Sugar Skulls Read online

  Another furious blast of pyro, farther upstage this time, and I see Vee, lying in a heap a few feet from me, hands clawing at the stage floor. I crawl over to her and pull her close. She’s cold to the touch, and the stink of spoiled apples is all over her.

  And yet … it’s still her. This hauntingly lovely girl looking up at me. My heart pounds, blood rushing to my ears, and the chaos all around us has nothing to do with it. I’m dumbstruck, fumbling for words. “Vee, it’s me. Micah. I’m Micah. From—”

  “They’re coming for you, love. Help me with this.” She takes my hand and places it on the spot she was pawing at. There’s a handle.

  A trapdoor. Brilliant.

  I wrench it open as a third flare of luminous phosphorous explodes from the stage, and I can see people rushing toward us. I hurl myself into the hole, hitting bottom quickly and reaching for Vee. She slips down into my arms like a rag doll, pulling the trapdoor shut behind her. I put her down before jumping up and flipping the lock on it.

  Won’t hold for long, but every little bit helps.

  I grab Vee’s hand, threading her biting-cold fingers through mine. We make tracks through the understage, slamming right into the back of the greyface stationed at the exit door. He whirls around, reaching for his sidearm. But I’m faster, pulling the other pair of Brights from my hoodie and tagging him in the neck.

  He goes down twitching. I slap an adhesive patch from the medical supply depot under his chin. Vee looks at me, still dazed.

  “Level-five sedative,” I tell her. “Just in case.”

  She leans against me and breathes frost into what little air there is between us. “Micah—”

  I kiss her, one stolen moment of bliss in this legendary clusterfuck, and wish desperately I could keep kissing her forever. But I pull back, my lips and hers sticking for a second, the cold bonding us together.

  “Come on. I’ll get you out of here.”

  I wrap an arm around her, and we run.

  CHAPTER NINE

  M

  The power’s still out. Vee clutches my hand tight as we dodge beams of approaching flashlights. With the emergency lights in the back corridors flickering, we stick to shadows and dark corners, racing scanners and guards alike.

  I look back at Vee as we run. Even under siege by the applejack, she’s hardly a damsel in distress. Her reaction time is slowed, but her instincts are sharp, her shaky muscles reinforced with inner resolve. Ferocity lurks right below the surface. In the midst of this insanity, I’m still a little awed by her.

  We duck into a maintenance closet just in time to avoid a pair of shadows on the move. Their riot gear clicks with military efficiency as they pass the thin steel door.

  They must’ve had a few special-ops guys waiting just in case.

  The acidic stench of industrial cleanser dominates the tiny room. Vee huddles close, her shivers radiating cold in all directions. I pull His Majesty’s lighter from my pocket and spark it, casting the darkness aside with a gentle flickering of flame. Her eyelids are heavy, and her thigh-high boots might be the only thing keeping her upright.

  Handing her the lighter, I pull the slim black case from my hoodie pocket and crack it open, revealing the silver injector and a single dose of Rivitocin. In the meager half-light, it looks like rosewater. “Vee, the applejack. It’s killing you. Not in the slow-and-eventual drugs-are-bad way. In the serious-and-brutal raze-the-earth way. I have something that will help in the short term—”

  “No more drugs.” Her eyes are wild for a moment, but just a moment, as if the cold is stealing her fear along with everything else.

  “Shh, shh, I know. Think of it as medicine.” A brief pause. How do I convince her? “I need you to trust me.”

  “I do trust you.” No hesitation, which speaks volumes after the way she’s been manhandled tonight. She stiffens just a little, like she’s bracing herself. “Do it.”

  Placing one hand on her cheek, I try to hold her attention. All the while, her lips are tantalizingly close. I suppress that thought and soldier onward. “This is gonna hit you fast, and it won’t be pretty. But I’ve got you. Okay? I’ve got you.”

  She nods, her head lolling forward, then back.

  I’ll take it.

  I press the injector to her neck and with the low hiss of a deflating tire, the soft pink liquid is in her system. I grab her, one arm around her lower back, the other under her arm and cradling the back of her head.

  There’s no way to prepare her. She starts shaking, vibrating in my arms as nerve endings fire like bottle rockets, muscles spasming at random. I wince as she bites my shoulder hard to keep from screaming.

  It’s the longest ten seconds of her life, I’d bet. It’s a close runner-up to the longest ten of mine.

  When the aftershocks finally subside, her skin is warmer, and there’s some color beneath her china-white makeup. I step back as far as this closet will allow, and she stumbles. I catch her before she falls.

  Vee leans against my shoulder as I open the door, just a sliver. The coast is clear, but she’s in no condition to run now.

  “You’ll have to excuse my hands,” I whisper, as I dip down and wrap my arms around her, boosting her over my shoulder. “You can be my lookout.”

  I pull open the door and make a break for it down the hall, as fast as my precious cargo will allow.

  V

  I’m not sure what’s worse: the world twisted upside down or my mind turning inside out. Whatever Micah shot into my neck builds a barrier between the applejack and my skitzy nanotech, walling off the killing cold, but it leaves my body at the mercy of the green-tinted poison.

  By the time he’s gone ten feet, the heat is building again, as steady as the rhythm of his sneakers hitting the concrete. Just like that first night at the Palace, edges sharpen and colors brighten. What little illumination there is in the hall flares in the space behind my eyes. The moment he steps out of the building, the chaos is like an explosion.

  No lights anywhere; no emergency backups, not even a distant glow to indicate other districts might have survived the outage. The sky has burned to a crisp, leaving only star-embers to wink at us.

  The grid is dead. I brought it to its knees with Micah’s song, and my fans finished the job. Now every single one of those glorious little dead things is following my orders to burn Cyrene down, down, down. In the distance, the audience floods into the streets, crowds down the alleys, swarms the loading dock. They write on the walls of the Dome with flames, break windows, throw debris into the path of the responding rescue vehicles. Greyfaces try to form a human barricade and are knocked aside within seconds.

  I’m burning, so we all burn.

  I raise my head in time to see the other Sugar Skulls hustled toward the limo by one of the special-ops teams. Jax pauses at the door of the car, equal parts taunted and tempted by the cries of the rabble-rousers.

  Damn. Now two riots I owe her.

  In stark contrast, Sasha’s face is a study in terror, and she’s got her hands raised to keep the world from crashing down on her head. Reaching out, Jax snags her around the waist and shoves her into the car before tossing a look of regret over her shoulder.

  Not that she would get far, if she tried to join the fray. Damon is right behind Jax, barking orders and shouting into two phones at once. Even with the grid down, even in the midst of utter pandemonium, he’s strong-arming everything under control and gaining the upper hand.

  I shudder, willing Micah to turn away, to find a darker place to stand. Even pitch-black shadows aren’t enough to hide me from Damon …

  Heat licks over every square inch of me, and I want to tell Micah to put me down. To leave me here. To get the hell out while he still can. But I’m afraid he’ll actually do it. Afraid of being without him now that we’ve finally latched on to each other, two people drowning in a sea of fucking anarchy.

  I twist my hands in the back of his hoodie; for an answer, he clamps his arms down harder on my legs. Scanning
the scene from left to right, he affords me a partial view of the fistfights, the improvised weapons, the flares of discharged Brights and shock batons.

  Micah sucks in a breath. “Holy shit …”

  M

  “It’s like the end of the world out here,” I mutter.

  The Dome is a war zone, punctuated with overturned vans and skirmishes between fans and security. The emergency lights kick on, their grotesque orange glow creating small safe areas in the darkness.

  The mob has fanned out in all directions, scattering greyfaces and guards as they try to corral and neutralize the rampaging horde, employing every nonlethal trick in their arsenal. It’s the perfect cover, and I switch from “escape the building” mode to “make a hasty retreat,” looking for anything that will get us moving faster.

  Off to the right, down the only side street not clogged with screaming fans, someone scrambles in the direction of a parked motorcycle. Perfect.

  I set Vee down gingerly, her legs a little wobbly but otherwise stable. A brush of her cheek rouses her attention. She already looks clearer than a few minutes ago, her eyes focusing on me with ease. I put one finger to my lips, then I bolt down the sidewalk, closing the gap between me and the shadow.

  Don’t have much time. She’ll be burning up soon.

  As the shadow hurriedly rifles through his pockets, I clamp a hand down on his shoulder, spinning him around. The moonlight hits his face just so, and I snarl. The bright red scratches are new, but otherwise it’s the same face from the Palace, just a little less smug and a lot more surprised.

  “Hello, Your Majesty—” My fist reacts before I’ve even finished, and I crack him across the jaw, the throbbing of my bare knuckles a fair tax to pay. My Brights are out soon after, and I bury them in his gut, crumpling him as the juice tops him off. He hits the asphalt in a well-dressed heap, and I check his pockets quickly, showing the tiniest advancement in my learning curve.

  Keys materialize in my hand, and I punt him in the stomach. Just once, and not in the ribs, because I’m not a sadistic asshole.

  I spin in place, ready to check on Vee, and she’s right there, gearing up for a monster boot into His Majesty’s ribs. I don’t stop her. He obviously did something to deserve those scratches.

  Unbelievable. Scumbag manages to peddle his shit to the only two girls I’ve touched in a long while. Aren’t there any other pushers in this town?

  I smack a sedative patch on his neck before we go. A night in the alley might do his attitude some good.

  Straddling the bike, I let my weight settle on the seat, keys in the ignition, my hand finding the throttle. I remember plenty of nights spent ripping up the streets on Zane’s glorified rocket. We’d all taken turns racing the devil.

  It was a lifetime ago, but hey—just like riding a bike, they say.

  I turn to Vee, and she takes my hand, slipping in front of me, facing me, almost glowing with the heat from the applejack. She hugs me tight, tucking her face against my neck, and locking her arms and legs around me.

  Feeling her body against mine, it takes me a moment to remember how to breathe. But she’s right. If she was behind me and started to pass out, she’d fall. If she faced away from me, she could lean the wrong way and swamp us both. This way, if she starts to go, I’ll know, and I can stop the bike.

  I run my hands along her back, hugging her in return, before flipping up the kickstand with my heel and lighting up the road.

  We fly.

  V

  After that, it’s only wind. And Micah.

  I cling to him, arms about his chest, legs wrapped around his waist. Tendrils of my hair stream over my shoulders, whipping him in the face. I’m afraid to let go long enough to catch them, ribbons on kite strings. The engine under us is a barely muffled roar, and the drug-heat is keeping pace with it, chasing me down narrow streets and narrower alleys. The night air on my bare, burning skin makes me want to howl to the moon. The tattered excuse for a skirt flutters away, a ghostly wisp of velvet swallowed up by the dark.

  “Stay with me, Vee,” he says. “Hold tight. If things start going black, if your blood feels like it’s on fire, if you’re going to let go, tell me and I’ll stop. But otherwise, I need you to hold on tight. Lean with me. I’ve got you.”

  It becomes evident very quickly that Micah knows what he’s doing. Every time he leans into a turn, he takes me with him just to the edge of falling. I can’t hold him any tighter than I already am, and I’m biting my lower lip so hard that I taste blood. Forehead pressed to his neck, I try to concentrate on breathing without screaming. One count in, two counts out. Laundry soap. Two counts in, four counts out. Clean sweat. By the third inhalation, everything that I am has homed in on the scent of him, of sex, of his body responding to mine. Every fear forgotten.

  I blame the applejack when I lick the side of his neck.

  His response is a strained noise of protest that ripples through his chest. When I press my mouth to the space between his ear and his jaw … Well, I hear the groan that time.

  “Take it easy, Vee, I need to concentrate!” He’s shouting, but the words are torn from his mouth and tossed into the road behind us.

  I should stop. That’s the smart thing to do.

  Except we passed up every chance to do the smart thing back at the Dome.

  His eyes on the road, both hands on the grips, he’s mine for the taking. So what if we’re ripping through the dark streets, faster than the speed of light? Who cares if siren wails are chasing us? All of Cyrene could converge upon us at any second.

  So I need to make every second count.

  His cheeks and chin and neck are rough with light stubble. I rub my cheek against it, brush my lips over it. I swear I feel the heat burning through his shirt.

  His shirt. Is in my way.

  I can’t exactly rip it off him this time, but I slide my hands under the fabric, up his back. I dig my fingernails into him when he takes the next corner.

  “Vee—”

  Hearing him use my name, my heart’s the sun, and solar flares erupt through my chest. I’m pressed against Micah, as close as I could possibly get with our clothes still on, but it’s still not close enough.

  “Hurry,” I tell him, except I’m not sure if I’m counting down to the moment I can get his pants off or the second my hummingbird heart will finally explode.

  Finding a straightaway, he opens the throttle to full. Emergency lights flicker on, sporadic bursts of neon hurtling past us on either side as we blast through light and shadow. The grid whines to life all around us. The noose around our necks tightens just a bit.

  And I want to taste his lips once more before we hang.

  M

  I weave us through the obstacle course of downtown, abandoned vehicles dotting the road. With the grid down all over Cyrene, everything phantom-powered has stopped dead, and between them and the cars still running, we’re practically slaloming to keep speed.

  All the while, I feel her skin getting hotter by the minute. She’s burning up, and the applejack’s only partly to blame.

  I want her just as much. Her touch, her presence instantly revises my definition of desirable. Even as she creeps ever closer to boiling up inside, she draws me in. Magnetic and intoxicating. My muscles tense, coiled like a spring as I muster every ounce of focus to keep us on the road.

  Her body pressed tight to mine, ringlets of black hair flowing in the wind, her lips on my neck and hands grasping, fresh memories bubble to the surface. Remembering a certain girl with a shirt made of temptation and promises, the confidence of a goddess, and a body that demanded obedience.

  And then she bites my neck.

  I moan softly in her ear, my resolve weakening by the second. Thoughts of Vee and the girl from the Palace swirl in my head, the coincidences rattling my brain.

  We blast through the streets like a meteor. Almost home. Almost safe. I make some quick calculations: how many doses of the garbage she probably had, how long since the Rivitoc
in shut down her nanotech, how long before the heat peaks and she crashes.

  We’re cutting it close, we’re cutting it really fucking close.

  Finally, the bridge appears in the distance, and I gun it, sure that we’re leaving flames behind us in the road, the melted slag of asphalt bubbling in our wake.

  Vee grabs the back of my head and plants one on me. Hard. It’s passion and terror and attraction and desperation all at once. Her lips are like lava against mine, the air around us almost shimmering with heat. I kiss her back, giving her all of me, sacrificing breath and focus and even our getaway just to share this with her.

  She kisses me, and it feels like good-bye.

  Our lips part, and we both gasp for air. The Arkcell looms before us, and I cut the throttle and kill the engine, letting our momentum carry us down the little access road leading underneath the bridge.

  I just hope we’re not too late.

  V

  Micah manages to get both of us off the bike without dropping it or me or falling himself. I immediately cover his mouth with my own, so his words come through piecemeal.

  “Vee … I’ve …” I bite him again and he stumbles. “Shit …” He tears his lips from mine; it’s like ripping a piece of paper in half. “I’ve got to put you down.”

  My response is something between a snarl and a whimper, but I feel cold concrete against my ass a few seconds later. Then he’s dragging my hands off his neck, his chest, pulling them away from his hair, his shirt, prying my legs apart but only because he’s determined to leave me here … alone … in the dark. He has my face in his hands, his fingers measuring the pulse in the curve of my neck, but there’s nothing left to feel; it’s all one continuous stream of heat.

  “Fuck, just hold on,” Micah says, but he might as well be shouting over the top of the train barreling down on me.

  He vanishes from sight, and I curl up on my side and start to shake. There’s a tiny rock under my cheek, one sharp point doing its damnedest to pierce my skin. I’d turn my head, but then I wouldn’t be able to watch the grid coming back online, district by district. Beyond the bridge, lights climb up the tower buildings one story at a time, like champagne flutes filled to overflowing. I can’t see the top of the Carlisle from here, but I can easily imagine the moment it flares with brilliant blue-white welcome. It’s a dragon uncoiling as I die, pierced by poisoned claws, smothered in ash, hollowed out by the applejack. The sky is hazy with smoke, the world a hookah den, everyone choking on strawberry cough.