Page 49 of Hush, Little Baby

“Charlie.” His voice is deep and rumbling, the same tone he used before when telling me to drink water and eat grapes and tilt my head back while he washed my hair. The tone that somehow slips under my defenses because it doesn’t sound like anger, even when it gives me no choice.

One second, I am sitting upright, and the next, I am curled sideways on the sofa with my head in his lap, no force needed.

Nikolaus’s lap is warm.

His body gives off heat like a furnace, and my cheek is against the soft sleep pants covering one of his thick thighs, which is somehow worse than if I had put my head on his bare skin, because now I am aware of the fabric and the body underneath it and the way he has one hand hovering above my head, waiting.

“May I touch your hair?” he asks.

I almost laugh.

The question is absurd after everything. Because he kidnapped me and had guards outside the door and won’t let me leave, but is seeking consent to touch my hair.

I don’t understand the rules.

I don’t understand any of the rules.

But my scalp still remembers his fingers from the bath. The nice pressure, the careful untangling, and the way my whole nervous system had betrayed me and melted for it.

I give a tiny nod, my eyes closing as his hand settles on my head.

Nikolaus does not say anything. Maybe he knows that if he does, I’ll remember to be embarrassed and sit up. Maybe he just doesn’t want to ruin it. Either way, his fingers move slowly through my hair, not combing exactly, just stroking from my forehead back toward the crown of my head, then down to the nape of my neck.

My body doesn’t relax fully, but some of the tension I’ve been carrying since the guard incident finally begins to loosen.

Nikolaus reaches for the remote with his other hand and turns on the television, muting it immediately before the sound can startle me. The screen fills the room with a soft blue glow. He scrolls through channels, apps, and menus like he’s searching for something specific. He passes by sports games and news broadcasts, stopping eventually on a cartoon.

A little animal character in a raincoat is talking to another little animal beside what looks like a treehouse. The sound is low when he unmutes it, gentle and cheerful, and so far removed from everything that just happened.

“Is this one alright?” he asks, his fingers lightly scratching at my scalp.

I nod against his thigh, not really ready yet to talk. He doesn’t make me, and sets the remote down.

The little animal on the screen trips into a puddle and gets back up laughing.

Nikolaus’s fingers travel lower, rubbing at the base of my skull. A shiver moves through me before I can hide it, and his touch slows before he repeats the same motion with more intention. He rubs my neck next, thumb pressing gently into the tight muscles there, then moves behind one ear.

The sound I make is tiny, barely anything, but the soothing touches don’t falter, and my captor doesn’t comment on it.

He only rubs behind my ear again, and my eyes burn because apparently, this is all it takes to make me want to crawl out of my own body. A warm lap, a cartoon, fingers behind my ears, and the knowledge that the men with guns are outside the door instead of inside the room, and if they tried to come back in, Nikolaus probably wouldn’t hesitate this time before pulling the trigger.

That should horrify me, and it does, but it somehow also makes my breathing easier, which I kind of hate.

The door opens after a few minutes, and I jolt so hard I nearly roll off the sofa.

Nikolaus catches me with one arm before I can fall, pulling me back onto him. “Easy.”

Constantine steps in, carrying a dark duffel bag, and freezes. His eyes flick to me, then Nikolaus, then the television. Something like understanding crosses his face, but he is smart enough not to say anything about the cartoon.

“Sorry,” he says quietly. “It’s me.”

My heart is still thudding.

Nikolaus’s hand settles heavily between my shoulder blades. “Bring the room service menu over, please.”

Constantine finds the leather-bound menu on the kitchen counter and brings it over without argument. Nikolaus takes it, then nudges my shoulder.

“Pick out something for your breakfast, baby.”