I drop my eyes to his chest and reload the shotgun. “Stay back.”
Morrow laughs, the sound sliding directly into my head.“Or what? You’ll make more noise?”
My mental stage is only half up when he flies at me. I aim at his head and pull the trigger, but the shot goes wide, punching a hole through the drywall to his left. He hits me with the force of a freight train. Cold crashes into me, so intense it burns, and I’m airborne until I slam into the wall. I slide into a sitting position, wind knocked out of me, death-gripping the shotgun because it’s all I have.
Morrow hovers right above me, close enough that the cold radiating off him makes me feel like I stepped into a freezer. I swing the barrel of the shotgun up through his torso, but the metal passes through the smoke. Right. Not iron.
The crowbar’s on the floor, probably ten feet away. If I can get to it?—
I lurch forward, but Morrow crashes down on me, pinning me against the wall. My scream dies in my throat as his hands clamp around my face, translucent fingers pressing into my cheeks.
I try to twist away, but it’s like being held down by concrete that’s somehow also intangible. His fingers sink deeper, pushing through the outer layer of my face like I’m made of Jell-O.
“Aren’t you a spirited one?”Morrow says.
I try to bite down, try to do anything, but my jaw won’t cooperate. My muscles have turned to ice under his grip, refusing every command my brain screams at them.
His thumbs press against my lips, forcing my mouth open.
“You may think you’d do anything for him,”he says.“But you’ll break so beautifully under the right circumstances.”
The ectoplasm is already leaking down the back of my throat, thick and oily and wrong. I gag. More pours in. My vision blurs, the edges of the room going soft and dark, tunneling down to just Morrow’s face hovering inches from mine.
I close my eyes even though I’m still wearing goggles because no way is this asshole going to get inside my head, and spit the ectoplasm at him.
“Fuck,” I grit out, through the slime running down my chin. “You.”
A door slams open somewhere outside Mathis’s apartment. The grip on my face loosens.
“You and I will be seeing each other again,”Morrow sneers.“Very soon.”
His hands rip out of my face so fast it feels like he’s taking parts of me with him. When I open my eyes, he’s gone.
CHAPTER 27
The unfortunate reality of hiring young people is that they tend to bring their hormones to work.
—Journal of Donald Dellman, August 2024
I crumple to the floor, ripping the goggles off my face and choking as ectoplasm pours out of my mouth in stringy globs. I hear someone rush into the apartment, hear their sharp intake of breath as they take in the ruined hallway.
Nico skids around the corner, into the living room, and relief floods me so suddenly at the sight of him that it leaves me dizzy.
Benji’s right behind him, already pulling equipment from a bag. Nico’s across the room in three strides, dropping to his knees in front of me with controlled urgency.
“Eden,” he says, his voice low and commanding. “What happened?”
I snap my head toward Griffin, and Benji’s already there, kneeling beside him. What if he’s dead? What if I wasn’t fast enough and Griffin’s dead because I froze for half a second too long?
“Eyes on me.” Nico’s hand catches my chin, forcing my face back to his.
I focus on those green eyes. On the gray ring around his irises that makes them look even brighter under the goggles he’s still wearing.
His gaze sweeps over my face. “Where are you hurt?”
“Griffin—” I try to twist toward Griffin again, but Nico’s grip tightens just enough to keep me in place.
“Answer my fucking questions,” Nico says. “Where. Are. You. Hurt?”
