in time to watch as, one by one, they popped into puffs of gray smoke that dissipated into the air, as if they had never been there at all.
There was a touch on my shoulder, a gentle one, but still, I jumped and swung blindly at the attacker.
"Liv!" Nick said, jumping back, holding up his hands. "Liv, it's me!"
I fell back onto the patch of grass by the sidewalk and tried to catch my breath. I couldn't speak, I could barely breathe. My heart couldn't get a simple rhythm going, pounding erratically in my chest, and for a moment, I thought the fear alone was going to drop me right there.
Nick looked up and down the street, as if trying to get his bearings. "What the hell just happened?" He glanced down at the ground, where Peach lay on her stomach, and he made a hollow sound and dropped to his knees at her side. Gently, he rolled her over, looking at her bruised, unconscious body.
"What happened?" He looked at me, his eyes bright, almost fevered, as he dialed 911 on the cell phone. His voice shook a bit as he told them that we'd been attacked, and then he flipped the phone shut and tucked it in his pocket. He leaned down over Peach and pulled her into his arms, and she groaned as her eyes fluttered.
"Nicky?" she said.
"Yeah, baby." His voice got stronger, for her, and he'd even managed to inject his usual undertone of easy, good humor. "How ya feeling?"
"Ow," she said. "I'm feeling ow."
"I know." He ran his hand over the unbruised side of her face. "There are people coming to help. You just relax, okay?"
"What happened?"
A flash of disturbance ran through his expression, and he looked to me, a question on his face.
"You don't remember?" I asked quietly.
He shook his head, just a bit, just enough to tell me he remembered nothing without alarming Peach.
"Me, either," I lied. Seemed the simplest of all my choices.
He smiled down at Peach. "You're okay, and everything's going to be just fine."
He didn't remember. Probably, neither would Peach. It was only then that I thought to glance up and down the street - a street on which you couldn't open your refrigerator at midnight without Ginny Boyle or Frances Huddy commenting on it the next day - and no one had come out of their houses. I could see the flickering lights from televisions playing on some windows; in front of others were shadows of people passing from one room into the other. My neighbors were home, but no one seemed to have heard or seen or noticed a thing.
I turned my head the other way, toward the spot where Millie had been; there was no sign of her. I remembered her cold laugh, and the joy in her voice when she'd said, I'm not doing anything.
It had been a lie, of course; she'd done some of it. But not all.
It was him, the son of a bitch. He'd loaned her power, and when she'd pooped out, he'd tried to finish the job, until I got in the way. To kill Peach, he would have had to go through me, and he didn't want me dead.
Yet.
People didn't start to come out of their houses until the ambulance got there, and then all hell broke loose. A crowd formed around us, everyone asking what had happened, and none of us could say. Well, I could, but I didn't; I feigned amnesia to fit in with Peach and Nick, who genuinely didn't seem to remember. The EMTs treated Peach and put her in the ambulance, and Nick went with her. Ginny Boyle told me I looked like hell, and I should go to the hospital with them, but I declined. I had a tender spot on my shoulder, and my lip had split a bit on the lower left side, but aside from that, I was okay.
Well, physically, I was okay. Emotionally, I was a mess. Furious, helpless, terrified. Once the furor on the street died down, and I'd refused the many offers of hot tea, baked goods, and guest rooms in case I didn't want to go home alone, I went back into my house. I walked upstairs to my bedroom, where I found Gibson in his box, snuggled up with the little crane, who perched on Gibson's back, either dead or asleep. I put my finger under the crane's little paper feet, and it stirred, then moved gently onto