Dangerous Creatures(84)

“You’re full of questions today, Shrinky Dink.” Ridley sat with her pink toes in his lap while he drove, and Link held on to them with his hand.

She wiggled them and he smiled.

“Only one more question, and I promise this one’ll be easier than the last.”

“All right, then,” she said.

“Should we go back to Gatlin?”

He was wrong. This wasn’t easy, either.

This one kept them talking for a hundred miles.

As much as Ridley wanted the answer to be yes—more than she’d ever thought she’d want to go back to Gatlin, to everything that meant—she knew in her heart there was no way she could risk everyone she cared about. She wouldn’t even risk telling them where she and Link were headed.

Not when Silas Ravenwood was involved. Or worse, Abraham.

“Then where do we go? If we can’t stay in New York, and we can’t go home?” Ridley hadn’t quite figured that out yet.

“Did you actually call Gatlin home?”

“Don’t avoid the question,” Ridley said, avoiding the question.

Link grinned, tapping on the steering wheel. “Where are we goin’? You and me? That’s music and magic, Babe. I got just the place. There’s only one.”

“Yeah?”

“Sure. It was supposed to be chapter ten in my autobiography. You know, Carolina Icon. Did I ever tell you that one?”

Rid had to think about it. “Viva Link Vegas?”

“Nah, that’s all fake magic. Plus, that’s chapter twelve, the one with the white tigers. For when my vocal cords are shot and I’m fat from eatin’ fried peanut butter.” He winked at her.

Ridley smiled. She hadn’t known they weren’t shot now. “Where, Hot Rod? Don’t die on a toilet before you tell me.”

“Aw, come on. It’s not the worst way to go.”

Ridley didn’t know about that, but at least it wasn’t a fire or chains. She wondered what Nox’s third vision was, the last one he’d seen.

The one he wouldn’t tell her about.

Rid looked back at Link. “Cough it up. Where are we headed?”

Link was going to tell her, but then “Stairway to Heaven” came on the radio, and they had to stop talking.

It was the only rule of the Beater.

Ridley would have to wait a few minutes to find out.

She wrapped a strand of pink hair around her finger and thought about where she was going and what she was leaving behind.

Link was singing, the radio was playing, and the wind was blowing. Rid’s window was down and her hand was hanging out to feel the warmth of the sun. There were cows on one side of the highway and horses on the other. Everywhere she looked, round bales of hay sat tied up with string, like birthday presents.

Ridley felt pretty good, for someone with a banged-up heart and a bounty on her head. Her ring tapped against the side of the car, but she couldn’t see if it was glowing, and right now she didn’t care.

Which was also the reason she didn’t see the truck coming right at them.

Sugarplum—

People said the gas tank alone burned more than two stories high.

Hot Rod, don’t you leave me—

The back of the Beater? Smashed like a dropped accordion.

Stairs. Flames. The sky.

“Stairway to Heaven” kept playing right up until the radio caught fire.




To be continued…





Acknowledgments


SO MANY PEOPLE HAVE WORKED together to bring our readers the continuing adventures of Link and Ridley and the Caster world in the Dangerous Creatures novels. The last six months have been nothing short of miraculous.

Our agents, Sarah Burnes (and everyone at the Gernert Company, on behalf of Margie) and Jodi Reamer (and everyone at Writers House, on behalf of Kami), have collaborated, as always, with grace and general awesomeness.

Our editors, Kate Sullivan (for Margie) and Erin Stein (for Kami), as well as our former editor, Julie Scheina, have been not just patient and brilliant but passionately #TeamLinkAndRidley from the start.

The publishing, sales, editorial, marketing, publicity, school and library services, art direction, and copyediting groups at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers have continued to work tirelessly on behalf of Casters everywhere.

The teachers, librarians, booksellers, bloggers, journalists, tumblr-ers, tweethearts, Facebook followers, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, writer friends, YALLFestians, and most of all DEAR READERS (NOTE: THIS IS YOU) who make up the larger Caster world have become the GREATEST FANDOM OF ALL HUMAN HISTORY.

We offer up a giant, Wesley Lincoln–sized thank-you to all of you.

But most especially, we want to thank our families. You, darlings, are the collective loves of our respective lives. You Charm us every day.

Lewis, Emma, May & Kate, and Alex, Nick & Stella, we’ll save you the biggest cherry lollipops of them all.

XO,

Margie & Kami





Copyright


This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright ? 2014 by Kami Garcia, LLC, and Margaret Stohl, Inc.