The Fire and the Sky (Book 3 of the... - Chapter 37: Chapter 37

Grant, May thought. Of course. Thank goodness.
While the host took the call—chair turned and voice nothing more than a low whisper—May stared up at Jeremy, hoping to get his attention. He ignored her with expert conviction.
"What's happening?" May hissed.
"Shh. Just wait."
May bristled. She was ready to tell him off for shushing her, but the tell-tale snap of the flip phone closing cut her off. Sighing, the host whirled his chair around and gave Jeremy a pointed and disgruntled look.
"You're one lucky son of a bitch, you know that?" he said, rising from behind the desk and nodding to the man by the safe. "Could you grab the key for unit four, Jethro? Thanks."
Without another word, the host breezed past May and Jeremy and into the hall. The pair exchanged a curious glance before following. They tramped after him up the staircase and pushed through a set of swinging doors into a bustling kitchen. The smell of fried food was as thick as a wall, and May slogged through it while simultaneously dodging the rogue shoulders and elbows of line cooks too busy to notice they were behind them.
The host didn't acknowledge either of them until they reached yet another set of swinging doors—these ones opening to the bar's dining floor. Behind them, May could hear peals of laughter and the crack of pool balls. The three of them stopped, and the host handed Jeremy back his new burner phone.
"Meet Jethro at the bar to collect your keys, then head through the door just past the washrooms. Follow the stairs to the next floor. Unit four is yours until three."
"Three what?" May asked.
The host gave her a tired look. "Three in the morning."
"What's happening at three in the morning?"
"That's when your party will be here to pick you up. Just leave the keys on the table when you go."
Jeremy gave the host another cavalier salute. "A pleasure working with you, as always."
The host rolled his eyes. "Just remember: this makes us even."
"Noted."
The pair pushed through the doors and out into the crowd. Sure enough, May could see the man from the safe already waiting for them, leaning back on the bar and chatting with the same bartender from earlier. May assumed he must have come up from the same secret entrance they had used to access the speakeasy in the first place. When he caught sight of them, he straightened up, tossing the keys to Jeremy when they were close enough. Then he went right back to his conversation.
Together, May and Jeremy followed the host's instructions, slipping through the door by the washrooms and following the stairs upward. At the next landing they found themselves spit out into a hallway that bisected the floor straight down the middle. Doors dotted the walls on either side in evenly spaced intervals.
"What is this?" May wondered aloud.
"Rooms for rent," Jeremy replied. "Come on."
They found a door marked with a hand painted black number 4. May crept in behind Jeremy, uncertain of what she might find. Inside, a double bed took up most of the floor plan's real estate. There was a small threadbare couch beneath a window that faced a brick wall across the alley, and a round table with a pair of spindly chairs tucked in the corner. Jeremy poked his head into the narrow door to the immediate right of the entrance and flicked on a light that filled the small space with an insect-like buzzing.
"Bathroom," he announced. In the moment before he turned the light back off, May caught a glimpse of faded linoleum bathed in buttery yellow light.
She knew she had no right to be choosy, especially given the circumstances, but the entire set-up made her squirm with discomfort. She didn't want to imagine what happened in rooms for rent above a dingy bar. Regardless, she wandered in and gingerly took a seat at the edge of the bed—neatly made despite its shabby coverings.
"What now?" she asked, keeping her hands and feet tucked in close. She didn't want to take up more space in this depressing room than absolutely necessary. "Are we really just supposed to wait?"
"Yep." Jeremy stepped on the heels of his boots and kicked them unceremoniously aside. "Don't knock it—this is one of the safest places we could be right now."
"I'm not knocking it. I just don't understand why we have to wait. Why can't the others just come and get us now?"
Jeremy shot her a withering glare. "We just escaped from a prison lockdown. You blew up a cop car. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't mind letting some of that heat die down a bit before we go back to traipsing around."
May shrank back. Her hand clutched the star cannon self-consciously.
"We got away, didn't we?" she grumbled.
He ignored her. "Make yourself comfortable—we've got a lot of time to kill. I'm going to shower this blood off."
Jeremy didn't look at her, he just turned and disappeared into the washroom.
And then May was alone, and the weight of the silence that came with it was too immense to measure.
It was a smell that coaxed May from her dreamless sleep. She didn't remember falling asleep—didn't even remember lying back on the bed of questionable purpose—and when realized she had, her entire body jolted with surprise. She could hear Jeremy murmuring softly at the door, his voice too low for her to make out what he was saying or too whom. May's muscles tensed. She lay perfectly still, wondering if they were going to have to make yet another run for it.
I wonder if this is my life now, she thought as her fingers gripped the blanket beneath her. Always running away from some new threat. Then it dawned on her that this must have been what Em's life had been like before, back when she was Audrey.
How exhausting. No wonder Em was so desperate to leave that life behind.
There was a click of the door closing. May sat up just as Jeremy padded back into the room wearing only his jeans and a pair of socks.
I guess this is his whole life too.
She was instantly drawn to the puckered scar that ran up the middle of his chest—a far angrier version of what hers could have been, and a horrifying remind of how truly vicious the Loyals could be. Her stomach clenched at the sight of it, so she pulled her gaze away. Her eyes roamed, landing first on the takeout container in one of his hands—the source of the savory aroma that had awoken her in the first place—then to a wad of clothing clutched in his other fist, and finally to his left forearm. There, a tattoo of a lit match burned, its end charred and withered by a ball of orange and yellow flame that licked up his flesh right up to his bicep. It reminded her of what Welkin had told her about Jeremy being like flame; a wildfire of a man, burning furious and bright.
"Checking me out?" he asked, intruding on the quiet of her thoughts. He looked down at her, his expression impassive. She would have wondered if he was serious if she didn't know better. The question reminded her of Blake, the handsome assistant from the Art Collector's manor, and a half-smile tugged at her lips.
"You're not my type."
"Tell me about it," he said without inflection. He dropped the takeout container on the table. It landed with an oddly satisfying plop, the lid popping open as it did. "Here, feed."
May slid from the bed and inspected the container. Inside, a mountain of crispy fries were wedged between two gooey burgers. It wasn't the kind of meal she would have chosen for herself, but the savage rumbling in her stomach told her it didn't matter. She plucked some fries from the pile and crammed them in her mouth.
"Where did this come from?" she asked once her mouth was empty.
"The bar kitchen. I was starving, so I called down for it. I would have asked what you wanted but you were snoring pretty loud. I didn't want to interrupt."
"I was not!"
He made a face at her—a flash of playfulness that reminded her of Kai and the way he would pester her when they were kids. But it was gone just as quickly as it came, and he shifted his attention to what turned out to be a t-shirt balled up in his hand. He shook it out and eyed it critically before pulling it over his head. On the front was a faded logo for a music festival that would have happened when May was 12. The shirt was about two sizes too big, and its loose fabric hung off of Jeremy's lanky frame in a way that made him look like a child wearing his father's clothes—had his father not been a ruthless sociopath, of course.
"Did that come from the kitchen too?" May pointed a fry at the shirt. Jeremy plucked at the collar and looked down at it.
"Based on the way it smells, I'm guessing it came from the lost and found. But that brings up a shitload of other questions I don't think I want the answers to, so I'm trying not to think about it."
May tried to suppress a smile and failed. She pulled out one of the chairs and sat down, reaching into the box for her burger as she did so. Jeremy hooked his foot on the leg of the other chair, tugged it out, and dropped down too. He picked up his burger and held it up in front of her.
After a beat, May raised a quizzical eyebrow.
"What?"
"It's a toast."
"A toast... to what, exactly?"
"To breaking out of prison. To vigilante justice." He shrugged. "To whatever. Seriously, in this business you've gotta take what you can get."
Without thinking, May laughed. It surprised them both.
"In that case—"she lifted her burger and tapped it to his "—here's to blowing up a cop car."
Jeremy grinned, a genuine and charming transformation to his usually dour expression.
"Hell yeah."