Against the Darkness by Kendare Blake

Author:Kendare Blake [Blake, Kendare]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Disney Hyperion
Published: 2024-04-09T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Leader of the Pack

The party at Jake’s was wild and uncomfortable: The lacrosse players were wild, and the Scoobies were uncomfortable. Frankie, sitting on the sofa beside Grimloch and Sigmund, ducked a thrown Wiffle ball, which Hailey caught and lobbed back in between sips of her cola.

“Are they always like this?” Hailey asked Sam as Zach Connors and Perry Reilly tackled each other down the hallway.

“No?” Sam grabbed a wobbling bowl of snack mix before it could fall to the floor with the rest of the bowls that were already down there. “But they’ve never been invited to a party at Cap’s house before.”

“Well, they’re going to trash the place.” Frankie twisted around. “Jake!”

“Hey, Scoobies.” He perched on the back of the couch, his red-gold hair wild and his eyes bright. “Having a good time?”

“Super,” Hailey said, deadpan.

“You think you might settle things down?” Frankie asked.

“Huh?” Jake asked. Someone had turned on some music, and it blasted through the house. Another errant Wiffle ball winged through the air, and Sigmund jerked out of the way. It struck Grimloch cleanly in the side of the head.

“I said!” Frankie shouted. “Do you think—!”

Jake made a cutting motion toward his neck, and someone turned the music down.

Frankie took a breath. “Do you think you might ask them to settle down? This place is getting wrecked.”

“Yeah,” he said, but he didn’t seem too concerned about it. “Definitely. But we’ll be moving the party outside pretty soon, anyway.” He gestured to the windows, which had begun to darken. “Moonlight football.” And then Jake was gone again, taking Sam with him to attack more of the leaning tower of pizza.

“Francesca,” Grimloch said, and stood. “We need to talk.” He held out his hand.

“Okay,” she said, taking it. He tugged her up off the couch a little too quickly. She barely had time to shrug to Hailey, who traded an awkward glance with Sigmund and went back to sipping her cola.

At the Rosenberg house, Oz and Spike reclined comfortably in the living room while Willow brought out the Parcheesi box and set it on the coffee table. “Parcheesi?” she asked, and both men leaned forward.

“Sounds good to me,” said Spike, and she lifted the lid.

Of course, there was no Parcheesi inside the box. There was only a very old bottle of scotch. Oz set out three short, crystal tumblers and Willow poured, while the vampire rooted around among the rest of the detritus of time gone by. When he came up with a baggie of something, he raised his eyebrows and Willow snatched it.

“That’s medicinal. And it’s for spellwork.” She smiled as she tucked it into her belt. “It’s for medicinal spellwork.”

“So,” Spike said as they settled back with their drinks. “It’s nice to gather around for a night. With none of the kiddies scampering underfoot.”

“Mm-hmm,” murmured Willow.

“No immediately impending apocalypse,” the vampire went on. “No running out to save the world.”

Oz nodded.

“The kids probably think we’re hovering over our phones or trying to stop ourselves from driving by the house to spy,” Willow said.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.