The Blood that Binds #3 (Thicker than Blood series) Read online

  “You wish I wished that, Lucario.”

  “You wished that I wished that you wished that, Willoughby.”

  “You wished that I wished that you wished that I…” Trailing off, I shoved up from the floor. The humidity had thickened and the wind had picked up, whistling softly through the broken corners of the house. But there was something else, too.

  “Rain,” I breathed, drinking in the sickly sweet scent that always preceded a summer shower.

  I ran from the room with Lucas hot on my heels. Together we raced to the stairs, leaping down the broken steps two and three at a time, just barely managing not to lose a foot in the process. Lightning flashed, briefly lighting the dim halls. A clap of thunder boomed overhead, reverberating through the floor beneath our feet, vibrating the walls around us.

  “It’s a storm!” Lucas shouted, and we both whooped as loud as we could, the thunder shielding us from any nearby Creeper ears. Thunderstorms were the only time that Logan allowed us the freedom to be as loud as we wanted and we always took full advantage.

  We collided with Logan in the downstairs hall, causing him to drop the stack of plastic tubs he was carrying. Recognizing them as the storage containers from the garage, I quickly realized his intentions—if it rained long enough to fill them, we’d have enough water for several weeks’ worth of drinking, bathing, and maybe even laundry. The thought of cleaning my clothes with something other than creek water inspired another joyful shout.

  Inside the office, we hurried to undress, each of us stripping down to our underwear. Lucas and I made a mad dash for the window, toppling over one another as we fell into the grass below in a heap. Jumping to my feet, I tilted my face to the sky, the first drop of rain hitting me square in the forehead. The second hit my nose, the third, fourth, and fifth hit my cheeks in a chorus of small splashes.

  The whole world had turned gray—thick clouds were gathered overhead with bursts of light breaking through their heavy veil in rapid, jagged flashes. Thunder continued to crash—a symphony of clangs and bangs that exploded through the air and vibrated the rapidly forming puddles at our feet. Holding my arms out wide, I spun in drunken circles until I was drenched with rain and dizzy with delirium.

  “It hasn’t rained like this in forever!” Lucas shouted happily. Stomping and sloshing through the high grass, he was moving farther across the lawn.

  “You look like you’re in a mosh pit!” I shouted back.

  “Mosh with me, Wilhelmina!”

  “With pleasure, Luciano!”

  I ran to him, the ground soft and wet at my feet. Clasping hands, we kicked and stomped through the high grass, flattening it beneath the crush of our feet. We played hard, tripping and slipping, pushing and shoving one another until we’d made a good-sized circle of flattened greenery, liberally peppered with muddy puddles. Meanwhile, the wind picked up speed and the rain fell harder.

  “Playtime’s over!” Logan called. He was gesturing wildly, pointing at a nearby group of trees whose heavy branches had begun to dangerously sway. Above us, the gray skies had considerably darkened. Storms had always had deadly potential, but nowadays, without the safety nets the old world offered, the dangers posed were significantly more.

  Clasping hands, Lucas and I started for the house where Logan was attempting to secure the lids onto the overflowing containers. Releasing me, Lucas grabbed hold of the stack and together, he and Logan fought against the wind. They’d managed only two lids on before the wind caught hold of the flimsy plastic, sweeping the remaining covers up and over our heads.

  I jumped up, catching the corner of a lid; the lid acted like a sail, sweeping me straight off my feet and then depositing me face down in the tall grass.

  “Willow!” Logan’s usually captive roar was a mere whisper among nature’s lethal noise. “Willow, grab hold of something.”

  I’m trying, I wanted to scream, even as the wind pushed me farther away, aided by the wet, slickened state of things. But I couldn’t find my voice. The violent whip of the wind had turned the warm summer rain into a cold barrage of water pellets, causing me to flinch and shiver between gasping breaths.

  Finally, my hand snagged on something hard—a tree root that had erupted through the earth, thick enough to anchor myself against. Gripping it, I blinked rapidly through the wall of water, just barely making out the blurry outline of a fast-approaching form. Soon, gruff hands clamped down around my wrists and hauled me to my feet. “Hold on tight!” he shouted.

  Even with our combined weight and our arms wrapped around one another, we struggled with each step, the wind intent on blowing us backward. I cried out as something heavy and sharp slammed into our legs, knocking us over and nearly succeeding in knocking us apart. While pain radiated up and down my left leg, Logan hauled me upright once again and together we attempted another fruitless battle forward.

  “Luke!” Logan bellowed. “Luke—get your ass in the house! I’m going to try for the shed!”

  Turning from the house, Logan and I ran with the wind, lifted by it at times, toward the small, dilapidated building shaking precariously at the edge of the yard.

  Logan

  Struggling to keep the doors open, I thrust Willow inside the shed and then jumped in after her, just in time for the wind to slam the doors shut behind me. Trembling from exertion, I placed my hands on the quaking wood, feeling the strength of the wind battering against it. While I stood there, something large crashed against the doors, hard enough to startle me. Backing slowly away from the doors, I eyed the roof with trepidation, hoping it would hold if a heavy branch dropped onto it.

  “That’s why they call them widow-makers,” I muttered. “‘Cause they drop down and kill people.”

  My dad had been a seasonal worker, a jack-of-all-trades, who’d snow plowed, landscaped, repaired fences, and even trimmed trees. On the rare occasion that he hadn’t been berating me, he’d been teaching me his trades.

  You’re going to need these skills someday, he would slur, a bottle of gin pointed in my direction. You’re gonna blow your knee out or knock up that girl a’ yours and then you can kiss that fancy-ass scholarship good-fuckin’-bye.

  He’d been right. I had needed the skills, and I had kissed my state scholarship goodbye… just not for the reasons he’d thought. The end of our world hadn’t exactly satisfied my desire to watch dear old Dad eat his words but considering the state of things and the fact that he was long gone, it would have to suffice.

  “W-what?”

  Willow was huddled against the back wall, quivering from head to toe, her teeth chattering violently, furiously rubbing her upper arms in an attempt to warm herself. Mixed with the rainwater dripping from every inch of her, a trail of bright-red blood ran down her calf.

  “Your leg is bleeding,” I told her. “Make sure you clean that.”

  When Willow didn’t respond, I said, “Did you hear me? I said, make sure you clean that.”

  “I’m n-n-not stupid,” Willow muttered, rolling her eyes. “And I heard y-y-you the first time.”

  My nostrils flared; my eyes narrowed. “If you’re not stupid, then why the fuck am I always having to repeat myself?”

  Willow was instantly on her feet, her eyes flashing. “Are you kidding me? W-what the hell was I doing wrong this time? I didn’t answer f-f-fast enough—that’s what your problem is?”

  I didn’t want to fight with her, especially not right now, but she had such an incredible talent for working my last nerve, for winding me up so fast and in such a way that I lost my grip on sense and reason.

  “Look around!” I shouted. “My problem is, we’re hiding in a fucking garden shed! If we would have left this morning, like I’d wanted to, this wouldn’t have happened! But no, you wanted to stay!”

  Willow’s trembling mouth fell open. “If we would have left this morning, we wouldn’t have tubs full of fresh water!”

  “Filthy water!” I bellowed. “I couldn’t get all the lids on, remember? We’ll be drinki
ng sediment!”

  She was suddenly nose to nose with me. “I’ll filter it all myself! Will that make you fucking happy?”

  No, I wanted to scream. No, it absolutely will not make me happy! But I found myself at a sudden loss for words. I was so angry, I was vibrating, literally shaking with rage, and yet… I was rock hard. Willow’s mouth was so goddamn close to mine, her minty breath hot as it blew across my face, her lips wet with rain. Grabbing her and kissing her was suddenly all I could think about. Kissing her and… touching her. Just like last night, when I’d grabbed her thigh; it had been a knee-jerk reaction that I hadn’t remedied right away. I’d knowingly kept my hand there, thinking all sorts of fucked-up thoughts, the very same thoughts I was having now.

  “Do I need to speak in football analogies for you to comprehend what I‘m saying, Logan?” Willow spat. Her fingers snapped in front of my face, and I blinked, my anger quickly rising back to the surface.

  “Why are you such a bitch?” I thundered. “Why can’t you ever just listen?”

  Her eyes grew wide, flashing with flames. “I’m not the one who needs to listen,” she shrieked. “You are! You think you know everything, you think you’re always right, but you’re not, you know that? You’re really not!”

  “Name one time you haven’t needed me to save the day!” I demanded. “You can’t, can you? You know why? Because you’re fucking useless.”

  Hurt flashed briefly across her face, soon replaced with fury. “Fuck you! Fuck you!” she screamed, spittle flying past her lips, spraying across my face. She was borderline hysterical now, and so was I—the desire to kiss her warring violently with the desire to shake her.

  “You think we need you, but we don’t. I’m an adult, remember? Luke and I are both adults—you just like treating us like babies!”

  “Oh, you’re an adult?” I sneered, grabbing hold of her arms before I had the sense to stop myself. Gripping her biceps, I shook her roughly. “Then maybe you should fucking act like one!”

  Shock flashed in Willow’s eyes. Screaming, she slapped my hands away and shoved hard at my chest, knocking me back a step. “And maybe you should stop acting like your father!”

  We both froze, staring at one another—Willow barely breathing, and me breathing far too hard.

  There were things we rarely spoke of… not out loud, anyway, and my father was at the top of that list. But Willow hadn’t just brought him up, she’d compared me to him. It was a slap in the face, a sucker punch to the gut; there was nothing worse she could have said to me.

  Backing slowly away, I moved to a far corner of the shed, giving Willow my back. While the storm continued to rage around us, we raged silently in our separate corners. I refused to look at her, determined to never forgive her for what she’d said.

  I’m not like him, I silently recited. I’m nothing fucking like him.

  Eventually the wind died down and the rain became little more than a drizzle. I moved quickly, pushing through the doors, and striding through the swampy yard without a backward glance. Willow was there though, following close enough that I could hear every splash of her footsteps.

  “You guys okay?” Lucas was hanging out the office window, his forehead creased with concern.

  “Never better,” I muttered.

  As Willow hurried past me, I changed course. Inspecting the tubs of water, they were as I’d expected—filled with debris. Seeing this, I felt doubly vindicated in my anger—I had been right and Willow had been wrong, as was usually the case. But would she ever admit to it? Not a chance in hell.

  “Logan?” Lucas called. “You coming in?”

  I waved him off. “Yeah, in a minute.”

  “You’re bleeding, you know?”

  Glancing down my body, I found a quarter-sized gash on my shin. I shrugged. “I’ll take care of it after I do a perimeter check.”

  I managed a half-assed property search before giving up and heading back; adrenaline had worn off and fatigue was fast setting in. Hauling myself up through the office window, I found camp calm and quiet—Lucas was bent over the stove fiddling with a small fire, and Willow was snoring softly, buried up to her forehead inside her bedroll.

  Slipping out of my wet shorts, I laid them out to dry and grabbed my pack.

  “So what exactly happened out there?” Lucas whispered. “Willow was, um, kind of upset.”

  “What always fucking happens. She acts recklessly and then gets pissed off when I try to talk some sense into her.”

  There was a pause; Lucas took an audible breath. “Logan, she told me what she said. About Dad. You know she didn’t mean it, right?”

  I resumed digging through my pack, producing the small first aid kit I always carried. It was mostly empty, barring a small tube of disinfectant and a bottle of expired aspirin. Swabbing my leg with disinfectant, I pulled a semi-clean bandanna from my bag and tied it tightly over the gash.

  “Here,” I muttered, tossing the kit at Lucas. “Make sure Willow cleans her leg.”

  “Yeah, thanks.” Lucas cleared his throat. “Uh, you know, things seem to be getting really bad between you two. I just don’t think we can… you know… afford to have another year like the first.”

  I glanced up sharply. “What are you saying?” I demanded. “Are you actually suggesting that I would do something like Dad—”

  “No!” Lucas shouted, startling us both. “How could you even think that?” he demanded. “I only meant how screwed up everything was after that—how screwed up we all were. You guys were always fighting back then too… and now you’re fighting again.”

  “Luke.” I sighed my brother’s name, suddenly feeling twice as exhausted. “Everything is still screwed up. Everything is always going to be screwed up. Look around you—look at this shithole we’re squatting in. Jesus, look at us. We’re hungry, filthy and just barely getting by. We’re a fucking mess—everything is a goddamn, motherfucking mess.”

  Lucas was silent for a moment, chewing on his lip rings. “I get what you mean,” he said softly. “But I don’t think it’s that bad. We’re alive, right? I know I’m okay as long as I have you guys.”

  I stared at him, unable to think up a response that wasn’t crass or cruel. Lucas only felt that way because he had Willow, someone he loved who he could share this hell on earth with. If our roles were reversed, I knew he’d feel differently.

  “I’m going to sleep,” I eventually muttered. “Do you think you can keep watch for me?” When Lucas nodded, I turned away. Stretching out over my bedroll, I prayed for oblivion.

  I woke to hushed whispers and muffled giggles. I’d slept for a few hours at least, judging by the darkened state of things. The stove was still going—I could hear the crackle of the fire and see the flicker of the flames dancing along the wall.

  “You said that part already,” Lucas was saying.

  “Oh-ho, I’m so sorry,” Willow replied around a yawn. “What are you—the Wonderland police?”

  “Yep. Now, are you ready for your sentence?”

  “Sentence!” Willow feigned outrage. “But there hasn’t even been a verdict!”

  “Sentence first,” Lucas replied solemnly. “Verdict later.”

  Reciting the story of Alice in Wonderland was something Willow had started doing during our first year on our own. When she’d been scared or had a hard time falling asleep she’d start whispering the lines; Lucas would often join in, adding his own nonsense to the story in an attempt to make her laugh. As the years passed, what had begun as a comfort had since become an obnoxious ritual. They told the stupid story so goddamn often that I now knew it by heart, even their silly versions. Like the one they were currently telling, where Alice was Alastair, the most infamous Drag Queen of Wonderland, and the Queen of Hearts was actually the Queen of Farts, having obtained her power by stealing and eating all the beans in all the land. There was no need for beheading in this adaptation—this queen could kill with a single toot of her most lethal butt-trumpet. Hearing them, it
would have been easy to mistake them for children, not the twentysomething adults they really were.

  I didn’t need to turn around to know that Willow was nestled between my brother’s legs, and Lucas’s arms were wrapped around her, his chin resting on top of her head. They’d been sitting that way for years—on our family room floor while watching television, in the school hallway during their free periods, and at my football games, under the bleachers, completely oblivious to the world around them. The comfort they found in each other, the ease in which they interacted, was completely foreign to me. I’d never been like that with anyone, not with any girlfriend, not even with my own mother.

  “Twinkle, twinkle little bat, how I wonder where you’re at…” Willow trailed off with another yawn. They continued on, each of them murmuring different lines, no longer following any sort of order. Lucas was the last to speak before the room eclipsed into silence. I waited several minutes and was about to roll over when I heard the distinct smack of a kiss, followed closely by the rustling of a sleeping bag.

  I went still, hoping they weren’t about to have sex… even as some small, depraved part of me wished they would. Willow couldn’t be quiet if her life depended on it, and the way she always panted during sex, those muffled mewling noises she always made… I was getting hard just thinking about it.

  I squeezed my eyes shut and ground my teeth together, trying to think of anyone but Willow. Only my lust-addled brain had become a broken record that kept skipping straight back to her.

  It doesn’t mean anything. I was just pent up in more ways than one. It had been years since I’d been with anyone—Willow had been the only girl in my life for so long now, of course it was her I was focusing on. It didn’t actually mean anything—other than I was becoming desperate.

  It definitely didn’t mean that I liked her.

  “You know, I used to pray that we’d fallen down a rabbit hole. That none of this was real and someday we’d find our way back home.” Willow’s voice was thick with sleep and heavy with melancholy. “…which is super funny considering how much I hated it there.”