I want to argue, but Griffin’s already turning back to face the smoke pooling above Mathis’s unconscious body. He sets the container of salt down, grabs a jar from the duffel, uncaps it, and sets it on the floor. He attaches a device I’ve never seen before to the bottom, but when he turns it on, a small whirring sound comes from it. I assume it’s a portable version of the big ghost vac Donny used in the parking lot to contain William Caine.
Shit.
I grab my phone from where it skittered across the floor and rip the front door open, sprinting down the building’s hallway. I raise the phone to my ear, my breath coming in gasps that make it hard to form words. “Are you almost here?”
“Five minutes out,” Nico says. I can hear the roar of the engine and Benji screeching something that sounds like“Are you insane?”in the background.
The stairwell looms ahead of me. I’m pulling the heavy door open when a crash echoes through the building.
Griffin screams.
I stop, my hand frozen on the door handle, my entire body locking up like someone just dumped a bucket of ice water onto my head. I stare at Griffin’s blood on my sleeve. What am I doing, running away?
Never again. I promised myself I’d never be that scared little girl who saved herself and left everyone else behind again.
So never again.
I shove my phone in my pocket and run back down the hallway, my legs pumping harder than they’ve ever moved. The front door is still open, and I charge into the narrow, salt-strewn hallway and skid to a stop in the living room doorway.
Griffin is pinned against the living room ceiling. His arms and legs are spread wide, and Morrow hovers below him. Morrow has taken on a more solid form than before. His translucent hands are buried wrist-deep in Griffin’s chest cavity, and I can see them moving inside him.
The duffel bag lies on its side. I snatch it up, dumping the entire contents at my feet.
I shove a pair of goggles onto my face. The elastic snaps against the back of my head. The world turns green.
The ceiling’s too tall for me to reach with the crowbar. I pull out the shotgun. It’s heavier than I expected, the weight of it solid and real.
I grab a handful of rounds and jam them into my pocket, then crack the shotgun open the way Dad taught me. Two shells stare back at me, packed tight with white granules.
Salt rounds. I can work with that.
Except—I glance up at Griffin, still pinned to the ceiling with Morrow’s hands buried in his chest. If I shoot now, the salt spray will hit him, too. Salt rounds can kill a person if shot at close range.
Morrow hasn’t noticed me yet. He’s too focused on Griffin, whose face is now purple. The veins in Griffin’s neck are bulging, and though his lips form words, no sound comes out.
I have to do something. I have to do something right now or Griffin is going to die, and it’ll be my fault for standing here like an idiot trying to figure out the perfect plan when there is no perfect plan.
I plant my feet, bringing the shotgun up to my shoulder. The stock is cold against my cheek. Morrow and Griffin are too close. But then Morrow lowers his legs, and I get a clear shot.
I pull the trigger.
The recoil slams into my shoulder hard enough to spin me halfway around. In the small apartment, the sound is deafening, my ears ringing so loud I can’t hear anything else.
The ghost’s lower body explodes into a spray of oily smoke.
Griffin lets out a strangled cry and drops from the ceiling, hitting the floor face-down with a wet thud that makes bile rise in my throat.
“Griffin!” So much fear pours into me, it’s like all the air got sucked out of the room.
I stagger across the apartment, crashing onto my knees next to him. I drop the shotgun and grip his shoulder, trying to roll him onto his back, but he’s so heavy.
Gritting my teeth, I push him all the way over until he’s staring up at the ceiling. The salt ripped through his pant leg. I’m relieved when my fingers brush over his prosthetic.
I’m feeling under his jaw for his pulse when a sound behind me makes me jam up.
I glance over my shoulder. The smoke is reforming, pulling itself back together like it’s being sucked through an invisible straw.
Morrow hovers three feet off the ground, and now that he’s not actively murdering Griffin, I can see him clearly for the first time. He has silver gray hair combed to the side in that way older men do when they’re trying to hide a bald spot, and deep-set eyes that look like someone carved two holes into a skull with a melon baller. He looks exactly the same as he did in his mugshot, only made of shifting smoke.
