Through the Zombie Glass (White Rabbit Chronicles 2)

My fifth day back, Cole moved me into Reeve’s suite. With both Mr. Ankh’s and Mr. Parker’s permission, Kat had moved in as well, and the two girls had been asking for me—needing me. An unbreakable bond had formed inside that cell, one that would last as long as we lived.

The men in our lives weren’t willing to upset us, so, regardless of the danger I still presented, three twin beds now dominated the sleeping area.

But...

On the sixth day, I began to feel Z.A. stirring. She was angry. Hungry. Determined. I fought her with all that I was, doing my best to keep her on a tight leash, and it cost me. What little strength I’d won, I lost again, confining me to the bed.

Reeve recovered from the trauma first, and that was when her father pounced.

He strode into the room, sat at her bedside and held her hand. Uncaring about his audience, he said, “I’m going to talk, and you’re going to listen without saying a word until I’m done.” He waited for her to nod before he continued. “I want to send you abroad. I never wanted you to know what was going on here, didn’t want you to live your life in fear and danger—”

“I’m not going anywhere,” she interjected. “And are you trying to tell me the zombie problem is isolated to this area?”

“No, it’s not,” he gritted out. “But I don’t want you around the people who fight in the war. They’re targets. Magnets. If you’re here, you’ll cave and hang out with them. Then, as you see the injuries they receive, you’ll start to fear and stop living your life.”

“I’ve seen the injuries, and I’m not afraid. I’m ready and willing to help. Those guys carry a huge burden, and I need to step up and take on my share.”

I lay on my side, and Kat, who had the middle bed, lay on hers. We peered at each other, remaining quiet, listening to the conversation over the beeps and hums of medical equipment.

“What can you do?” Mr. Ankh demanded. “You can’t see the monsters.”

“Neither can you, and yet you manage just fine.”

“I’m a doctor.”

“And I’m a healthy girl with two arms and two legs, capable of taking orders to assist the doctor tending to the slayers.”

He shook his head. “The zombies could bite you.”

“And I could be given the antidote,” she sniped. “Look, Dad. I’m going to help the cause whether I do it here or somewhere else. That’s not something you can stop. I caused the mess we’re currently in. Me. And I want to make amends. I need to make amends.”

“No, you—”

“Dad,” she insisted. “We both know the truth. I’ve been spying on everyone, trying to figure out what’s going on and why the people I love, the people who profess to love me, kept lying to me. In my quest for answers, Ethan was able to encourage me and teach me how to be a better spy. I told him everything I learned. I caused this.”

His shoulders drooped, and he scrubbed a hand down his face.

I yawned, my eyelids growing heavy.

“If you want to stay, stay,” he said softly. “If you want to help, help. But you will not go near that boy.” There at the end, his tone had hardened. “Do you understand me?”

Reeve scowled at him. “He has a name.”

“Bronx,” the doctor gritted. “You’ll not go near him.”

“Why? Why do you hate him so much?”

“I don’t hate him. I just hate the thought of you with him. He’s too...rough for you, honey. You haven’t read his file, and you don’t know his past or the trouble he’s been in, the things he’s done or the things he’ll do.”

Her smile was sad. “And I don’t care. I know the boy he is now, and that’s all that matters to me.”

“Reeve—”

“No! I’m not Mom. I didn’t understand her breakdowns before, or what they did to you, but I do now. I get it. But you don’t get to control this part of my life. And if you try to punish him and the slayers because I want to be with him, then you will lose me. I will move out. And who do you think will be there to take me in?”

I gave another yawn, this one nearly cracking my jaw. My eyelids drifted closed, and the rest of the conversation faded from my awareness.

Not over... Will try again... You’re not going to win... Z.A.’s voice filled my head, oozing past the barriers I’d managed to build.

I wanted to reply, but there was a strange fog in my head, muddying up my words.

“—still sleeping,” Kat said.

“Yes,” Cole said. “She sleeps all the time.”

I tried to open my eyes but couldn’t quite manage it.

“I’m worried about her.” Kat said. “I’ve never seen her look so...fragile.”

Were they talking about me?

“She’ll recover,” Nana said. “I’m not going to lose her.”

Nana was here, too?

If Cole replied, I missed it.

I wasn’t sure how much time passed before I felt warm fingers brush through my hair. At last the fog dissipated. I pried open my eyes as sparks of energy bloomed. Nana was gone, I realized. Kat and Reeve were asleep. Cole was next to me, his eyes closed. He absently stroked my scalp.

I smiled. I needed more of this, more of him.

I thought about the journal. The answer. Light. Fire. Clearly, he was a light to me. Just as clear, I burned for him. But there was more, something I was missing.

To-do: figure it out, and fast. Time was running out.

* * *

“—I’ve always known,” Frosty was saying to Kat.

My eyelids fluttered open, and I realized two things at once. I’d fallen asleep while Cole stroked me, and morning had arrived.

Frosty sat beside Kat’s bed, holding her hand. Her other had tubes sticking out of it—tubes attached to a dialysis machine.

Her eyes widened with shock. “You have?”

“Well, yeah. Kitty Kat, I’m, like, a master black ops agent man, and not just when it comes to Call of Duty. To hang around you, and to let you hang around my friends, I had to know all about you. I never said anything about your illness because I wanted you to trust me enough to admit the truth on your own.”

Oh, wow. He’d always known.

“Well, that didn’t stop you from asking a bazillion questions about what I was doing each day,” she grumbled.

“I was giving you the opportunity to come clean,” he said with an unrepentant grin.