Total pages in book: 209
Estimated words: 196141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 981(@200wpm)___ 785(@250wpm)___ 654(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 196141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 981(@200wpm)___ 785(@250wpm)___ 654(@300wpm)
There’s a moment when Elias and Drake chase one another around with snowballs in hand—Elias shouting, “Come and save your boyfriend, Kyle!” and Drake laughing maniacally—that Kyle finds his eyes drifting to the house next door.
He thinks of Kaleb and his new life here. Raya, her departure from the House of Vegasyn—and from Tristan’s side. Nico and his difficult adjustment to being one of their kind now.
It’s times like these that make Kyle nearly forget the reality of the situation they’re all in. How so many citizens in Nowhere are still scared and unsure. Wondering if this is how they’re going to die, spending all the rest of their days in this town, waiting for supplies to run out. And despite all the mayor’s and Chief Rojas’s reassurances, no one truly feels reassured.
All they can do is make the most of their days—and their cold nights—by acting like they’re on a permanent vacation together.
A permanent vacation in the middle of truly Nowhere.
“Oh shit, I forgot about the cookies!” Drake darts back to the house as Elias and Kyle sit in the middle of the road on a mound of snow, watching him through the front window as he flies into the kitchen to salvage his babies. Kyle and Elias turn to each other as the snow gently falls.
“Do you ever feel like …” Kyle second guesses his question, changes his mind. “Never mind.”
“What?” Elias pulls away, brushes snow off the top of Kyle’s head. “Safe space, babe. Something on your mind?”
Kyle glances at the house next door again. “Something feels so different about tonight. I can’t put my finger on it. Like … this little paradise we built … is about to …”
“Fall apart?” suggests Elias too casually, then shrugs. “I hope not. I want this to last forever. Isn’t this amazing? No care in the world for what’s happening outside the shroud. All I want to do is have sex all day long, build covered walkways over the whole town so you guys can go where you want even during the day …”
“The shroud and the cold weather make it pretty overcast most of the time, anyway,” Kyle points out.
“Not overcast enough to prevent a tragic accident, and no, we won’t go there,” he adds with a laugh. “I don’t know what about today is special for you, but I can tell you, every day I spend with you here feels special to me. Perfect.” He gives Kyle a gentle kiss. “A part of me … hopes Cade and Layna … never figure it out.”
Kyle gazes into Elias’s eyes. “Really?”
“Yeah.” He stares off the other way down the street, where in the far distance, the edge of town resides, the place where no one can penetrate to the other side. “I can’t help but worry … what may await us on the other side of that shroud. What might await us out there in the world. What if it’s changed? What if a war has broken out between all matters of supernatural beings? What if the whole human race is already wiped out and there’s just …” He lets out a sigh fringed with anxiety. “… nothing left out there?”
Kyle stares off at the dark, hazy nothingness, too. He doesn’t want to consider that possibility. He wants everything out there to be okay. He wants to believe the world is still there for them—if someday the citizens of Nowhere are allowed to rejoin it.
This can’t be the end of everything.
Drake bursts out of the house. “Cookies!” he declares, lifting them in the air cheerily.
Moments later, they meet up with the others at the bar, which is overly decorated for the holidays courtesy of Cade. Many from around town are also here, making the inside feel cozy and warm when the trio arrive. Drake and Mikey, who have become rather brotherly over the past few months in every way short of a secret handshake, meet by the jukebox and argue about the music. After greeting Leland and his girlfriend Becks at the bar, Elias and Kyle make the rounds to see the familiar faces. Jeremy and Mariah—formerly known as Blood 304—sit in a booth in the back corner, absorbed by something on Jeremy’s laptop, likely the computer game they’ve been bonding over, despite his still being unable to speak. Silas, one of the two teenage boys rescued from Vegasyn, sits at a table with Layna, both of them sharing a basket of nachos and laughing together.
“I’ve been so restless lately,” says Cade when Kyle joins her at the bar. “I keep going to my computer thinking I might chase one more lead digging into my family tree, then am reminded all over again that none of us have internet. You’d think the stupid shroud wouldn’t block all cell and internet service, too. Isn’t keeping us trapped here bad enough? No, no,” she quickly says, lowering her voice, “I’m not trying to work anyone up. I’m just tired of all the side eye my daughter and I get. Isn’t it better to be stuck here and alive than hunted and fed on by murderous vampires?”