I pick at the edge of the fluffy white rug by my knees.
“Thank you,” Flynn murmurs.
“You’re not welcome.”
He laughs.
Dammit Hazel, don’t make the serial killer laugh.
I run my tongue around my mouth and force a full breath into my lungs. “I don’t know how to do this,” I admit.
“Never partaken in small talk before?”
“Small talk with a murderer? No, can’t say I have.” The words leave my mouth before I can think better of them, and my eyeswiden as they hit the air. In my head, Flynn’s hand circles my throat, shadowed eyes glaring down at me.
In reality, his lips twitch in amusement.
Who’d have thought serial killers would be so fucking friendly?
“Fair enough,” Flynn says. “How about I start? Favorite TV show?”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Grey’s Anatomy.”
“A tad morbid, no?”
“Says the murderer.”
He laughs again, the tendons in his neck standing in harsh relief as he tips his head back. I’m busy trying to figure out how someone so dangerous can be so beautiful when Flynn quirks a brow. “You know small talk is generally reciprocated.”
I sigh. “What’s your favorite TV show, Flynn?”
“Dexter.”
My fingers stop fiddling with the rug. “Is that your way of telling me you’re really one of the good guys because you only kill bad people?”
Flynn turns somber, all traces of humor vanishing in an instant. “Dexter isn’t a good guy, Hazel.”
I don’t know what to make of that but apparently my body has relaxed enough for my stomach to rumble.
Flynn frowns. “You’re hungry.”
“Yeah, well, a serial killer broke into my house, so I missed dinner.”
“It’s after midnight.”
I shrug and go back to twisting the rug tassels between my thumb and finger. “I can’t always eat when I get home from work,” I admit.
“Why not?”
Another shrug. “I don’t know. My job’s stressful. Good but stressful. My gran used to say my brain had too many thoughtsto be hungry.” I don’t know why I told him that and I wince as my stomach growls once again.
“You need to eat.”
“Okay,” I drag the word out, not quite sure what he wants me to do with that statement. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have a weapon on him but I’m working on the wholedon’t move till the guy keeping you hostage in your own bedroom tells you tophilosophy.
I’ve talked enough panicked people through sticky situations to know that 99% of the time, doing what you’re told is your best shot at getting out alive. That and not having your music so loud you miss the escaped prisoner alarm but hey, nobody’s perfect.
“Right.” Flynn dusts his hands off on his matching gray pants and leaps up. He opens my bedroom door and steps back, flourishing his hand. “Ladies first.”
