah.” I tense a little at the memory. “Only for a second, though. He came to see me in recovery.”
