Chapter 24 Ghosts

“You didn’t like that man.”

Alex walks so quick it's almost hard to keep up with him. Thankfully, once we were away from the others and walking down one of the streets, he let my wrist go otherwise I’d probably be dragged along behind him. There is still a tenseness to him that makes him alert, his eyes dart from the horizon at any small sound.

“Alex,” I reach a hand out and touch his arm. That seems to work. He stops and looks down at me, giving me all of his attention.

“He is dangerous.”

“But who isn’t around here?”

Alex suddenly steps very near me, placing his hands on my hips like he had earlier when he surprise tackled me.


“He doesn’t like humans.”

It takes a second before I can think clearly enough to realize what he means. “You mean people like me who don’t have powers.”

“Yes. He thinks they're weak.”

There is something to Alex’s face that tells me there's more than he’s saying. “But I'm sure he's not the only one who thinks that way.” In a lower voice, I add, “I mean, you know where I'm from.”

Alex doesn’t move. “He is a Ghost.”

That throws me. I don’t know what that's supposed to mean.

He probably catches my utter confusion. “They are people who are high rank, but work alone. Southlanders don’t know they exist.”


I roll my shoulders instinctively trying to shove off the chill threatening to roll down my spine. It doesn’t make any sense to me. How could the Southlanders not know about that guy? He looks like he’d stand out like a sore thumb. “How?”

But Alex shakes his head. “Not here.”



At the apartment building, he pulls me inside and then into one of the abandoned apartments on the bottom floor before he stops and looks at me again. My back is to the wall and he stands in front of me with that look of mature concern. It feels weird to be trapped like this in a very abandoned room with a shirtless Alex. His skin still holds some of the heat from the sun and with as near as he stands to me I can feel it bouncing onto my own cheeks.


“Your cheeks are red,” he says as he brushes them with his fingertips. “And hot. This happens a lot?”

“It’s called ‘embarrassment.’ It might happen less if you had a shirt on and didn’t do things like that,” I say as I take his hand and move it away from my face. He chuckles again and I do my best to completely ignore it. “You were talking about the Ghosts. How do you know about it when no one else does?”

Alex becomes serious again. “They know of them, but most think it is a story. I know because I have seen him.”

“Aaron?”

“Yes. With Brandon. They once visited my tribe together.”


My body is frozen, even my heart feels like its slowed down with this surprising new information. “To do what?”

Alex stands back and crosses his arms. I can see him thinking about his answer. “Brandon is our link to the Southlanders. We helped protect the border.”

“Border? What border?” The only one I can think of right away is the Neutral border.

“The Lost Lands.”

A picture comes into my head and right away I remember where I am. We're closer to the other border. The Lost Territory where the worst of the worst live. They're different from the Wildlanders because the Lost Territory was lost even before the time of the labs.

They say Lost Landers are more animal than human. They hunt to live, eating animals and each other if they have to. Supposedly they roam the land in real tribes, attacking each other constantly. That’s all that’s known about them.

It sheds a new light on Alex. He helped protect the border from truly wild Lost Landers, and he’s hardly older than me. Some part of me feels horrible for him having to grow up fast enough to protect his home from people like that. And then I realize that I watched him sparring for fun where the ultimate goal were “kill taps.” He's hardly older than me, but I still get the feeling he's packed more into his life than I probably would have even if I were 30.

Maybe there’s something to my expression. Alex steps forward, his long arms enfolding me like I'm the one who needs the hug. I wrap my arms around him instinctively. His skin against my cheek is still hot like we're still standing in the sun.


“It’s getting late,” he says before he pulls away.

He’s right. I still have dinner to prepare. We step into the hall ready to go our separate ways. I don’t ask him up as I'm needing some time with my thoughts before Henri gets home.

And Alex doesn’t ask. We quietly say good bye, and then I turn away to head up the stairs. Before I get far though, Alex smacks me with an open hand on my behind. It comes out of nowhere and when I turn around, he's grinning hugely. He points to his cheeks and I lift my hands to my own which’re hot enough to cook dinner.

I'm completely mortified. Not very appropriate at all.


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