Plague Read Free

foot on rug.
    “I know you’re there, Bug,” Diana said calmly, not looking back. Not giving the little creep the satisfaction. “What do you think Caine would do to you if I told him you were spying on me in my underwear?”
    No answer from Bug.
    “Aren’t you a little young to be a pervert?”
    “Caine won’t kill me,” a disembodied voice said. “He needs me.”
    Diana crossed to the California king–sized bed. She slipped on the robe she’d chosen from among the many in the closet. They belonged to the woman whose bedroom this had been. A famous actress with very expensive taste who was only one size bigger than Diana.
    And her shoes fit almost perfectly. Close to seventy pairs of designer shoes. Diana slipped her feet into a pair of fleece-lined slippers.
    “All I have to do to get rid of you, Bug, is to tell Caine your powers are increasing. I’ll tell him you’re becoming a four bar. How do you think he’ll react to having a four bar sharing this island with him?”
    Bug faded slowly into view. He was a snotty little brat of a kid. He’d just turned ten.
    For a moment Diana felt something like compassion for him: Bug was a damaged, messed-up little creep. Like all of them, he was scared and lonely and maybe even haunted by some of the things he’d done.
    Or not. Bug had never shown any evidence of a conscience.
    “If you want to see naked girls, Bug, why don’t you creep up on Penny?”
    “She’s not pretty,” Bug said. “Her legs are all . . .” He twisted his fingers around to demonstrate. “And she smells bad.”
    Penny was eating better, like Diana. But she was getting worse. She had fallen from one hundred feet onto water and rocks. Caine had levitated her back up the cliff. But her legs were broken in a dozen places.
    Diana had done what she could to set the breaks, made splints out of duct tape and boards, but Penny was in constant agony. She would never walk again. Her legs would never heal.
    She lived now in one of the bathrooms so that she could drag herself to the toilet when she needed to. Diana brought her food twice a day. Books. A TV with a DVD player.
    There was still electricity in the house on San Francisco de Sales Island. The generator supplied a weak and faltering current. When Sanjit had lived here, he’d been worried that fuel for the generator was running out. But Caine could do things Sanjit couldn’t. Like levitate barrels of fuel from the wrecked yacht rusting at the bottom of the cliff.
    Life here was very good for Diana and Caine and Bug. But life would never be good for Penny. Her power—the ability to make others see terrifying visions of monsters and flesh-eating insects and death—was of no help to her now.
    “She scares you, doesn’t she, Bug?” Diana asked. She laughed. “You tried, didn’t you? You snuck in on her and she caught you.”
    She saw the answer on Bug’s face. The shadow of a terrifying memory.
    “Best not to make Penny mad,” she said. She pulled on slacks. Then she patted Bug on his freckled cheek. “Best not to make me mad, either, Bug. I can’t make you see monsters. But if I catch you spying on me again, I’ll tell Caine it’s either me or you. And you know who he’ll choose.”
    Diana left the room.
    She’d resolved to be a better person. And she would be. Unless Bug kept bothering her.
    The three Jennifers. That’s what they called themselves. Jennifer B was a redhead, Jennifer H was blond, and Jennifer L had her hair in black dreadlocks. They hadn’t even known one another before the FAYZ.
    Jennifer B had been a Coates kid. Jennifer H was home-schooled. Jennifer L was the only one who’d attended the regular school.
    They were twelve, twelve, and thirteen, respectively. And for the last couple of months they had shared a house on a cul-de-sac away from the center of town.
    It was a good choice: the big fire had come nowhere near the development.
    Now, though, it seemed like a bad choice. The so-called hospital was