Burning in a Memory (31 page)

The other two shared a look over Adelaide’s suggestion. Angie nodded first and then Adam hopped out of the car. While outside, his head spun on a pivot
before he opened Angie’s door and gestured for her to take the backseat. The woman agreed but struggled to snap her seatbelt free. Once the doors shut and the engine purred again, Adam made his decision.

“We’ll have to do that. But how
do you plan to recruit local help to find the place?” he asked directly of Adelaide for the first time.

“Humans always think those
places are haunted.” Plus, with the right amount of cleavage showing and an innocent smile, men were always happy to speak to her. She left out the last part, remembering it wasn’t completely unlike how she snagged Adam. She continued explaining. “I’m sure when we get close enough someone has to have heard of something.”

“Maybe
, but we have to be careful. If we’re in that locality, the locals might also tip off the shades.”

She nodded. Humans rarely worked with shades, but she believed anything was possible now. As quickly as Adam addressed her, he ignored her again. He shifted the car and put them back on the road. Angie lay down in the back seat with a few whimpers until she fell asleep. Adelaide forced herself to look out the window again, to stare at the green
highway signs that flashed by and try to recognize something. It restarted her headache all over again.

She gave up and closed her eyes. They arrived in another hour. The halting motion of the car drew her out of her daze. Fluorescent lights from outside blinded her, but she
could just make out the silhouette of Adam walking from the car’s passenger side. Angie was already up and stretching, but her movements were zombie-like and awkward.

“I’m going to scout the area for shades
so we aren’t taken by surprise.”

Adelaide
’s brow furrowed. She sized up the near empty parking lot. The place itself buzzed with bright lights and a red neon sign, but right outside of the reach of the bulbs was a dark set of woods. A few dirty semis waited in the back and anything beyond that was invisible.

“Don’t go alone,” Adelaide said quickly. It was far too early to separate now. Adam ignored her, but he did plaster on a smirk. “I’ll be back,” he taunted.

Angie already let herself into the building. Adelaide followed reluctantly after a few hopeless adjustments to her appearance. She pulled her top down enough to show a hint of the pink bra beneath; it felt more shameless than subtle, but it’d have to do. Only a few steps inside and she knew she was overdressed for the part anyway. She’d stayed in a few truck stop motels in her life, but they never stopped taking her off guard. The scent of mold and stale coffee slapped her in the face. The building lacked central air and the window unit screeched as it blew.

Angie picked out the first open seat and dropped into it
as Adelaide walked to the front desk. A miniature television perched on a pile of magazines, flickered images on the screen. No one sat at the desk.

“Hello
?” Adelaide called out as sweetly as possible. It took a minute for a man to lumber out from the back. A scowl marred his aged face, but lessened when he set his eyes on her. Adelaide plastered a smile on her face, but laid it on slowly. To her, he was a greasy old man and an easy target.

“Sorry to wake you, but we need a room,” she said.

“I don’t know if we got one. You a trucker?”

Adelaide resisted the urge to ask if she could pass as one
. After sitting down, the man appeared to awaken a little bit more and changed his question.

“You and your friend can fit into one room?”

“Whatever you got,” she answered.

He nodded, using a pencil and paper to orchestrate it. Then he held up a skeleton key at the offering of her cash. The transac
tion went so easily and quickly that Adelaide was surprised.

“Can’t let you keep driving tonight. Not a good place to break down. There’s almost nothing anywhere,” he mumbled as his attention
drifted to his television.

She fingered the dirty key in her hand, flipping it back and forth to study the etched numbers.
There was only one floor to the motel and their room was right next to the office. Adelaide lingered at the front desk.

“I saw a gas station down the road, right?”

The man shrugged.

“We got those. Trucker stop.”

She resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

“Is there anything else around here to see? I’m out here to see the old country. I’m here on a ghost hunt…”

Shaking his head, he mumbled something like “you ought not be involved in that.”

Adelaide rocked back on her heels. She couldn’t even get this man to look at her
now, much less join her mind game. Maybe it had been something she said. She fingered the key again.

“Thanks for the room.”

That didn’t earn so much as a grunt. Her gaze shifted and she looked at the television. The local news flashed on the screen. She thought of something then.

“Come on,” she said to Angie and opened the door. Adam waited on the other side. She nearly jumped
out of her skin upon seeing him in the darkness.

“That was fast,” she commented.

His eyebrow rose.

“You’re telling me. I thought you were getting information,” he said
while gesturing inside. She frowned but led them to the room. Adam walked in first before he beckoned them to follow. Adelaide sealed the door behind the group.

“Look, there might be something about it on the news though.
Leon is not going to go without fighting and that kind of fighting will attract attention. Plus, in a place this small, strangers will be noticeable,” she said.

Adam made a face as he scanned the room.

“There’s no television here.”

“Use your phone
, the car radio, whatever,” she said until Adam finally nodded.

“We must be close. I couldn’t feel any shades nearby, which isn’t uncommon
in a territory of a powerful coven. Any shades around here must be Hawthorn.”

“Or in line with them,” Adelaide pointed out with half a mind on it.

“I sincerely doubt they’re working with anyone else. It’s not like them.”

Adam let himself outside again, but she knew he wouldn’t go far.

“Boo, Adam,” Angie mumbled as she collapsed onto the lumpy mattress. In minutes, she snored lightly.

It
took awhile for Adelaide to realize that in the entire room, there was only one bed. There was enough room to hop on the other side, but Angie’s company was hardly what concerned her. If they switched off, she’d be sleeping with Adam.

Now realizing that her and Adam’s shifts could not correspond, she hurried to sleep now and take watch opposite of him later. The mattress surprisingly managed to be less comfortable than it looked, but she crawled into the bed. Eventually exhaustion still won and she fell asleep. When she awoke,
it was to her back hurting. She groaned loudly and rolled, managing to fall off the unfamiliar bed. Once her fingers touched the grimy ground, she jumped back up. Awareness came flooding back. Her head whirled to size up the room. Angie slept on the bed still. Adam sat in the corner. She forced her heart to slow and to regain her composure before she spoke.

“What time is it?” she asked Adam.

She knew from his posture and the subtle gestures of his body that he was well aware of her presence. Just as she thought he wouldn’t answer, he did.

“Three a.m.,” he said.

She blinked. She’d at least slept for four hours, but now that time seemed too fleeting.

“Feel free to sleep,
” she said and waved at the bed. “I can take watch from here and you’ll need your rest.”

“How do I know you won’t kill us in our sleep?” Adam asked abruptly.

His statement stung and she just shook her head.

“I guess you don’t,” she bit out.

He stiffened accordingly.

“Adam, I wouldn’t have come out here if I was trying to kill you. I would
’ve just let the shades get you at the other house. Or, better yet, I would just let them get you now.”

“And you expect me to give you the chance?”

“Look, I’m here now so you have to trust me a bit. You’re relying on me to help you, right?”

He studied her intently.
It was the first time he made a show out of not looking away.

“I’m not relying on you, but you’re a necessary risk,” he said simply, denying her again.

“Then risk sleep. Take the bed. I’ll take watch for you, whether you appreciate it or not.”

Finally giving up the bar
stool, he switched corners with her. They danced around each other with an awkward, unpracticed rhythm. Now Adelaide sat while Adam hovered by the bedside. When he didn’t hurry to sleep, she asked another question.

“Did you hear anything on the radio?”

Adam nodded.

“There have been fires, trees downed to block roads, and the chaos is all leading to one direction. I charted it out and it’s not far from the place you described. I made a plan for our hike down into the woods and our escape plan,” Adam said without
a hint of doubt in his voice. Adelaide noticed for the first time he clenched a worn map in his fist.

Adam sat down on the bed, shifting again and again when the mattress sucked him down. He dropped the map in frustration and kicked off his boots. His hands went into his hair and he watched her again.

“Will you be able to sleep?” she finally asked.

Adam neglected her question and asked his own.

“You’re not really here to save your cousin, right? That’s not why you came?”

She heard something raw in his voice. Her gut churned.

“No,” she admitted quietly.

Adam sized up Angie’s sleeping figure before continuing, and when he did, his skin flushed.

“I figured it couldn’t be something as nice or as pleasant as the story I’d told for you. I’m sure its evil. Honestly, I haven’t asked because it’ll make me so angry that I won’t be able to work with you at all.”

Adam hadn’t said this many words to her in days, and hearing them now, she quickly replayed them in her head.

“I think of myself as many things, Adam, but not evil,” she said the words, but felt no heart in them. If she wasn’t evil, she asked herself, then what was she? She’d gone through on her attempt to kill Leon, though it failed. What did that make her, even if Leon was half a shade? Her expression faltered. “I’ve made mistakes, and you have a right to be angry with me, but we have to work together,” she amended after a minute.

“Are you going to tell me the truth, Adelaide? If I ask?”

She stiffened. Her mouth opened but she failed to construe words. If she told the truth, Adam would never forgive her. He’d barge into battle alone and be killed. She needed to help him, and then he could hate her. Her lack of an answer prompted Adam to turn his back. He killed the nightstand light from where he sat and laid down.

She
couldn’t see his face through the shadows, but she heard him clearly.

“If you can’t tell me the truth about that, then why would I ever believe that you care about me? Ha.”

Twenty-seven

             
Adelaide flinched as if she’d been stung. Stumbling from the chair, she jammed her hand into her coat pocket and killed her phone’s vibrations. She moved too late because the sound of the ringtone woke the other two up. Adam rose from the bed in a flash. The bright bulbs from outside stayed lit the entire night so the room was illuminated through the cracks in the blinds. Adelaide held up an open palm to calm him as he clearly reoriented to the room.

             
“What was that?” Angie asked.

             
She gripped her phone tighter.

             
“Alarm,” she lied. “I think it’s about time to move.”

             
The reminder consumed Adam’s attention and he whispered inaudible words to Angie. The woman hurried to her bags, resurfacing with some of the food they’d packed. Adam slipped into the tiny bathroom. Adelaide stopped squeezing her phone. Scanning the screen, she sized up the missed call to recognize Bradley’s phone number. He’d brazenly texted her after the call. “411? Please,” it read.

             
Her heart thundered. Without another second of thought, she flipped the phone and uncovered the battery. She pulled the SIM card and snapped it between her fingers. She snapped the remains again. She manually reset the phone and obliterated the last data on it. Satisfied after a few minutes, she tossed the dead phone onto the counter.

             
“Would you like something to eat?” Angie asked, offering a white food pack and bottle of water.

             
“Thanks,” she accepted the gift and shoveled down the contents. The potent salt dried her mouth and she drank the entire bottle to wash it down. The others eventually did the same. Time inside felt fleeting and, in minutes, they returned the key to the front desk and hopped into the car. Adam took the wheel this time.