Chapter 108

Jo and Callum walked up the middle of the street toward me, their faces pale even behind my tinted sunglasses. I'd been riding in circles around the neighborhood, trying not to kill anything, until I wound up at my house again.

"I've been texting you for hours. Where have you been?" Jo's voice was gentle, not scolding. I could tell from the look in her eyes she knew something was wrong, more wrong than it already was.

Callum shrugged off the backpack he carried. His eyebrows knit together while he tried to read my face, so I attempted to make my expression as blank as possible. I'd already wasted enough precious time lost in my own thoughts to explain Darby and her bites to them.

"Here's the lilac petals wrapped in wax paper like you asked. We saved some of them and the hawthorn leaves to put around your house."

"And your house?" I asked, taking the bag from him.

"Already done," Jo said.

"And the lilacs, did you swallow - ?"

When they both nodded, I stepped back.