The Darkest Minds (The Darkest Minds #1)(51)

“We saw this a lot driving through Ohio,” he explained without me having to prompt him. “After people lost their houses, they’d go to the nearest closed hotel and try to fight over the rooms there. Gangs and all that crap.”

The motel he settled on was a Howard Johnson Express, one with a quarter of its parking lot filled with different makes and models of cars and the blue VACANCY sign on. I held my breath as he navigated around the outer ring of rooms, careful to avoid driving past the office. He picked a spot at the very edge of the lot, surveying the line of rooms in front of us. Two were easily ruled out—we could see the glow of the TV through the windows and curtains—but the others weren’t as obviously occupied.

“Wait here a sec,” he said, unbuckling his seat belt. “I’m going to scope out the area. Make sure it’s safe.” And it was just like before; he didn’t bother to wait for any of us to protest. He just jumped out of the car, glanced into each room he passed, and began to jimmy the door of his choosing.

Chubs and I were left to divide up the last of the food we had gathered from the gas station in Marlinton. Our inventory was down to a bag of Cheetos, peanut butter crackers, some Twizzlers, and a snack pack of Oreos, plus the candy I had managed to stuff into my backpack. It was every six-year-old’s dream feast.

We worked silently, avoiding each other’s gaze like champions. Chubs’s fingers were quick and nimble as he opened the peanut butter crackers and started in on them. The same ratty book was on his lap, the pages open and smiling up at him. I knew he couldn’t actually be reading them—not with eyesight as bad as his, at least. But when he finally decided to talk to me, he didn’t so much as glance up from it.

“Enjoying our life of crime yet? The general seems to think you’re a natural.”

I reached over to wake Zu, ignoring whatever it was he was trying to imply. I was too exhausted to deal with him, and, frankly, none of the comebacks warring at the tip of my tongue at the moment were likely to win him over.

Before I could step out of the van, my backpack and food in hand, Chubs’s hand reached out and slammed the door shut again. In the dim light of the hotel, he looked…not angry, exactly, but certainly not friendly, either. “I have something to say to you.”

“You’ve already said quite a bit, thanks.”

He waited until I had looked back at him over my shoulder before continuing. “I’m not going to pretend like you didn’t help us today, or that you didn’t spend years living in a glorified shit hole, but I’m telling you now—use tonight to think seriously about your decision to stay, and if you decide to slip out in the middle of the night, know that you probably made the right choice.”

I reached again for the door, but he wasn’t finished. “I know you’re hiding something. I know you haven’t been completely honest. And if you think for some insane reason that we can protect you, think again. We’ll be lucky to make it out of this mess alive without whatever crisis you’re bringing to the table.”

I felt my stomach clench, but kept my face neutral. If he was hoping to read some clue in my face, he was going to be disappointed; I’d spent the better part of the last six years schooling my expression into perfect innocence under the threat of guns.

Whatever he suspected couldn’t have been the truth, though, otherwise he wouldn’t be giving me one last chance to duck and run. He would have personally punted me out of the van, preferably at a high speed, in the middle of a deserted highway.

Chubs rubbed a thumb across his lower lip. “I think…” he started. “I hope you get to Virginia Beach, I really do, but—” He pulled the glasses off his face and pinched the bridge of his nose. “This is ridiculous, I’m sorry. Just think about what I said. Make the right choice.”

Liam began waving at us from the door of the room, keeping it propped open with his foot. Zu put a hand on Chubs’s shoulder. He jumped, blinking in surprise at the touch of yellow rubber. She had been so silent, I had forgotten she was there, too.

“Come on, Suzume,” Chubs said, dropping a hand on her shoulder. “Maybe if we’re lucky, the general will deign to let us take showers. And, maybe if we’re really lucky, he’ll actually take one himself.”

Zu followed him out the side door, casting an anxious look my way. I waved her off with a forced smile and reached in the backseat for my black backpack.

I didn’t notice it until I was already outside, the darkening sky sapping away the last bit of the van’s warmth from my skin. One of my hands reached out to hold the sliding door open as I leaned back into the minivan and pulled the book out of the passenger seat’s back pouch. It was the first and only time I had seen it free from Chubs’s hands.

The flat, empty M&M’s bag he was using as a bookmark was still in place. I flipped the book open to that page, and didn’t need to look at the spine to know instantly what book it was. Watership Down, by Richard Adams. No wonder he had gone to such great lengths to hide what he was reading. The story of a bunch of rabbits trying to make their way in the world? Liam would have a field day.

But I loved that book, and apparently Chubs did, too. It was the same old edition my dad used to read to me before bed, the one I used to steal from his study and put on my shelf for when I couldn’t sleep at night. How had it come to me just when I needed it the most?