CHAPTER 2
The lights come back on when I’m in my room, halfway dressed.
It’s not all that difficult to get ready in the dark. I never really cared about my appearance before the Turning, and these days I basically wear the same kind of clothes every day, almost like a uniform: A pair of black jeans. A white tank, or light grey if the whites are all dirty. My hiking boots. And, most importantly, Rory’s jacket.
I finish tying the laces on my boots, then quickly run a brush through my damp hair a few times. Leaving it loose to air dry into messy waves, I head downstairs to look for Jack. If he’s still here, I know where I’ll find him.
Jack Holden is the leader of the Grave, of our people. At forty-eight years old, you’d think he’s too young to be a widower, though with his salt-and-pepper hair, sad brown eyes, and chiseled jaw, it’s no secret that he has plenty of female admirers amongst the survivors in our community. But he still wears his wedding ring religiously, and seems oblivious to their attention. In the before times, he used to be a firefighter—the last one left in our side of town who never had the chance to accept the Injection when it was offered to his firehouse—and, in a worldthat runs by fire, that was the only qualification he needed in order to take charge of us all.
He’s also my dad which makes my position as difficult as it is. As my dad, it’s easy for him to be overprotective, especially after what happened to Rory and Hallie. As our leader, he can get away with making changes to the Grave’s routines. No one dares argue with him.
I certainly can’t. Even if I call him Jack to respect his new title instead of Dad, I know that that’s exactly who he’ll always be to me.
He’s in the kitchen, just like I suspected. A cup of coffee is set before him, but he isn’t drinking it. Instead, Jack is staring into space, lost in thought. He jerks when he sees me enter the room and he stands up quickly—but not so quickly that I don’t see the worried expression that flashes across his face.
Even though his mug is half-filled, he picks it up and turns toward the sink.
“Allie!” he calls out, voice rough. That, coupled with the deep circles under his eyes, tells me it was another long night for the hunters. “Good morning, honey. Sleep well?”
I twitch at the name Allie. I can’t help it. Before I decided I wanted to go by Xandra when I was twelve, it always used to be Hallie and Allie, the Holden twins. But ever since Hallie’s death, Jack has started to call me Allie again. I don’t have the heart to ask him to stop, even though it’s like a prickly splinter every time I hear it, nagging and annoying if essentially harmless.
“I guess I slept okay,” I lie, taking the seat he emptied. The nightmares come at night which means sleep rarely does. I’m sure the matching bags under my eyes are a big enough clue. “I know I slept past the six o’clock patrol. Any news this morning?”
Jack keeps his back to me as he dumps the coffee down the sink, taking his time to wash the mug out. I count to ten, waitingto see if he’ll answer me. Figuring he must not have heard me, I try again.
“How were the patrols?”
“Hm? The patrols?”
“Yeah.”
“What about them?”
Something isn’t right. No matter how tired or busy he is, Jack’s neverthisdistracted. I watch as he grabs another mug from the cabinet only seconds after dumping his first cupful of coffee. He won’t even look over his shoulder at me. It’s as if he’s avoiding my question.
What doesn’t he want to tell me?
My stomach tightens. I’m not ready for bad news—I don’t know if I ever will be—but I absolutely refuse to remain ignorant. In our new world, that’s too dangerous.
So, swallowing back my unease, I raise my voice as I call out for him: “Jack!”
There’s no way I don’t see how the edge of his jaw goes hard when he hears his name. It’s a habit I picked up after the Turning, after he took over as the leader of the Grave. He doesn’t mind when we’re around other survivors, but I know he hates it when I call him Jack when we’re alone.
He turns slightly.
“Why don’t you have some breakfast? Mrs. B brought over some of her pancakes this morning,” he says lightly, gesturing to a plate piled high with the fluffy cakes sitting on the side counter. I don’t know how I didn’t notice them before. “There’s fresh syrup on the stove.”
Jack is as transparent as one of my glass bottles: I can see right through him. But he knows me nearly as well as I do him, and we’re both aware that there’s not much that can sway me from hunting. Food—especially Mrs. Baker’s pancakes—might be the only thing.
I’m not really hungry this morning, but I still remember how terrible those first days were after the Turning, once we realized that there was no going back to the way things used to be when our government basically failed; no help from the world outside of the US was coming, either. We went weeks with empty bellies, eating whatever food we could scrounge before the Grave banded together and it became anusversusthemsituation rather than everyone fending for themselves. I never turn down food now—and Jack knows it. I’m climbing out of my seat and moving toward the dish cabinet at the wordpancakes.
I give up on asking about this morning’s patrol. Somehow, I don’t think Mrs. Baker would be bringing over breakfast if Jack had somewhere else to be. It must’ve been a routine check, no lurkers reported. I’m probably just overreacting, and Jack’s just tired.
I know I am.
“How’s Mrs. B?” I ask, reaching around him for a plate and a fork. “And the baby? They’re all right, I hope.”
Mrs. Baker is a kind-faced, cheery woman in her mid-thirties. A math teacher from before, she spends her days teaching the young children in the Grave, and that’s when she’s not baking treats for Jack. Her husband was considered one of the first victims—someone who died on January 1stwhen the first lurkers Turned and were initially vulnerable—and he left her with two kids and a third on the way. When she went into labor a few months later, Jack was right there to help deliver the baby boy. She comes by at least once a week to give him something to show how grateful she is.