Witch and Wizard_ The Fire - James Patterson [21]
I think for a minute. “The last time we saw Emmet and Janine was in that underground steam pipe after Garfunkel’s was blown up, before we got separated, right?” Whit shrugs, but I see the doubt on his face. “So we start looking by going back there. Maybe they turned it into the new Resistance HQ.”
It’s not likely, but it’s possible, right?
“All right, Captain Wisteria. If you say we’ll find ’em, I guess we’ll find ’em.” Whit punches me playfully, but I know he’s trying to downplay just how much this outcome matters. “Vive la Résistance!” He does an energetic lap around the parking lot, ready to sprint to the steam pipe right now.
“Only, Whit?” I call after him.
“Yeah?”
“I’m not quite ready for another all-night journey through the lion’s den of the New Order just yet. I think I’ll take you up on that offer to find someplace to sleep first.”
Whit bangs on the side of the Dumpster. The mealy, gag-inducing stench of rotting meat is wafting over. Oh no. I am so not going to —
“Got a better idea?” my know-it-all brother asks.
He plants his hand and vaults his legs over in a graceful move even I have to admire. Whit has always been athletic, but in the weeks we were apart, he must’ve been training on his own nonstop. He’s gotten, as Celia would say, “seriously ripped.”
I scramble in after him. As much as I don’t want to lay my head to rest among the scraps of the New Order citizenry’s garbage, it’s strangely fitting, actually. Kinda poetic.
It’s also sheltered. And out of the way. And, as my brother has already discovered, full of food. Well, if you can call “food” a quarter pound of deep-fried meat that consists of the body parts of hundreds of different animals and is now discarded in a crumpled bag in the bottom of a Dumpster.
Whit sees my expression and shrugs. “I’m starving,” he says, chomping off a chunk of a half-eaten One-Der Biggie Burger. Three words: Dis. Gust. Ing.
My stomach complains loudly and Whit grins, holding the bag out to me. “Happy Holiday,” my brother says, mouth full. Reluctantly I reach into the sack.
But the only thing left in this bag is a kid’s plastic action figure of The One, bald head shining in the weak light of the Dumpster.
My temper simmers, and I melt The One down to nothing in my hand.
“Whoa,” says Whit. “You’ve got some mojo in you after all.”
I shake my head. “That’s not mojo. That’s just pure hatred.”
Chapter 21
Whit
“WHIT, BABY? CAN you hear me?”
I wake — or think I wake — to the sweetest voice I’ve ever heard.
Her face — her perfect, beautiful face — is just inches from mine, and I swear, if my heart stopped beating right now, I’d die happy. Her long dark curls frame her face, and she’s looking into my eyes in that calm, unself-conscious way that always did me in. I hold my breath and inhale her scent.
If this is a dream, I never want to wake up.
“Celes, is that really you? I so want it to be you.” Chasing Celia’s image has gotten me into trouble before, and Wisty’s convinced it’s The One trying to manipulate me. If so, I have to admit, he’s using the right angle. Celia’s the one thing I can’t say no to. I’d probably run into a snarling pile of zombie wolves if she asked me to.
Celia surveys the Dumpster. “Nice digs you got here, baby. A little fancier than the Shadowland, I’ll give you that, but I have to say, you smell worse than a herd of Lost Ones.” She wriggles her nose in mock disgust.
I grin. That’s my girl.
I reach out to touch her face, her smooth, soft skin, and she turns her cheek, mimes kissing my hand even though it’s only air. My heart aches. She’s never felt more real, but moments like this don’t last very long.
“Oh! I almost forgot!” Celia reaches into her pocket. “I brought you a present for the Holiday,” she says, and smiles in that way of hers — shyly — that brings back a rush of memories so potent I almost can’t take it: the first time she placed her hand in mine, her slender fingers so warm; her face when I scored the winning touchdown; the day she first introduced me as her boyfriend; the first