“Yeah?” he asked, a note of hope in his voice that practically choked me.
“Yeah. It’s just cake, right?”
“Right. Chocolate. Buttercream frosting. It has a layer of ganache in it.”
I smiled at how he’d perked up.
“Dessert then. After pizza rolls.”
He smiled and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, after pizza rolls.”
He placed the cake on the bedside table.
“What movie do you want to watch?”
“Uh, something fun and exciting.”
“How about The Phone Call? I heard that’s good.”
“Sure. I haven’t seen it. What’s it about?”
“It’s about this guy who gets a phone call from his future self. He has to complete all these tasks to save the free world.”
“Sounds OK,” I said.
He laughed. “It’ll pass the time, huh?”
“Yeah. Seems like it.”
He got up and grabbed the pizza rolls from the microwave before returning with some bottles of water and the remote. He climbed onto the bed next to me and settled in, the pizza rolls on his lap.
“Eat,” he said, turning on the TV.
I took a pizza roll and bit into it. He did the same as he cycled through his catalog. A moment later, the opening credits started, and we officially settled in.
I was certain this was the strangest kidnapping in history. As much as I knew I should hate it, I didn’t.
It was… nice.
I winced,my ankle throbbing again. The movie had ended, and we’d eaten all the pizza rolls, but a few of them hit the TV because we were frustrated and threw food at it. It was almost like old times, with the exception of me being held captive by him.
“I have something for that,” Cole said. “It’ll be better than the pills.”
He crawled off the bed and dug around in his bag for a moment before returning to me with a sugar stick in his hand.
“You want me to get high?” I frowned. “I-I don’t?—”
“This is some new stuff E has been working on. It’s for pain management. He actually has a contract with an alternative pain management center here in the city, so it’s good. I promise.”
I eyed it wearily. “Cole, I-I don’t know.”
“I’ll do it with you,” he said gently. “So you’re not alone.”
I nodded. “OK.”
He settled in next to me on the bed and lit up the stick. I breathed out nervously, watching as he took a deep drag off it before handing it back to me.
“Bottoms up,” I murmured, putting it to my lips.
