“What is it?” I ask, muscles tensed to attack or defend. She takes a step past me and I grab her shoulder, holding her back, not understanding.

“It’s amazing,” she says, kicking through the snow toward the wall of the structure encasing the stairwell. She presses her fingers gingerly to the charcoal-stained bricks.

Parts of the drawing have been blasted clean by the wind but much of it is still there on the section sheltered from the worst weather.

“Who did this?” she asks, her voice soft as a whisper.

I stare at my feet, cheeks burning, unable to take credit. But she knows—just from seeing me squirm she figures it out.

“I had no idea,” she says, mesmerized, her eyes taking in the flow of lines.

I shrug. “It’s nothing. Really.”

She turns back to me. “No, it’s good, Annah. Really good. I could never do anything like this.”

I blush harder. “I just …” I shrug again, trying to figure out how to explain the night on the roof after the infected woman jumped and I found her powders and stains. How something welled in me like a scream that dulled with the color and movement.

“I guess I never really knew I could do it either,” I finally say, just to fill the silence. “I never took the time before.”

She presses her hand against the wall. “It’s beautiful,” she says, staring back at me.

It takes everything I have not to duck my head. Instead I smile and accept the compliment: “Thank you.”

Chapter XXXII

That night I pull the covers over my head and try to will away the darkness. I’m tangled in nightmares when some part of me feels the mattress sag, feels a body slipping under the blankets.

The Recruiter on the platform immediately rears in my mind and I’m about to lash out when the bright heat of Catcher’s body pushes up against my back, his arms wrapping around my waist and his face pressing the nape of my neck.

Before I can say anything, before I can even utter his name, his lips move against my skin. “I can’t do it, Annah, I can’t,” he murmurs, his breath whispering over the tiny hairs along my spine.

“Catcher, what’s going on?” I try not to let fear creep into my voice as I turn to face him, but he holds me in place, wrapped around me. He feels so hot, and I can’t tell whether it’s the natural heat of him or if there’s something else causing it.

He weaves his fingers through mine, holding them so tight it’s like he’d be lost if he let go. “I can’t save them,” he finally says.

“Catcher—” I start to respond, but his body begins to tremble and his voice cracks.