Chapter Thirty-one

THAT UNDENIABLE FRIED-GREASE smell over took my senses and made my mouth fill with the taste for a double cheeseburger. I hadn’t been hungry before, but now I felt as though I had gone days without food.

Celia popped up from her seat and almost danced over to Dean and me as we arrived in the food court. She was a cute girl, I’d give her that, but she was a little too bubbly for me. I tended to lean toward a more geeky girl who had freckles on her nose.

Speaking of, as I scanned other tables in the food court, I couldn’t find Kate. I pointed my attention back to Celia. “Hey, have you seen Kate Huddy?”

She unglued her eyes from Dean and answered, “Nope.” Then she was back at him.

I kept searching, my stomach still growling. “I’m going to get something to eat,” I announced.

“Grab me something,” Dean chimed in.

What is it with guys and food courts—well, food in general? We’re bottomless pits.

Surveying my options, I spotted just the place. Slider’s Haven. I just about ran over a little kid who scooted his chair out in front of me. Quickly flanking to my right, I avoided the collision, but stayed on track toward my destination.

I stepped behind a portly guy who obviously had the same state of mind I did and could do nothing but stare at the glistening photos on the menu board.

“Careful, you don’t want to drool,” came a voice behind me.

I turned to find Kate.

“How could you eat at a time like this?” she asked.

“Hey, how could you not eat at a time like this?”

She rolled her eyes in Huddy fashion, and although I’d seen it about a million times, something was different now between us. I didn’t feel tense and guarded toward her.

“You want something?” I asked, fishing money out of my wallet. In the back of my mind I hoped I had grabbed enough out of the business fund to cover sliders and fries as well as a decent outfit for the dance.

“Me? No, thanks. I don’t like my food slathered in grease.”

“Are you kidding? Look at those pictures.” I motioned to the menu overhead. “A golden bun lying atop a sizzling, cheese-covered, grilled-to-perfection burger with a stack of steaming fries piled high next to it. Behind it, a tall, sweaty, cool cup of sweet drink to wash it all down.”

Kate raised her eyebrows to me then let out a snort.

“You do know you’re lying to yourself thinking that’s healthy for you, right?”

I laughed back. “Oh, I know, but I just can’t resist something so good.” I turned back to the mouth-watering photo. “Lie to me all you want, delicious slider. You will soon be in my belly.”

“You’re disgusting, you know that?”

I looked back at Kate. “Oh, and the things I know about you.”

She instantly grew serious and punched my arm. “That’s not funny.”

Having Kate know my secret was actually not the worst thing in the world. It was sort of fun, really. Too bad all fun comes to an end. Ours did when I spotted Trent coming toward us from across the room.

I had a feeling I wasn’t going to get my sliders.

I took Kate’s hand just as the worker at the counter asked for my order. We turned and moved back toward where Dean and Celia waited for us.

“Nolan, what are you doing?” Kate tried to wiggle her hand out of mine.

“Scumbags right behind you.”

Kate looked over her shoulder. “What do they want?” she asked.

“Revenge,” I said without thinking and hoped she hadn’t heard. Kate gripped my hand tighter now, realizing the reason for our hasty change of plans.

Dean saw us coming. I tossed my head to the side, indicating the trouble following us while trying to speed up our pace.

“Split up. Meet at Old Navy in fifteen minutes,” he called out to us, low enough that Trent couldn’t hear. “If things turn real bad, find those mall cops.”

I nodded, fully understanding the plan.

I supposed we could have just gone straight to the mall security, but then there was the chance our parents would get involved, and, like Dean, I didn’t want to screw up this outing, considering we were both looking forward to tomorrow night.

Dean and Celia took off to the left and Kate and I to the right. To follow us both, the Three Stooges would have to separate as well. I was curious whom they would choose to follow and also what Celia was thinking.

With Kate’s hand still in mine, we weaved between shoppers and groups like a pair of fish through water. I looked back to see if I could see any of them following, but it was too crowded. Trying to blend in with everyone wasn’t all that hard to do, but we must have been moving too fast because Kate tripped. Her hand being in mine kept her from a total face-plant, although she did go down to her knees. I turned, half catching her under the arms, letting her weight bear down on me. My leg lurched back to balance us.

“Whoa—you all right?”

“Yeah, keep moving,” she said, back to her feet in a flash.

How had it come to this? My mind tried to grasp that question as we narrowly missed plowing over a woman toting two children by the hands.

“Slow down!” she called out when Kate whispered in an apology as we passed them. I noticed a smile on Kate’s face. Was she enjoying the chase? Then I heard a snarky laugh and took another risky look back. It was confirmed. We definitely had pursuers, and not one or two—we had all three of them on us, Trent in the lead. Why would they all come after me? We had to lose them somehow.

By now I was becoming winded, and each step began to grow heavier. It felt like my body was shutting down. Was I dying? Was there something inside my head? I couldn’t be sure, but figured I was just out of shape. This running thing wasn’t going to last long.

“We need find somewhere to hide,” I said quickly between breaths.

“Here.” Kate became an anchor and towed me into a store. I didn’t have time to read the sign before I was already inside. Kate didn’t stop and wound around a few racks of clothing, ducking down behind them.

A middle-aged overweight man, his glasses at the end of his nose, peered down at us where we cowered for cover.

Kate shot him a glance. “Take a picture—it will last longer!”

The man went back to looking over the shirt he held in his pudgy hands.

I listened toward the front of the store to see if I could pick up Trent’s voice. Had they seen us come in here?

My chest rose, and my lungs felt like bagpipes.

“You okay?” Kate whispered.

I nodded. “I think we lost them.”

The man had moved away from us to another part of the rack, but kept sliding his eyes first to Kate and then to me. I made good eye contact with him and was back in a split second.

“Harold. Get lost.”

The man’s eyes widened at me and he lumbered off to another part of the store.

“Come on. Let’s try not to look so crazy,” I said as we pulled each other to our feet.

“Did you know that guy?” Kate asked.

“Who? No. Why?”

“Well, you said his name.”

I tapped the side of my head. Kate gave an “a-ha” look and shook her head. “I feel so vulnerable around you now.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m not a creeper.”

She made a face that said otherwise.

An overhead announcement thanked us for shopping at Old Navy and said there was a storewide sale.

“So how long before Dean and Celia make it here?” Kate questioned, looking around the store.

“Don’t know. They did run the opposite way, but probably figured out by now that no one was chasing them. I bet Trent won’t be able to find them now either.”

Kate rummaged through her shoulder bag and brought out her black notebook. I recognized it from the other day when we had run into each other in the hallway. It seemed like such a long time ago. How things had changed since then.

“So, while we have a few moments alone … I did some research,” Kate said as she paged through her notebook. “Have you ever heard of the Shadow King?”

I was still scanning the entrance to Old Navy for either Dean and Celia or Trent.

“What? No. Is he some kind of Disney character?” I finally answered. Kate let out an annoyed breath matched with a scowl. I placed my attention back on her. I really had no idea who or what she was talking about.

“The Shadow King is a fictional character from the X-Men comics,” she said, sounding truly like a nerd. It was my turn to roll my eyes. Kate went on. “He’s a psychic evil being living on the Astral Plane. The Astral Plane is a psychic dimension, something folks with ESP tap into to tell fortunes, talk to the dead, and such.” She stared at me for a second, making sure I was following.

I indulged her, nodding and saying, “Yeah, okay, whatever. What does this have to do with anything?”

She had a reply waiting. “You said you saw something inside of Stephanie’s mind, right? A monster or something? Maybe it’s something like this Shadow King.”

“No,” I said. “It was Stephanie’s body, but it definitely was not her. Like something was living inside her.”

Kate cut in. “Like a demon?”

I started to jump to crazy conclusions myself. “Wait, are you saying it was some kind of possession?”

Kate made a “hmmmm” noise, and I shrugged my shoulders at her.

“I did do some research on Stephanie. Everything was pretty straightforward. I didn’t find any kind of weird demonic stuff. She wasn’t into tarot cards or speaking with the dead through a Ouija board or anything. I ruled it out.”

Kate spoke her words plainly, as if she dealt with this occult stuff every day, but they sent chills down my spine. How she had obtained that kind of information on Stephanie was an even scarier thought.

“She was in a coma. Do you dream in a coma?” Kate asked out loud, although she seemed to be arguing with herself. I shrugged my shoulders again. “You might have been in her dreams. Ever think about that?”

I hadn’t. I guessed it could be a possibility, yet it didn’t seem likely, and I told Kate so.

“I think the environment of her mind would have been different, which it was, but it didn’t seem like a dreamscape—just her normal room with the creepy dial turned to max.”

Kate was silent a moment, a thought obviously working its way free. “Okay, that just gives cred to why I don’t think this is self-inflicted. There’s something else at work here.”

I spied the front entrance once more, saying, “You mean something like that shadow dude.”

“It’s Shadow King,” Kate corrected, “and yeah, I think there is something else, something seeking her out.”

Kate seemed so intense in her belief that it was hard to keep a straight face. Was any of it true? She was a fan of the fantastic, and that usually meant the fake.

She snapped the notebook closed and put it back in her bag.

“You guys okay?” I heard Dean’s voice, and he and Celia came up beside me. I hadn’t noticed them and I jumped a little.

“Fine,” Kate answered for us. There seemed to be an air of uneasiness among Kate, Dean, and me. It must be Kate’s paranoia leaking out and getting to me.

“Well, I guess we can shop now,” Celia said, getting Dean’s attention. I had sort of forgotten about that part and now dreaded it. I would almost rather have been running from Trent and his goons again.

Looking at a few shirts on the rack next to me, I picked the same color Harold had been holding.

“Done.”