Page 78 of Petrify

“I’m able to get almost anywhere in the house.”

“How?”

“These are the old servants’ passages, reopened when… when I was locked inside. When they did not want me out in the east wing anymore.” His throat bobs with a swallow. “This mask—I found it here in the attic. Years ago. I thought…” He trails off.

I lift my hand again to lay it on his cheek.

He flinches, barely noticeable, except for the way his lashes twitch.

Regret blooms in my chest. But he doesn’t stop me. The plaster is smooth to the touch, almost as warm as his skin, glowing silver in the moonlight. The soft ridge of a brow, the bow of the lips, the contour of the mask’s cheekbones. A full-faced venetian mask without any filigree or decoration. Too serene and pleasant for the man beneath.

“I thought maybe if I pretended I wasn’t Arnie, they wouldn’t hate me so much.”

I remember the image of him at eleven in that article, taken just weeks before he “died.”

“Can I…” I smooth a finger over his plaster cheek. “Can I see you?”

The muscles in his jaw jump.

“Promise me you’ll never leave.” His warm hand cradles half of my face, the thumb skating over my cheek bone. A possessive touch. “Promise me you’ll never run.”

“Okay.”

He told me that if I knew his face, I’d hate him. And lying on this rug with his arms around me, with the evidence of his desire seeping down my thigh, I can’t imagine that that would ever be true.

But he hesitates. “No. Not yet.”

He brings my spent body to the bed after undressing me for the night, wrapping me in sheets that smell so completely like him. I think he’ll touch me again, take me, but he only curls up next to me like some kind of big, lethal cat guarding the bed, and I’m nodding off to the sound of his breathing, intoxicated by his scent. His arm is wound around my waist, his body pressed against mine. Like even his subconscious can’t help but keep me close.

At some early hour I’m awake. Next to me, an arm propped under his head as he lay on his back, he stares at the ceiling. I can’t tell if his eyes are open, or if he’s found a moment to sleep, too. The midnight sky outside is too dark. At some point he turned on the lamp on the opposite side of the room, the low yellow light still too dim to make many of his features distinguishable this far away.

I sit up, goosebumps immediately erupting across my exposed skin. He’s still clothed. Maybe he knew I’d stay close if I was bare and freezing.

He doesn’t move, save for the soft breaths expanding his ribs. In, then out.

I could easily lift his mask now. See at the man underneath. Be the first to see Bastien’s face in years. And he wouldn’t know, would he? I can be gentle enough and he’ll never know I dared to peek again. I almost do it—I almost reach for the white plaster again. My heart aches to know his face. The temptation is too great.

But it is not the same as a secret readily offered.

Putting space between us is the only way to keep from giving in. I slide out of his bed, slowly, quietly. He doesn’t stir.

There’s a single bookcase near the window, overflowing with books that are worn from the passage of time, some nearly falling apart. More stacks of books on the floor. Most of them are recognizable classics, their titles barely legible in the dim lamplight, with tattered spines and bent covers. Another stack of notebooks, a few pens here and there, a pair of boots tucked halfway under the bed. Cobwebs in the corners, the husk of a moth on the windowsill.

In the shadowed dark, I make out an old upright against the far wall. There are papers scattered on top, a few candles melted down, an old kerosene lamp, a picture frame. The fallboard is lifted, exposing the cracked keys, and I know without a doubt the instrument isn’t tuned.

I remember my first night here, music echoing through the house. It sounded so close to my room as Ms. Byrne showed me around. That haunted melody, I realize—the same as the music Baz has been leaving for me. The piece he’s been writing for me.

I near the upright, careful to walk on the tips of my toes. Even up close, I can’t make out much of the written lines, thenotations in the margins. I can’t see whose picture is framed. But a glint of metal catches my eye, gold catching the dim light from the floor lamp.

The moment my fingers touch the chain I recognize the necklace.

It’s unmistakable; I’ve been wearing it since Jason gave it to me—until it had disappeared and wound up here.

And when I look back at Baz on the bed, his eyes are open, watching my every move from across the dark room. His arm is still tucked behind his head, the other resting on his stomach. I swear his eyes glint with hunger.

He stole my necklace. And he doesn’t look the slightest bit sorry.

“Trying to sneak away?” His voice is raspy with sleep.