Born at Midnight (Shadow Falls #1)(29)

Del a snarled at the toad. "Why don't we just make him a midnight snack and be done with it? Do toad legs taste as good as frogs?"

"Hmm. Don't know." Miranda glanced at Del a. "But I'm wil ing to find out," she said, and eyed the toad. Kylie could be mistaken, but she could swear the toad's eyes grew large with fear.

Miranda laughed. "If only I was that type of witch."

"What kind of witch are you?" Kylie asked, somewhat relieved.

"A screwed-up witch." Miranda frowned and then scowled at the toad. "You know the dril , Mr. Pepper, stop thinking bad thoughts and you'l go back to normal."

The toad wiggled his legs and then vanished into thin air.

"What kind of curse did you put on him?" Del a asked.

Miranda moaned in frustration. "If I knew that, I could stop it."

"You mean, you don't remember?" Del a asked.

Miranda lowered her gaze. "I remember what I thought I said, but I'm ... I'm dyslexic and I get my spel s wrong sometimes, and I have to know exactly what I said to make it stop. So until then, every time that pervert thinks about an underage girl, he's transformed into a toad and pops in for a visit."

Kylie leaned in. "While it sucks for you, it sounds like he deserves it."

"Yeah, he does. But he's like a constant reminder that I'm a screw-up."

"True," Del a said. "But on the positive side, you're keeping him from doing anything wrong. I hate perverts. I had an old neighbor who would stand at his window, empty lotion in his hand, and whack off in front of me or other girls."

"That's disgusting," Miranda said.

"Yeah, but what I hated was that a girl down the street had already told me he did it to her, too. She told her parents, the parents cal ed the police. The police came back and said that he's a deacon of the church and it was basical y my neighbor's word against his and they believed him."

"That's why I did the whole curse thing," Miranda said.

"But I handled it." Del a grinned.

"What did you do?" Kylie was almost too scared to ask.

"I broke into his house and replaced his lotion with some real y bad-ass superglue that my dad uses at his lab at work. You should have seen the look on his face when he couldn't get his hand off his dick. Then I made an anonymous cal to the police and reported him. I mean, how could he deny doing it? His hand was stuck to the crime scene."

They al burst out laughing. Wiping the tears of laughter from her eyes, Kylie looked at Del a and Miranda and she could have sworn they were just normal teenage girls.

Wel , she could have sworn until the blast of cold snuck up on her from behind. Kylie glanced over her shoulder hoping beyond hope nothing was there.

But hopes were often futile.

Soldier Dude stood only a few feet from her. Too close. Closer than he'd ever been. The chil from his presence sent an icy fear climbing her spine.

"Kylie?"

She heard Miranda cal her name-or was that Del a? Kylie couldn't tel because it sounded as if it came from another world. A world in which ghosts didn't exist. A world Kylie wanted to get back to, but couldn't.

The dead guy kept his eyes on Kylie while he slowly reached up and removed his helmet. Blood, bright red blood, gushed down his forehead. Kylie's breath caught as she watched the blood trickle down his face. Then everything went into slow motion. Kylie stood up, wanting to escape. Drip. Drip. Drip.

Blood droplets splattered onto the floor and left tiny speckles of red on the top of her bare feet. The drops kept coming. The specks of blood kept landing on her feet and then they started forming letters and then a word. Help ...

Kylie tried to inhale, but her lungs refused to take in the frigid air. Letting go of the oxygen trapped in her mouth, she saw a cloud of cold air float up from her own lips.

"What's wrong?" Miranda's voice seemed to float in Kylie's mind.

Good question, Kylie thought.

Too bad she didn't have a freaking clue.

"Do you guys smel that?" Del a's voice registered in Kylie's awareness but in a distant kind of way, like background music in a movie.

"Something smel s yummy."

"I don't smel anything." Miranda's words fol owed. Their conversation continued but suddenly it rang like a distant echo. "Oh shit ... shit ... shit. Kylie's aura is turning black. Black ... black ... black. I think there's a ghost. Ghost ... ghost ... ghost."

"Damn," Del a said. "I hate this shit." Footsteps sounded, her friends were running away. A door slammed. Kylie wanted to run, too, but she couldn't. She couldn't move. The blood continued to spatter on her feet, but she refused to look to read the words.

"Wait." Del a's tight voice sounded through wal s. "She stopped breathing. Kylie's stopped breathing. We have to do something."

Kylie heard the door swing open. Heard her name being cal ed. But that's when everything went black and her body slumped to the floor.

Chapter Fifteen

Coolness whisked across Kylie's brow and stirred her into a semi-alert state. One that brought on al the "w" questions: Who, What, When, Why, and Where. The musty smel of the pil ow answered the Where question.

Camp. Stil at camp.

The emotional overload from the last few days fil ed her chest. She forced her eyes open. Holiday sat on the edge of the bed. Her red hair hung free over her shoulders and concern appeared on her face and shined from her bright green eyes.