Chapters (52)
- Copyright
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Acknowledgments
- Read More from the Market of Monsters Series
- More Books from HMH Teen
- About the Author
- Connect with HMH on Social Media
People screamed, ducking out of the way, but they were too tightly packed, and the bike smashed into them and plowed a path through their midst. Voices rose high in panic, and blood coated the sidewalk.
The blood seemed to snap some of them out of their mob mentality, and they backed away, then sprinted off in various directions in panic. But it made others scream louder, eyes wide and unseeing, full of violence and rage that had nothing to do with rationality and everything to do with a hunger to hurt someone that was just as strong as Kovit’s.
Nita didn’t stick around to see what the swarm did next. The second after the bike hit, she raced away, feet pounding on the pavement, across the bridge and into the city proper, hoping Kovit had eluded his pursuers and terrified by the knowledge that even if he had, there’d always be more.
Thirty-Four
SHE COULDN’T GO back to the Airbnb because Fabricio knew about it, ditto with the room in the conference hotel. Nita had been using Fabricio’s money to buy things while he was their captive, but now that he’d escaped, she didn’t want him able to track her, so she used her own stash of money—most of it stolen from that diplomat she’d murdered yesterday—to pay for a hotel room.
She texted Kovit the address, but he didn’t respond. She tried not to let the fear creep in, but it was hard. She checked the news, but his name was still on the list, and none of the local channels or social media mentioned his death. Yet.
She took a deep breath and tried to be practical. He would survive or he wouldn’t, and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it either way right now. She needed to focus on the things she could do.
She doubled back to stop by the conference hotel to pick up the blood wine and the diplomat’s laptop she’d been using. Information from a hard drive wasn’t much use if she didn’t have a device to read it.
The new hotel was a cheaper one, just off Florida Street. When Nita checked in, the bored hotel clerk gave her two cards and then went back to scrolling through his phone at the reception desk.
Waiting for the elevator, two tourists, women in their late teens or early twenties, were whispering excitedly to each other.
“Did you hear there’s a zannie in town? He was spotted by the port!”
“I know! Do you think they’ve killed him yet?”
“I dunno. I hope not. I really want a chance to see him first. Gosh, I wonder if there’s a hashtag tracking him? Think of how many followers I’d get if I could get a video of him being killed!”