I could make sure all the windows and doors at home were barred to evil—Gran had taught me that. It wouldn’t stop a zombie—but I had someone with me now, right?

And I had guns. And grenades.

Great, Dru. So you could blow both yourself and your new friend up? Dad told you never to mess with the grenades!

But Dad wasn’t here. I was on my own. Except, well, for Graves.

Who shrugged, taking another drag and screwing his face up hard. “Habit. I’m an addict, okay? Can we get back on topic? What would your dad do?” He didn’t look like he was going anywhere. He looked, in fact, determined to stay put.

It was probably a bad thing. It might get him killed. But I couldn’t help feeling relieved.

I couldn’t help being glad he was around.

“He’d make a daylight run.” I was shivering so hard the words almost got chopped into bits. “Where I found the truck. He’d go back and start digging where that streak-headed wulf scuttled away to. Track it if he could.”

“Streak-headed?” He waved it away as soon as I opened my mouth, his cigarette trailing a line of smoke. “No, don’t tell me. I’ve got a better question. Was that you? Did you do that to ol’ Bletch?”

I swallowed the lie I meant to tell. “I guess so. It’s called a hex. I’ve never thrown one before.” And that’s something to worry about too. Where the hell did that come from? I’ve never been able to do that.

But I’d never been so angry before, had I? Or so hopeless. And I was doing new things all the time now. The touch was getting stronger.

“Then how do you know it was you?” He looked down at his feet, obediently carrying him over the sidewalk. Stopped and motioned me around an icy patch; there was only room for one person to walk. “Looked to me like she had a heart attack once someone called her a bully to her face.”

“Did I call her a bully? I don’t remember that bit.” I shuffled, picking my way around the ice. The glare of sunlight off snow pierced straight through my head, and I was suddenly very aware of my empty stomach.

There was a sound of moving cloth. “It was great, Dru. You said what everyone’s been thinking for years.”

“I’m glad you approve.” Still, I hexed her. Dammit. Gran would have a cow. Dad would take one look at my face when I got home and give me the Lecture About Using Gifts Responsibly. My bag was too heavy. I fussed with the strap, trying to get it to not cut into my shoulder.

Graves’s half-yipping laugh came again. “I was about to stand up and applaud, but people started screaming.”

When his coat came down on my shoulders I gave a half-startled, nervous sidling step or two, almost dumping myself on the bank of road-snow. Again. “Are you crazy? It’s fifty below out here!”

He shrugged, his thin shoulders moving under a ragged red wool sweater that had seen better days. He had brought a lot of his clothes over, and it was a relief to see him in something new. “You’re making me cold, you’re shivering so hard. I’m used to this, Florida girl. Just say thank you, okay?”

I winced half-guiltily, remembered I had told him about Florida. “You’re nuts.” But the coat was warm, and I pushed my arms through the sleeves. My bag bumped my hip, and as soon as we got home I’d have to clean it out. “Let’s go home. I want some lunch and we can plan.”

“Sounds good.”

We walked in silence for a little while, crunching under each footstep like little bones clicking and breaking. I smelled him on his coat—healthy boy, deodorant, testosterone, cigarette smoke, and the faint tang of fried food. My cheeks tingled, but I didn’t blush. Instead, I stared down at my feet, moving independently of me like good little soldiers, and hunched my shoulders so I could take a deep breath. Funny, but you don’t really realize how personal it is to smell someone. He wasn’t Dad, but he was right here with me.

I bit my lip, then I opened my mouth. “Graves?”

“What?” He sounded wary. I would too, if I was dealing with a crazy girl who had just hexed a stupid history teacher and told me all about suckers and wulfen.

“Thank you.” The coat was really warm; I could see why he wore it. The shivers began to ease. The clearheaded sense of being cried out and ready to get to work dawned over me like a blessing.

I could tell he was grinning by the sudden feeling of warm sunshine on my back. “No problem, Dru. First one’s free.”

The truck was still parked cockeyed in the driveway, and the phone was ringing when we let ourselves in. Graves went straight to turn the heat up, and I reached the phone just as the tinny repeated shriek ceased. “Probably the school calling to tell on you,” he said, with his bitter little bark of a laugh.

There were a lot of missed calls lately, but the thought of that one sent a chill up my spine. “Jesus. I suppose you could pretend to be my dad.” I struggled out of his coat, now wet with slushy ice near the hem since he was so tall it dragged when I wore it. My shirt held a faint ghost of cigarette smoke now, too, as well as an even fainter ghost of deodorant.

“You’ve got some kinky ideas, Miss Anderson.” The heater wumped into life. I passed him in the hall and headed straight for the first weapons crate.

The gun came out of my bag, and I discovered I was sweating. What had I been thinking? It was loaded, one in the chamber, and the safety (thank God) on. Going to nice suburban schools meant I didn’t have to worry about metal detectors, but it was still stupid to pack heat to Foley High.

Dad called it “the rabbits”—when a hunter got stupid, blunted by fear or the walloping unreality of the Real World. I suppose a better term would be shell shock, or even monster shock.

I was about to strip the gun and set it back in the box when my head jerked up. A half-second later, the doorbell rang. I jerked around, my nostrils filling with the smell of coppery rust. It mixed uneasily with the sudden wax-citrus tang in my saliva.

Ohshit. And something occurred to me—it was broad daylight, sun splashing off the snow.

Suckers don’t go out during the day. So it was something else.

But what?

There was a fast, light flurry of taps on the door. And the shimmer of something weird behind it, clearly visible. The blue lines of warding weren’t visible, but I could feel them, thread-thin, running together and humming. Gathering themselves like blue lightning.

If whatever-it-was took two steps to the side, it could peer in the huge, uncovered window and see me crouching near a weapons crate, my frozen hands locked around a nine-millimeter and my legs suddenly cramping.

OhGod. Not right now.

But you don’t get to choose what comes after you, and when. If you did, life would be a lot simpler, wouldn’t it?

Graves appeared in the doorway to the living room. His eyes were wide, white-ringed, and he looked almost as scared as I felt. His cheeks were cottage-cheese pale under their even goldenness. For an ethnic boy, he certainly got pretty white.

“What do we do?” he mouthed, and I didn’t even try to pretend there wasn’t serious bad news standing on the porch.

I snapped a glance at the front window and the wasteland of snow that was the front yard. Jesus. I’ve got him to protect, too. He’s not trained for this.

I motioned him back with one hand, eased myself down to the floor, and began to crawl-slink along the carpet, gun in one hand. I checked and rechecked to make sure the safety was on, and was careful to point it away from my fool head.

More light taps. The sense of breathing, amused impatience welling up behind the door sent chills down my spine. Crawling over the discoloration on the carpet gave the chills more weight. There was a faint, rotting tang of zombie, not enough to make me gag but enough to make me wish I didn’t have to slither over it.