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Tears tighten my throat. I can hardly even remember the man in the mask. That’s why he gave me the shot in my neck. So I would forget. Who was it? Who was it, and what did they want to talk about?
I smell the snow. The road salt. I can feel the cruel, pervasive cold. I feel like I’m turning real to ghost and back again, as if I’m flickering as I stand here.
He already killed you.
I don’t even know where the words come from, but they make my chest feel tight, my body even less substantial. Suddenly, I just want Barrett. I need him.
I’m worried about making it down the ladder, but I go anyway. I hurry from the second floor to the first and find Barrett sitting in an armchair in front of the fire. He’s shirtless, in a pair of loose, black sweats.
As I near the bottom of the stairs, he springs up, lithe and gorgeous in the firelight, bounding over to me like…“a leopard,” I giggle.
“What?” He tilts his head and smiles, taking my hands.
“You remind me of a leopard.”
He gives me another handsome smile and squeezes my hands. “You seem to be feeling a little better.”
I nod, even though a mere moment ago, it wasn’t true. “I feel better when I’m with you.”
He kisses my cheek and cups my shoulder with his hand. I look at his face and notice that the beard is longer. Even though he’s smiling, his eyes look…tired? Or red? I can’t tell in the dim light. I wrap myself around him and he holds me against him. We sit in the chair, and as happy as I felt a moment ago, now my eyes start leaking.
“What did I miss?” I ask in a raspy voice.
His hands rub circles on my back. “Not much.”
I look around the room and notice a small glass on the table beside us, filled with amber liquid. I squint. Is that whiskey?
“Nothing happened? While I’ve been in zombie mode?”
“I missed you,” he says softly.
I look up at him and find his face looks tight, despite a small smile. “Are you upset?”
He cups my cheek. “I should be asking you that, Pig.”
I kiss his jaw, rubbing my lips over the little beard hairs. “That is not an answer,” I whisper.
I cut my gaze upward in time to see him blink. The way his face is frozen—it looks like he’s struggling to stay composed. He shuts his eyes and exhales.
So he’s upset. Well, of course he would be. Given his past… He probably has a hard time knowing that he couldn’t stop it.
“I love you.” I burrow my hands behind his back and draw my knees up, so I’m tight and cozy in his lap.
“I love you too,” he says a little roughly. The fire crackles. I watch his Adam’s apple bob along his throat. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there.”
“You didn’t know.”
He laughs dryly. “I bought a car.” He shakes his head.
“What?”
He blinks at me. “That’s where I was.”
“Can I see it?”
I’m out of his lap before he even answers. Barrett’s up behind me, chuckling as I dance around to make him laugh. We bound down the front porch steps like puppies, him catching my hand as our feet hit the dirt.
He turns slightly to the left and there, along the house’s side, I see a Jeep.
