ghosts are walking tonight,” DJ muttered. “Where have you been? All this time... Damn, Robbie—”
“It doesn’t matter now. Time is what we don’t have. People are dying, and we have to stop it.”
“Oh, I’m going to stop it. I’m going to stop you.”
Suddenly DJ lunged and grabbed Barrie, hauling her up off the floor. His arm was hooked around her neck, and she could feel that incredible vampire strength; she was completely immobilized and knew he could crush her throat in an instant.
Mick/Robbie stood completely still, but in the wavering light of the candles she could read terror on his strange, beautiful face. “Let her go,” he said slowly and carefully. “She’s got nothing to do with this.”
DJ’s grip tightened on Barrie’s throat. “But you’re the one who brought her into it. What were you looking for, a cover story?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Mick said. He looked at Barrie’s face, and she could feel him willing her to stay still.
“I know you killed Johnny,” the actor lashed out. “Was Mayo going to spill it after all this time? Maybe some publicity scheme he was cooking up for the remake?”
Barrie felt the rage in him, vibrating through the arms that held her captive, and she felt light-headed. It can’t be.
Mick shook his head. “Now you’re saying I killed Johnny, Mayo—and Branson? Come on, Deej, why? Saul—anyone would want him dead, and you know I’m not grieving for Travis. But Johnny? You think I could kill Johnny?”
DJ stared across the circle at him, and the actor’s face looked like a Greek sculpture of Dionysus, and no older than when the two boys had been in the movie. “I know you did, pal.”
Barrie’s heart dropped to her shoes. He absolutely meant it; she could feel it in his body against hers.
DJ looked around them at the set, the scene of the movie. “You think I didn’t know? I was fucked up to the moon, but you think I couldn’t tell you from Johnny?”
His black eyes bored into Mick’s golden ones. “Oh, I knew. I even understood. Hell, we all wanted to kill Johnny at some point. You just got to it first.” He laughed, a hollow sound. “Those last scenes, they kept talking about camera angles and reflections, and yeah, I could barely stand, but I knew. You were shifting your little heart out those last two days. Playing yourself and Johnny. I don’t know how you kept it straight.”
Mick closed his eyes briefly. “I was playing him. I didn’t kill him.”
Barrie swallowed through the choke hold and looked at Mick, and she saw a teenager. A heartbreakingly open, gorgeous, vulnerable teenager.
“They told me if I didn’t the movie was dead,” Mick went on.
“So, you did it for all of us,” DJ said, in a voice so mocking it cut Barrie to the core.
“I did what I was told,” Mick—or Robbie—said softly. “Didn’t we all?”
For a moment DJ was silent, with Mick’s words hanging in the air between them. And Barrie, tight in his grip, could feel him thinking, weighing what Mick had said.
“No,” DJ said savagely. “You lie. If you hadn’t killed him, you wouldn’t have left.” His voice hitched. “You left me alone. You, Johnny...you left me alone with all of them.”
Mick took a careful step forward, and DJ’s grip instantly tightened on Barrie’s throat. Mick stopped in his tracks. “I’m so sorry for that, Deej. I had to get out. I wasn’t thinking about anything but getting out, getting away.” He spread his hands. “What chance did we have? Three kids against the whole machine?”
There was silence in the cold and candlelit throne room, and then Barrie felt DJ shaking his head.
“You’re good. You’re very good. But you’re lying.”
“I think so, too,” another voice said, cutting through the darkness, young, clear, male. DJ’s grip loosened on Barrie, and she turned toward the sound. And out of the shadows appeared Johnny Love, as pale skinned and golden as when he had manifested at the séance. Only this time he had a gun. Again Barrie had to fight to keep from gasping aloud.
Mick and DJ stared at Johnny, and for the moment reality rippled; they were impossibly but unmistakably in the movie now, the three actors reunited.
“Johnny?” DJ whispered.
“No,” Mick said. “Not Johnny.” He stepped forward carefully. “You’re Tiger’s friend, aren’t you?” he asked the specter. “Phoenix.” Barrie was shocked to realize that he was right. When she focused on the image of Johnny, she could see the telltale